They lay scattered, like breadcrumbs, along the reading pathways of my life-trails winding around books I love, stories I have lived and breathed as my own, authors whose words scale summits I aspire to reach. If you’d asked me then what my writing inspirations were, I might have opened up an archive box full of research materials-an eclectic collection of books (history, biology, philosophy, language, poetry, memoir), photocopies from archives and newspapers, travel notes and photographs, printouts from websites.Īll of the materials in that archive box were indeed inspirational, and indispensable, and they mean a great deal to me.īut now, reflecting on the novel I have written, I can recognise other inspirations-the kind that are less about the particularities of time and place, character and circumstance, and more about writing itself. In the conception and writing of Elemental-a period of more than five years-I was never conscious of having Tirra Lirra by the River in my head. Interesting choices? Read on to find out what’s behind these pairings. If you live in Australia, you can enter the giveaway by going to the Elemental Facebook page and clicking on the blue BOOK GIVEAWAY tab, centre alternatively, you can link directly by using the Facebook mobile app link. This month the Writers Ask Writers group is giving away a set of TWELVE books (value $300)-a copy of our most recent releases, plus a book we’ve each selected that has, in some way, inspired our own.

Tirra lirra by the river