Bellarine trio launches crime novella

THREE Bellarine authors have come together to publish a crime novella, written over more than a decade.

Jacqui Connor, Jenny Macaulay and Pearl Wilson collaborated on the piece, Argyle: One Island, Four Voices, a project that started out as a way of seeing if they could do it.

Set off the coast of Victoria, the novella is about a fictional lighthouse on an island, moving across a century of lighthouse keepers, families and visitors.

Ms Wilson said it’s been an interesting experience and the collaboration was tricky in the beginning.

“It was fun doing the research but when we actually created the characters we had to link them in some way, but that was probably the best part of writing together.”

Each author researched and wrote about a period of time, linking the characters with different objects left at the lighthouse.

The project was almost finished when the COVID pandemic hit and they set it aside for three years before picking it up again last year.

“I think having been locked down during the pandemic gave us a real insight to what isolation feels like and that’s written about a lot in the book,” Ms Wilson said.

“There were some parts that were tweaked because of it, but it is a crime novella, that’s the genre, so there is a bit of crime in there.”

The cover of the book was illustrated by author and artist Jenny Macaulay who also drew a map of the island, showing where the characters were and where there was a murder.

The three authors will be taking their novella to the Boronggook Drysdale Library on November 20 and to Marli’s Bar on November 28 to talk about the collaboration.