Public speaking has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. This does not necessarily mean I enjoy it. I’ve always been reasonably introverted and having to get up and speak publicly is not something I willingly volunteer to do. But years of practice have meant I’ve developed the ability to manage presenting without falling into a nervous heap.
Giving book talks is part and parcel of being a writer, and to my surprise I am finding I am quite enjoying them.
My very first book launch was during COVID and like everything else at that time it was on Zoom. This was for ‘Winton, the Swann family history’ and a Zoom launch was quite fitting since I had family all over Australia and my audience came from all over.
Since then, my talks have always been to small groups such as at book launches, libraries, as an invited guest, radio interviews and to book clubs. I usually have a rough idea of what I am going to say but mostly I let the audience dictate where my talk is going to go. This leads to some interesting and very unexpected results.
Usually, I arrive early and try to meet people as they arrive, recording names so that I can use their name – not always successfully since I am woeful at remembering names and quite often end up calling someone the wrong name and then having to apologise profusely. I also try to find out a bit about attendees and what brought them to the talk. This enables me to direct what I say to their interests and make it a bit more personal.
This has led my talks in some very interesting directions! Following are a few examples.
I spoke about ‘The Memory Chest’ to a book club comprised mostly of former and current teachers. One of them asked how I plan my books and the sequencing of the plot. I had to admit that I don’t – especially with ‘The Memory Chest’ where I had completely changed it around half way through! Usually it is the events of the time that dictate my story line, and when I start writing a novel I have no idea where it is going to go, what is going to happen or where it is going to end. This was delivered to a shocked silence, to an audience that spend their life telling students to plan, draft and refine.
Another time I had been invited to do a radio interview and at the time was in the middle of writing ‘Nod to the Admiral’. As part of my research, I had spent several days prior to the interview researching, of all things, the introduction of septic tanks to Kalgoorlie as I had been hoping to incorporate that development into my story. In the middle of the interview the interviewer made the mistake of asking me about how I conduct my research. My eyes sparkled and I began: “Well, let me tell you about septic tanks….” He told me afterwards that was the last place he had expected that interview to go!
Sometimes it is not the subject but the process which ends up being the focus of the conversation. I was talking about ‘Women of Wolfram Camp’ to a group in Mareeba, but the conversation soon turned to the self-publishing process. Many of the audience were aspiring writers and wanted to know how it all worked. However, sometimes letting the audience lead means a talk can get hijacked. At an earlier launch of ‘Women of Wolfram Camp’, one of the audience members was also a local historian and the talk became more about her books than mine!
I will never forget one of the afternoon tea talks arranged by my cousin, Yvette. I gave a brief overview of many of my books, and when I came to ‘As I Remember It’, suddenly one of the women asked if the dentist in the book was Andrew Graebner – it was. Turns out she had worked for him. But then it got weirder. I also talked about ‘Glimpses of Jean’ and shared some of my memories of Jean’s Kalgoorlie home in Addis Street. This same woman looked with astonishment and asked what the house number was. I told her, and it turns out she had lived in the same house in her own childhood! Amazing coincidence.
Recently I launched ‘Last Coach to Quartz Hill’ in Georgetown about 400kms west of Cairns. The conversation turned to many of the historical events of the area and several of my audience turned out to be avid history buffs. We could have talked for hours. What really surprised me though, was that before the talk one of my cousins walked in to say hello, totally unexpectedly. When I was working the joke used to be that I had a relative in every town of Australia – so true!
I launched ‘Cossack Pearl’ in Karratha in 2025. The local library had organised quite a large group to attend. One was a woman who was a descendant of one of the characters in my book, which was a lovely touch. Another member of the audience was a woman I had worked with over twenty years beforehand and hadn’t seen since that time. It was quite a reunion.
‘The Sandalwood Cutter’ was launched at the Kalgoorlie Historical Society, and this was the first time I had returned to Kalgoorlie in over twenty years. Most of my audience turned out to be former friends and colleagues and it was more an evening of sharing memories than being about my book. It was a wonderful night!
So, each speaking event turns out to be quite unique in its own way. I love the interaction with potential readers and others who are interested for other reasons. I’m about to branch out and try a few writer’s festivals and such like so there are some new challenges ahead!
Before ending this, I must mention my ‘roadies’. In most cases my ‘roadies’ are family members who volunteer to help set up, manage sales, take photographs and carry boxes. There is also my friend Anne, who comes for long drives, helps set everything up and is a great companion. I could not do without them all!

Every day I receive upwards of twenty emails offering me marketing services. Usually, they are extremely long tirades of praise for ‘my book’ – rarely actually named – a detailed analysis of the gaps in my marketing, and then an offer to fix those gaps – at a cost.
I have learned to read through them all before deleting, because there have been a few genuine emails mixed into the pile, and this has been a valuable trick because I have learned much about what to expect.
Most of the generic emails are just feelers and instantly recognisable and don’t take too much time before I hit the delete button.
But the ones that do name one of my books take a little longer because at first glance they seem to be from a reader who has actually read the book.
I now recognise that the substance of the email is usually an AI-generated reworking of my blurb and biography. Long, elaborate sentences of praise are designed to make me feel good and respond positively, followed by detailed ‘analysis’ of my Goodreads and/or Amazon ‘followings’. The ‘hook’ is the offer of miraculous services to fix all of this.
The spammers have also discovered my website and are using the contact form in a similar manner. I began with a policy of responding to every contact form, as I felt it was only polite. Usually, I respond with a polite thank you for your comment and a ‘not interested’ for any services offered. They don’t give up though, as my response is often countered with a second attempt, and sometimes even a third.
I no longer respond to contact form emails that are not genuine questions or responses.
So, I was patting myself on the back for being pretty savvy about dealing with spam, until I fell, hook, line and sinker for a publishing fraud.
I received an email ostensibly from a publisher saying she had reviewed one of my books and was interested in having a discussion about publishing. Wow! That was unexpected. I googled the writer and her publishing company and all seemed to be quite genuine. So, I responded.
I received a reply saying that she would prefer to work through an agent and she even helpfully supplied a name. Being self-published, I didn’t have an agent, but as I had already been thinking about going down this route I started putting out some feelers. I even consulted a writers’ Facebook page asking about the process and sought advice about finding an Australian agent. I received several suggestions of helpful advice, mostly asking why I would want an Australian agent if the publisher was in New York. I thought about it, and had to agree, so I wrote to the agent the ‘publisher’ had suggested.
She was lovely. Extremely helpful, read a section of the manuscript and agreed that it should be taken further and re-published with a large publisher. I began to hope that, just maybe, my big break had finally arrived.
At this point, I began to feel that this had all been a bit too easy, and so I decided to do some more checking before proceeding any further. I emailed both the publishing company and the agent’s company, providing the email addresses I had been using and asking them to verify them.
Both were total frauds.
All my hopes and expectations came crashing down and I was grateful that I had not reached the point of signing any contracts or exchanging any money. Lessons learned!
My father used to say to me that if something was almost too good to be believed, then it probably wasn’t genuine. So true! I am now doubly cautious, of course, but still embarrassed at just how easily I was taken in. I still find it difficult to believe that there are people out there who spend their time deliberately trying to defraud people. This had been quite a lengthy process with several exchanges of emails and we weren’t even close to formalising any sort of arrangement, so the fraudsters were obviously in for both the game and the long haul, willing to put time and effort into reeling me in.
So, I remain self-published with obvious gaps in my marketing, still receiving copious emails from spammers who just do not give up.