Sandi Wallace – Jenn J McLeod – small-town storyteller

#Write Round Oz is dropping into Sandi Wallace in the enchanting Dandenong Ranges in Victoria.

Sandi, thank you for letting me park my rig on your …

… drive? Hmm, it’s a bit tight. Am I going to knock over a rhododendron or two on my way out?

Oh, I hope not, Jenn! I’m rather attached to my rhododendrons.

Oh! Oops about the rhododendrons but what’s that I see written on your ‘welcome mat’, Sandi?

Enter at own risk. Crazy writer lives here.

I miss my HUGE refrigerator. If I looked in your refrigerator right now, what would I find?

I’ll go check… Phew, lots of healthy stuff (I’m a personal trainer in my ‘other’ life) and uh-oh, a couple of things well past their use-by.

Downsizing my life into a 24 ft caravan meant leaving lots of things behind in boxes. What (or who!!) would you have trouble leaving behind if you took off in a caravan?

It might be cosy with my hubby, dog, two cats, and me, but I couldn’t leave any of my family behind. Out of the household items, I’d probably miss my lovely big bookcases the most.

Do you REALLY have room at your house to park a fifth wheeler caravan and do you mind visitors? Oh, sorry, you don’t have to answer that one!! 🙂

If you can’t get the van up our curving drive, you can park on the verge out front and you’re very welcome, just let me know in advance. 😉

Country curiosities…

My latest novel, Season of Shadow and Light, has a strong horse theme. (I love what horses can teach us). If you were an animal what would you be?

I love horses too, although I haven’t been riding in a long time. I’d be a horse or a cat. I’d choose horse on one of my energetic, ‘I want to be outside and free days’, cat when I’m feeling lazy, ready for a snooze in a sunny nook of the house. That pretty much sums up my active and sedentary/personal trainer and author personality split!

You’re cooking and your food is going up against the best cooks from the CWA (Country Women’s Association). What would be your winning dish?

I do a mean spaghetti! Look out lovely ladies at the CWA.

(Ooooooh! CWA ladies everywhere are quivering in fear!!!!!)

About you…

What is the hardest part of writing for you?

I can fall into the trap of thinking too far ahead and need to work on focusing on the ‘right now’.

If someone was to write your biography, what do you think the title should be?

The Armchair Detective

Favourite four…

Favourite four characters in my book Tell Me Why: John Franklin (he’s a maverick cop, so just flawed enough, and looks lovely in and out of his blue uniform), Georgie Harvey (far from perfect and never boring, I love this gutsy woman), Pam Stewart (she’s a bit naughty and would make a brilliant grandmother) and Franklin’s daughter, Kat (a chocolate box without descriptions, she brings back good and bad memories – sorry, Mum! – of being fifteen-going-on-twenty-five).

Favourite place in Australia: Home (in the Dandenong Ranges), Daylesford, Harrietville and other country towns – we tend to swap one hill (home) for another on our holidays.

Favourite holiday destination: Country Victoria but I’d like to do a little overseas travelling with my hubby one day.

Favourite movie: I’m hooked on crime movies but can’t re-watch them too often because the plot stays too fresh in my mind. The movies I tend to see repeatedly are rom-coms like The Holiday and Love Actually. Who doesn’t love a bit of romance?

(*snap* my fave movies too – along with Dirty Dancing, of course!)

Favourite quote: What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

If I said to you, “Just entertain me for five minutes, I’m not going to talk,” what would you do?

I’d ask, ‘Tell me why?’ We’d chuckle. I’d wink, then talk about my book Tell Me Why and how it came to be published.

And I’d say… Tell Me More, Sandi Wallace!

Tell Me Why is book one in my Rural Crime Files series and my debut novel. I’m pretty stoked to have achieved step one in a lifelong dream to be the writer of a crime series and standalone books. It is an authentic, gritty, rural crime story with a touch of romance and stars Franklin and Harvey. They will return in book two, Black Saturday, which will be released later this year.

Give us the blurb.

Picturesque Daylesford has a darker side.

Melbourne writer Georgie Harvey heads to the mineral springs region of central Victoria to look for a missing farmer. There she uncovers links between the woman’s disappearance and her dangerous preoccupation with the unsolved mystery surrounding her husband.

Maverick cop and solo dad John Franklin is working a case that’s a step up from Daylesford’s usual soft crime; a poison-pen writer whose targets are single mothers.

Georgie’s investigation stirs up long buried secrets and she attracts enemies. When she reports the missing person to the local cops, sparks fly between her and Franklin. Does he dismiss the writer too quickly?

A country cop, city writer, retired farmer and poison-pen stalker all want answers.

What will they risk to get them?

What will be the ultimate cost?

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WIN a print (signed) copy of Tell Me Why.

We are looking for the funniest or best response to: ‘Senior Constable John Franklin has just flashed the strobes and whooped the siren on the marked four-wheel drive. He is waving you over to the verge. What have you done?’

Winner announced here, on the blog in two weeks. Australian postal addresses only.