Hi Annie, and welcome to All the World’s a Page. Thanks for visiting and sharing some of the inspiration for your wonderful Porter sisters series. I’ve read and loved each of them, and a big part of my enjoyment is how clearly you evoke the different landscapes of Australia. I feel as though I am in each environment.

1. What initially drew you to the Kimberleys in Western Australia?

We were planning our winter trip a couple of years ago (still in our trusty canvas camper trailer in those days) and we looked at the map and decided to go somewhere new. I’d had a vague idea about a diamond theft as a plot and when we discovered we could fly into the Argyle diamond mine on a day tour, that decided us on our destination.

You visited the Argyle diamond mine as part of your research for Diamond Sky.  Did the story idea change at all when you saw the mine first-hand?

The story idea developed from my original intention. Seeing the mine first-hand, and seeing how the security worked, deepened my understanding of the process, and helped me to write accurately. Some of the more interesting points: if you are at the mine as a tourist, you are not allowed to bend down to pick up anything from the ground. So if you drop your pen, your tissue or your keys, you have to tell the guide. Do NOT bend down!
Apparently the biggest diamond found at Argyle mine was lying on the ground and was discovered embedded in a truck tyre! 

​Your descriptions of landscape are filled with sensory details. Do you make extensive notes during your research trips? How do you recall and recreate these details for your readers?

 I take very limited notes when we travel, but I do try to write the occasional travel blog.  I do find that when I revisit my handwritten notes, most of the time I can’t read my writing!
So I keep a photographic journal. Hundreds and hundreds of photos each trip. Those photos then comprise a pivotal part of my writing day as I put the words down, sometimes up to a year after the research trip. The photographs bring the sensory details back to me. The feel of the air on my skin, the smell of the landscape, the heat and the gritty dust all form a part of my character’s response to the landscape they are in.
A taster for you below, I can still hear the plovers mournful cry as I write this!
This time he kept his eyes on the scrub at the edge of the road as he pulled over. On his right to the west, flat saltpans broken only by clumps of mangroves glinted in the late afternoon sun, stretched as far as he could see. The salt flats were dry white cracked mud, so vast it created a mirage; the Cockburn ranges bordered them to the south, incredibly tall, brilliant orange sandstone rising to over six hundred metres. The occasional derelict and abandoned boat lay in the mangroves and the only movement were plovers scurrying across the tidal flats in search of food. A fragment of memory tugged at him; how did he know they were called plovers? 
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Diamond Sky takes us to Dubai. Tell us how your experience of this place enriched your story. 

​I visited Dubai as a stopover on the way to Europe last year with the express intention of experiencing the heat, smelling the smells of the city and the desert, and seeing the Ain (where Dru works in Dubai) in person. When I was writing the scenes in Dubai, it transported me back to the city... and the Dubai Mall where of course, I had to research the shopping. When you read Diamond Sky, you will see there is a scene or two set there. One of the best places I visited, and I wrote a couple of scenes there, was the amazing palm Jumeirah Hotel where there is an aquarium in the restaurant. Thirty-three thousand fish and guest divers as you eat!

Finally, and you knew I’d be asking this! What’s your favourite photo and favourite memory from this trip? 

My favourite memory is the diamond shopping, and the pink diamond that my dear husband bought me for a significant birthday while we were in the Kimberley. ​

 
Thanks for having me, Susanne. I hope your readers enjoy reading Diamond Sky as much as I enjoyed the research and the writing.
Annie

To purchase your copy of Diamond Sky, click on the link below:

​http://www.annieseaton.net/diamond-sky.html 
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The series ... 

Thanks for chatting with us today, Annie. I know how busy you are with two books releasing within a week of each other, and you're presenting a workshop at the Winton Outback Writers Festival this week. Great timing! And congratulations on the release of Her Outback Cowboy. 
 
Blurb: The last thing advertising art director Lucy Bellamy wants is to go home to the Outback, but duty to family calls. At least there’s one bonus—her first love, sexy cowboy neighbour, Garth Mackenzie, is there and the attraction between them is still explosive. But Lucy has no intention of getting stuck in this two-bit town and she counts down the days until she can go back to her real life. 
After an engineering degree and working in the mines of Western Australia, Garth has returned to the Outback and is home to stay. His goal is to settle down, start a family, and work his beloved land with the girl he’s always loved. But if it comes to Lucy choosing between the glamour of the city or making a home with him in the Outback—he’d lose, hands down.

1. 1. Where did the idea for Her Outback Cowboy come from? Sitting around a campfire in the Pilliga Scrub quite a few years ago, I listened to the story of how the owners of the huge wheat and cattle property met and fell in love. It was in the days before I started writing, but the romance of their story stayed with me. A beautiful girl from Central London, meeting her very own outback cowboy, finding true love and following him back to the outback of New South Wales, and making a happy life and family together.​  In Her Outback Cowboy, that story became the back story of the grandparents of the four cousins who are summoned home. I loved including about Helena and Harry’s romance from many years ago, knowing it was based on a true story.
2. There are four books planned for this series. What connects them?  The four cousins and their journey to love in the outback
3. There are numerous differences in language between Australia and America. The use of ‘cowboy’, an American term, in the title is an obvious difference. Given this is an Australian setting with Australian characters, what factors determine the language ‘choices’ you have to make?  The language choices have been very interesting. As my US publisher is keen to make this an authentic Aussie ‘outback’ romance, they have opted to go for British spelling. As the books have been edited, the differences in vocabulary and perception has become very obvious to em. The common ones like ranch/farm/ property are to be expected, as well as cowboy/ station hand but there have been other phrases that the US editor did not understand. A good example is a phrase I included that something was ‘too good to knock back.’ The US editor said that would be interpreted as drinking hard liquor!
4. ‘Prickle Creek’ is a delightful location name. What does the name promise in terms of the overall series?  Prickle Creek is the name of Helena and Harry’s farm and each of the cousin’s stories will be based at this location.
5. What is the inspiration for the setting? Do you have photos of ‘Prickle Creek’?  I do! The photos that I have included were taken at the property (note not ranch!) where the book was researched and where the lovely romance of the 1970s  with the English rose and her outback cowboy actually occurred.
6. Can you give us a sneak peak at book 2 in the series? Whose story will feature?  Book 2 is Liam’s story. Journalist Liam comes home from London and unexpectedly comes across his former girlfriend in the very last place he expects to see her. Book 2, at this stage called Her Outback Christmas will be out on 9th October.