So I’ve been discovering ‘Little Lon’, an inner city area in Melbourne between Lonsdale and Latrobe streets, and Exhibition and Spring. It was a ‘slum area’ filled with brothels, opium dens, and ‘larrikins’. You can be sure it’ll make it into the novel, somehow. Here is Bennett’s Lane, which is just out of little Lon, […]
Read more +Because I’m addicted, I can’t help but put up some more photos I’ve found in my research. Click in them if you want to see larger versions. Queens St, around the 1880s. Collins st, in 1865 (early, huh!) The Federal Coffee Building, which I just can’t get enough of. The Deaf and Dumb Asylum, in […]
Read more +So to give an idea of just how steampunk-y Melbourne really was in the 1880s/1890s, I offer up some of my recent discoveries, photo-wise. Here is Victoria’s Coffee Palace on Collins St, right next to the Town Hall. Look at those beautiful balconies. Here is a shot of Elizabeth St, looking north from Flinders St […]
Read more +So I’m neck-deep in researching and writing my Australian steampunk novel. Truth is, the research has been distracting me a bit from the writing, because it’s just so interesting. Also, I’ve become a little obsessional with getting the details right, which is odd considering the book is, by its very nature, alternate history. This does […]
Read more +My new book – the one I’m writing after Unwrapped Sky‘s sequel The Stars Askew – is a steampunk novel set in Australia. The world is an 1890s version of my noir 1950s steampunk story ‘Int. Morgue. Night.’ Here’s a bit from the synopsis I’ve written. The 1890s in an Australia both strange and familiar: […]
Read more +Recently I received a third review, which was fairly devastating, and I may yet share it. In the meantime, there’s been a fourth, lengthy review by bookaneer (Carly) over here. Here are a couple of sections from it. My favourite aspect of the book was the worldbuilding. The sheer breadth of imagination is staggering; the […]
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