Fortunes Up For Book Folk Down Under

SYDNEY - March 2, 2014 - PRLog -- Monday, 3rd March 2014

Whether it is the slick inner city of Sydney’s Paddington and Lavender Bay, the Blue Mountains or the central desert regions, Australian fiction writers are drawing on the wide natural and social diversity of their land in books that it seems customers can’t get enough of, reports Erik Empson, co-founder of London based ebook publisher Not So Noble Books.

“I think it is a generational thing. We grew up with an image of Australia as a wild beyond, and writers like Antonia Marlowe and Kerry Northe really draw out the depth of its heritage, whether in the form of the native spirits of Uluru, the rainforests or the vast desert. Their books are proving really popular.”

The desert is central to the smoky hot romance HOT SET by New Zealand born Kerry Northe who recalls its “colours, smells, light, dry heat, horrendous flies and raw ancientness” vividly and which made it a perfect place to set her story. For Kerry:

“When the concept of HOT SET was developing, the desert was the most obvious choice as a setting to encourage an illicit romance between Rhys and Kate. Emotions become tangible when meeting the three ageless monoliths of Uluru (Ayres Rock), Kata Tjuta (The Olgas) and Artilla (Mr Conner) and it’s so easy to transfer such strong sentiment to another person in this environment. Life becomes both short and long out here and it sets a fire under a writer’s imagination.”

Residents of the Daintree might not be so pleased the Antonia Marlowe chose that ‘steamy and primitive’ location for a murder in her futuristic murder mystery STRANGE BODIES set in Australia in 2067. But inspiration for the book certainly came from the walking trails in the Blue Mountains and its steep scenic railway. This is an excerpt from her book:

“...a tiny pocket of temperate rainforest, with tall spindly gum trees, palms, acacias and massive tree-ferns forming a canopy that filtered much of the sunlight. The shaded floor was dense with small ferns, weeds and leaf litter, and the rocks and fallen trees were covered with mosses and lichens. The sharp crack of a whip bird's call reverberated in the still air.”

Whilst set in a future Australia, portrayed as an oasis in a world beset by climate change, political upheaval and corruption, STRANGE BODIES draws on Marlowe’s beloved Sydney and its current vibrancy, style and industry is well reflected in this excellent work of suppositional fiction.

Not So Noble Books is proud to publish and promote original work by authors that draw on their environment to produce fiction of the highest standard. And they will be on the eye out for more talent from the Land of Oz.

To arrange an interview with the authors or find out more about Not So Noble Books, get in touch by email or sign up to get notifications from us on twitter and facebook. Review copies of the ebooks and images are available on request, and we are happy to consider blog tours etc.

Get in touch at www.radicaleyes.it/notsonoblebooks

HOT SET is available from amazon: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00I545VUC/

As a thank you to their growing worldwide readership Not So Noble Books is making HOT SET available as a free download from 2^nd March to 6^th March inclusive.

STRANGE BODIES is available from amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GJ77EUM/

SAMPLE BLOG POST BY KERRY NORTHE

NATURAL INSPIRATION FOR HOT SET

Budding writers are often told to write about what they know. The Hot Set series is exactly that.

Australia, being uniquely an island, country and continent, elicits prose from the most hardened soul and no landscape more so than the majestic, mystical Central Australian desert. I visited as a teenager and even after the passing of twenty years, the colours, smells, light, dry heat, horrendous flies and raw ancientness has been embedded into my psyche. When the concept of Hot Set was developing, the desert was the most obvious choice as a setting to encourage an illicit romance between Rhys and Kate. Emotions become tangible when meeting the three ageless monoliths of Uluru (Ayres Rock), Kata Tjuta (The Olgas) and Artilla (Mr Conner) and it’s so easy to transfer such strong sentiment to another person in this environment. Life becomes both short and long out here and it sets a fire under a writer’s imagination.

In complete contrast, Sydney has also been showcased. Being a Sydney resident, it was not hard to describe my city and each scene was set in a place I know. For those that come to Australia’s largest city, the beautiful harbour with its iconic Harbour Bridge, Opera House and busy yellow ferries must be seen. However, I purposely portrayed Sydney as I (and Kate) see it; a place of work, of traffic and of industry. Still, every resident needs to play ‘tourist’ as often as possible because there is so much natural beauty to immerse oneself into. To the west are the awe-inspiring, sheer cliffs of the Blue Mountains and to the east, famous golden beaches like Bondi; to the north, the rugged sandstone escarpments are sliced by an enormous river and to the south are rolling, fertile highlands that saw the establishment of some of Australia’s earliest towns.

And, underpinning all of this is the Indigenous people who convey the stories of Dreamtime. Aboriginal culture and belief lives within the land, celebrating and honouring ‘Country’ as a protector and provider. You can experience the ancient land of the early inhabitants just by stepping into a gum-filled bush and opening your ears, by feeling the low melancholy notes of a didgeridoo and seeing the stripes of ochre on sun-roughened skin.

Australia is all of this; city, desert, culture, water, life and agelessness. It’s truly an honour to be able to represent this amazing country as a writer and resident. I enjoy the challenge to do it justice.