Babinda magic

The heat shimmers on the road as I drive south. The sugar cane in the fields is all newly planted and the stacks at the sugar mills stand silent guard over their domains. The sky’s turned pale blue as though the light is too bright for it.  Summer has arrived. In North Queensland the razorback Continue reading


Perfecting the pitch?

Sadly my singing voice is definitely in retirement and my flute is unlikely to ever be pitch perfect again so I’m not talking ‘perfecting the pitch’ in a musical sense… Today I’m over at the Romance Writers of Australia blog talking about my journey from pitch to publication. RWA is running a series of interviews Continue reading


Where do writers write?

At the Queensland Writers Centre in the Queensland State Library of course! After the shock of landing from Cairns to find the temperature was 17 degrees on Friday, with a wind chill factor taking it even lower, I have to give Brisbane credit for turning on a glorious spring day yesterday. As I walked over Continue reading


Featured in The Weekend Australian

Cold War thriller sparks novel approach BY:MY FAVOURITE NOVEL – HELENE YOUNG From:The Australian October 06, 2012 12:00AM John Le Carre’s classic novel The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. CHOOSE one favourite book? That’s too difficult. I’ve lost count of my favourites across the years.   I can however, share a book that changed Continue reading


Hello? Is this working?

Well now isn’t this fun! Helene’s crook in bed with a dreaded summer cold (kept me awake half the night coughing and carrying on. You don’t see dogs behaving like that…sniff..) Anyway, the thing is she left her computer turned on and within easy reach. Seems typing isn’t as hard as I thought it would Continue reading


The Life and Times of Chester Lewis

Today I’m over chatting to Steve at Aus Lit about the integrated short-stories which form The Life and Times of Chester Lewis. When Steve invited me to be part of the project I had no idea what the end result would be. I hadn’t written short stories since high school but I was up for Continue reading


Contracted to a new life!

Phew! What a week! It’s taken me until today to get my feet back on the ground and life sort of back in control. Champagne all round 🙂 Penguin Australia will be publishing my fourth book – title something like  ‘Dangerous Truth’-  in July next year. I’m looking forward to seeing where Ali Watts will Continue reading


Island time

It’s inevitable when you work in aviation that aircraft will have mechanical issues and delays will occur. Most airline pilots will find themselves stuck in a noisy terminal waiting for the engineers to work their magic. Where I work it’s a little more exciting than that! We had a five hour delay on Horn Island Continue reading


RuBYs and Diamonds

I’m exhausted, I’m uplifted, I’m smiling, I’m suffering brain overload, I’m inspired and I’m finally home. That can mean only one thing – I’ve been to the RWA Diamonds Are Forever conference on the Gold Coast. Every year it gets better and this was no exception. The fact a professional organistation like RWA is run Continue reading