Speaker 0:28

Welcome back to Kill City, where Australian crime fiction is our MO. And today we're talking to Dinuka McKenzie. Hi Dinuka, thanks very much for joining.

Speaker 2 0:38

Hello, Leigh and Helen.

Speaker 0:40

And I should say I've been a very big fan of yours ever since the torrent first came out, so this is a real treat for me today to chat to you.

Speaker 1 0:48

Hi Dinuka, it's so lovely to meet you. Now, if it's okay with you, just for our listeners, I'm going to start off with a quick snapshot of your background. Because you've actually packed a lot into your life even before coming one of Australia's most exciting crime writers. Now, I believe you were born in Sri Lanka and moved to Australia with your family when you were about 12. These days you're based in Southern Sydney and writing full-time, running writers' workshops, doing crime fiction manuscript assessments and mentorships for the Australian Society of Authors, and generally just being a powerhouse in Australian crime fiction. But before that, you were working as an environmental planner. Now, again, I think you did lots of writing in that job, but it was sort of regulations and reports and not writing about bodies and suspects. And as you said, you didn't step into creative writing until after you had your two young kids when you were juggling work and parenting, and I think you wanted something that was just yours. And that just yours project became your first creative writing manuscript, The Torrent, and that won the 2020 HarperCollins Banjo Prize. Now, this is just an amazing achievement because it's the first their first national prize for unpublished commercial fiction across all genres. Now, from there, you built the Kate Miles series, a procedural featuring Detective Kate Miles, a female detective navigating regional policing, messy cases, and the chaos of motherhood. Now the torrent was actually published in Australia in February 2022. The second in the series Taken followed in February 2023. And then Tipping Point arrived in January 2024. And I must say, very satisfying alliteration. Thank you. Now you've stepped into a whole new lane with your first standalone psychological thriller, She Lied First, which was released in July this year, which I can't wait to dive into in a bit later. So welcome.

Speaker 2 2:47

Hello, thank you so much for having me. That was an incredible introduction. Wow, I need to take you to all my events so you can you can introduce me like that. You've just answered my first three questions, yes. Those first three questions that I normally get. You've just like, yep. You've done that. That's amazing. Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 3:06

Well, no, thank you very much for joining us. Um we're we're really raped to have you on the show. So um let's perhaps jump into where it all began, the torrent. So this was your Banjo Prize winner and the book that introduced us to Detective Sergeant Kate Miles. Um, to let people know a bit about the setup, the torrent drops Kate into two cases at once. A fast food robbery that hits quite close to home and a drowning during the summer flood that doesn't quite fit right. She's heavily pregnant, she's exhausted, and she's trying to keep her family and her job from collapsing at the same time. It's a procedural, but it's really grounded. Um there's real pressures, and I'll talk about that a little bit later on. Um, real stakes and you know, no superhero cop stuff. So when you wrote that first draft, like how did you learn the ropes? Was it self-taught? Did you pick other writers' brains, or did you just sort of, you know, sort of go for broke from the start?

Speaker 2 4:00

Yeah, um, I mean, I guess it was very instinctual, I guess, at that stage, because I genuinely didn't know what I didn't know. Um, I think as Helen mentioned, you know, I hadn't really grown up wanting to write per se. It was never sort of ever in the life plan. It I I I honestly I don't think I ever growing up, even though I was a huge reader and I and I read voraciously, it never occurred to me to think about who was writing those books. Like it never occurred to me to think of writing as a career or like who was behind the book. So I I I always just dived into the story and that was pretty much it. So I never thought beyond that. So really, when I started writing, um, as you said, Helen, you know, it was exactly that. You know, I had my bubs and then I just needed a place or or a means by which to process what I was going through, and that happened to be, you know, writing. You know, I I found great relief in that because it was an escape, you know, so it wasn't real life. Like in the books, technically, you could like kill people and they yay, and they would, you know, they would die. Um, or you could tell a child to be quiet and the child was quiet. Amazing, you know, that would never happen in real life. So, you know, so it was an escape, but it was also processing what I was going through. So, so so it was really helpful for me. But in terms of sort of the craft side, I genuinely had no idea in the sense that I, you know, it was such a new thing to me. I I just started doing it for myself. So I didn't really actually even know that things like writer centers existed or writing groups existed or manuscript assessors existed. Like I genuinely was not in the writing community in any way, shape, or form. Uh I wasn't even on social media, so I I really was I was just doing that thing by myself for myself. It wasn't for the purposes of getting published, it was really for for me. Um and and I and I think I just, you know, I think Leigh, you mentioned that this story had those two kind of storylines, and that's what really helped me because it was sort of like what I tried to do is okay, each chapter I tried to focus on one of those storylines, and that kind of got me through because each chapter I went, okay, well, this this is focusing on the sort of the robbery side, or this is focusing more on the flood side, and it just kind of gave me a sort of basic structure to to um to get through the novel type thing. Uh, but uh uh beyond that I really don't think I had much of a structure apart from the sheer you know, whatever foundation of knowledge I had absorbed by reading, you know, by by by reading crime fiction, you know, having been a fan of it and having particularly being fan of sort of detective fiction, having somehow absorbed that into my brain as well a detective naturally would have to look into X, Y, and Z will have naturally have to, you know, look at suspects or you know, whatever that that sort of invest you know, investigative kind of natural pathway a detective would take. I just meandered the way through that um and and somehow got to the end.

Speaker 7:24

That um that is amazing. Like that is actually incredible. So once you had that first draft done, did you have like you would have had this moment, oh I've actually written a book. So what happened what happened next? Like um what was the story from it being a completed first draft uh and then being published?

Speaker 2 7:46

Yeah, I mean, just to be clear, it was a very crap first draft. I mean, like, you know, just to be very clear on this, that it was it was words on a page. I wouldn't I it was nowhere near being, you know, what the published version was. So so from then at at that point, exactly as you said, Leigh, you know, you once you write, once you have the 90,000 words or 80,000 words, whatever it was, on the page, you suddenly go, oh, well, maybe it can be something, maybe it is something, maybe it can be more than just my own sort of um my own therapy or whatever, you know, whatever it is I was trying to do. Um, and maybe it can be a book. So so then, yes, that was then the first step that I took to going, okay, well, what's actually outside of myself, what's out there? And so I basically just googled and I found out that actually in my local area there was a um writers' festival, so it's called Writers Unleashed, Sutherland Shire Writers Festival. Uh, and part of one of the things that they had as part of that writers festival was the opportunity to to pitch to a uh to you know publishers and agents. Um, and it wasn't so much a in my head that oh I was gonna get anywhere, but it did give me a deadline, so it gave me like okay, uh, you know, August that year, I would I'm gonna try and complete a full sort of draft buy, and so have something ready. So I did pitch to that, and of course it went nowhere, obviously. I mean it was a challenge. Like it was absolute vomit draft stuff, and I was already pitching it. I mean, this is this is how much I didn't know about the industry. Um and then from that point on, so that would have been what was that? That was 2018, I'm gonna say, I think. Um, yeah, because I started writing it sort of 2017, so I'm gonna say, yeah, something, something like that. Um, or maybe even a little bit earlier than that. But basically, then I started actually getting serious about it and actually started doing some online courses and started to like actually revise the thing, um, you know, and and edit it. And then I I was very lucky enough to win. Actually, I think this this happened in twenty uh 2018. I was lucky enough to win a um a um a prize with a firm press, so they ran a competition called The Perfect Prime, and I think from memory was the first 5,000 words. Um anyway, so I submitted it and I and and I won this mentorship with them for an entire year, and that is that was the game changer for me. Where because that that was an actual publishing professional giving me professional advice on like this is still making, you know, and and I basically went through two revisions with them or two rounds of edits with them, and at the end of it, they passed on the manuscript, um, which was devastating for me because I went through, you know, one, you kind of won something, and so in my head, like, oh, I have this opportunity if I'm able to, you know, make something of it. And so at the end of it, when they passed, it was like, oh, I've like, this was the one opportunity I was gonna get. I've wrecked it already. You know what I mean? So it's devastating. Um, but then you pick yourself up, and and and they I absolutely think that that that professional editorial work that happened through that process was where I kind of learned the difference between writing a draft, you know, just just putting that vomit draft together versus you know what a draft needs to be needs to look like to submit to or draft that you know, what shape it needs to be to go to a reader, do you know what I mean? I mean it still obviously wasn't there, but you know, like that kind of m it's so much, it's such a different thing to write for a reader compared to just to write for yourself, you know, and I and so that was a that was a lesson. Um and then the next thing I learned, the next thing I was lucky enough to get was a mentorship with the amazing um Emma Biskic, who's uh who's you know, um uh Melbourne crime writer who obviously writes the incredible Caleb Zelic series. Um and yeah, and so she um did this thing um on Twitter at the time, which remember when Twitter was good? Yes, well remember when that was that was a thing? Yes.

Speaker 1 12:13

Hold other hold other lights. I know though.

Speaker 2 12:15

I know it feels like yeah, I don't know, anyway, yeah, anyway. There was a time when Twitter was good, but and yeah, and so she did this amazing thing on Twitter where she would uh basically she put a tweet out going, um, I'm gonna give you free sort of um like review three three chapters of a of a of a you know work in progress um and and give you feedback. So, you know, so submit to me. So of course I submitted, of course it's Emma Bizcch. Uh and she chose my manuscript and uh and because she's Emma Bizkic and she's so incredibly generous, um, rather than just reading the first three chapters, she actually read the whole manuscript. Uh, and she was incredible and again gave me incredible feedback, and and so I revised it again based on her feedback, and I and I remember like talking to her on the phone, and she was telling me this this first chapter is not working, this is not something that's gonna hook anyone, you need to change it. Um, and so I and then we were actually chatting about a potential alternate scene that that that you know that that book would start with. And whilst talking to her on the phone, I was like, Oh, what if we start at the actual flood? Like, what if that's that's what you that's what you begin at? And she was like, Yeah, that would hook me in. Why didn't she write that? And I went, okay. And so I wrote that, and that's literally the first chapter that was submitted to the Banjo Prize, um, and then has ended up, you know, um being in the first chapter of the torrent. So so I would say that it was a long road, but it was also a lot of help from actual people in the industry who are so incredibly generous with their time and their feedback. Um, and um, and yeah, and then me just revising, revising, revising. Um, and then yeah, and then finally it went into the um Banjo Prize, and yeah. And then I won 2020, even though everybody else lost 2020. I won 2020. Yeah, I got the Banjo Prize um win uh that year, yes.

Speaker 14:17

Wow, that is incredible. Um, and then so when it comes out, so your your first book's out in the world, what changed? Like, um, what did those first few months look like after it came out?

Speaker 2 14:29

I mean it was it was excruciating to be honest. I mean, I I I think looking back, I really think I should have enjoyed it more, but at the time it was absolutely excruciating because um I you know I mean that that that imposter syndrome is real and and not you know, like as I said, like if you if just just going through that story, like I went from JoePlo, environmental planner, to like an absolute random person, to like overnight, you know, having the tag of a prize winner, and that really made me shrink, and it made me just uh like absolutely shrink from my skin into myself because I went, well, you know, in my head I thought if this gets published, it'll get published, we'll get going to bookshop and yeah, I'll go and see it, and yeah, that will be the end of it. Like that, yeah, I've done it, right? But then when it comes out with like a tagline of prize winning, then like suddenly the expectations are much higher, right? And then what if I don't meet those expectations? Like, what if the person like, I got this this freaking won a prize? Like in what universe? You know, you know, like because but that's what runs through your mind because I've never done this before. I didn't, you know, I basically I think I joined Twitter in 2019 in order to take writing more seriously, started following writers, and and that's how I kind of build a network. So so it was it was still all extremely new to me and very sort of um yeah, nerve-wracking. Um so I don't, I don't I I probably I had very little memory of what happened in that debut year, you know, because I was too busy sort of being like, yeah, just so scared of everything that it had finally happened, but it was, you know, um, yeah, it it it felt very scary. Um but but you know, and but then as with everything, you slowly get used to it, um, and and with the second and third book out, um, you sort of sink into your role as okay, I maybe I could do maybe, maybe I could do it. It changes day by day.

Speaker 1 16:43

I think it's like you said though, I mean nobody tells you how to do it, how to be an author, do they? It's it's something you really have to find for yourself. And it sounds fantastic that you had people like Hem Emma and the prizes and things, activities that you had to get there, but there's no sort of follow-by-numbers kind of way to do it, is there?

Speaker 2 17:01

Everyone sort of follows their own path and kind of yeah, no, no, exactly just as you said, Helen, I mean I think it's the one of the it's the loveliest part about the industry in the sense that that literally means that everyone can do it, in the sense that, you know, as long as you you do what works for you and you have that persistence and you're able to take feedback and you, you know, so you are able to because there's like a million one ways to become an author, just as there's, you know, million one, you know, people in in that sense. So but it's also the craziest thing because it it's also the scariest thing because, yeah, there isn't, you know, like a formula to follow in that sense, you know. Um and I think that and and and genuinely like it is hard every single time, or certainly it is for me, because each time you're coming back to that blank page, and it's honestly feels like whatever success or whatever lessons you learn. And I mean, obviously, you know, you're taking on those lessons left, but but it still feels like oh it's day one, and you still have to produce the 90,000 words, and it and it's still just as sort of excruciating. I I find the first draft stage the hardest. Um, I I know there's a lot of writers who kind of can do that really quick first draft. I am not one of those people. It takes me an excruciatingly long time to produce that first draft, and from that point on I'm happy to work on it and revise it, and and that's kind of um then I have a product to work with, but getting the product to work with is is the the longest.

Speaker 1 18:39

I know, and we we never get to know this as readers because I um Leigh's been a big fan of yours since the start, whereas I sort of came to your books a lot later. So, but I love the series because I got to binge all three really quickly, so I didn't know that all the time and blood, sweat, and tears you've gone into it. For me, it's like wow, she just produces this amazing series. And um, yes, it was like easy peasy. So, you know, to understand what it's like underneath, it just gives it a whole different perspective. So all kudos to you. So taken the second novel. So now in this one, um Kate's only back from maternity leave after three months, I think, which is goodness gracious, that's short. I think that took more than a year and stall, didn't really want to go back. Um she's got a newborn at home, she's pretty much exhausted, which is very typical of new mums. Um, money's tight because her partner's out of work, and there's a corruption scandal brewing that might just include her dad. So she's pretty much under the pump before the case even begins. And then what she's actually thrown into is a missing child investigation. A three-year-old boy who disappears from his home while his mum's asleep. Now, this one is incredibly tense, um, and one of the things I really loved about it is actually what we find out about Kate herself, because we know she's a great detective from the first book, but she actually is confronting some really tricky situations head on. Um, but at the same time, you have this amazing way of writing her as being an everyday person who is actually just juggling a hell of a lot at home and at work, which was just so real. Um, and I think that feels particularly familiar for lots of women. Um, maybe not the you know, juggling the um missing person's case, but in terms of everything else she's juggling, very real. So, what I'm really curious to know is when you were writing taken, what did you want to dig into with Kate that you didn't get to explore in her first book? And um, is there a bit of her in you or does she sort of come from a completely different place?

Speaker 2 20:45

Oh no, I think there's a lot of um her in me. I mean, I I when I first started kind of doing interviews for the torrent, I was very like, no, it's got nothing to do with me, it's completely fictional. But of course, you know, in reality, I mean, I think there was a lot of that. I mean, the emo the emotional core of Kate is you know very much me. Obviously the stuff she goes and does is like not me, clearly. Um but I I really I think I think you know I had the experience of um sort of you know when when you're sort of what's the word, I guess when you're sort of a diligent worker and you kind of are very task-oriented and you get the stuff done and you, you know, and and you sort of um you know, in your job, you kind of get the task done and it's done. And then you kind of have babies and you're like, wow, you get the task done and it doesn't stay done, they just keep waking up. What the hell? Like, you know, it's not like you can't sort of just take the task and it's like you know, it's done for the day. It's just if it literally is never done. And the manual doesn't work, they don't do everything they're supposed to in the manual. I know. It's it's it's So full on and and I think and and I think parenthood allowed me to see myself in a very different way and I went oh like I don't like myself in this way like I am showing a very I I thought I was pretty like sort of a nice person you know but I'm actually I'm quite I'm like incredibly impatient I'm incredibly you know um I can't you know sort of like I I lose my temper and so suddenly I was seeing this kind of not very nice side of myself when I was you know forced to not forced but like um you know when I was in the throes of doing this thing that I found quite overwhelming you know and even though obviously I loved my kids and you know it was it's both the most joyous thing you're ever ever going to do in your life but it's also the most sort of overwhelming and exhausting and all of the things and in particular that first 12 months and also then particularly when you have a second child it's not like it's a doubling it's like a log rhythmic kind of you know it's like it's it's to the power of you know just nothing like a doubling yeah yeah yeah so so suddenly like everything is just so concentrated and so kind of yeah sort of overwhelming so I I just wanted to funnel all of those feelings in into that character because I felt like it was real and I think it was you know women who are going through that like I wanted them to be seen on on on the page I I'm not sure if I even necessarily thought of it that way but it just felt like that's the feeling that needed to be on the page where you're just you know in every second of the day you're kind of second guessing you know like because I remember those feelings of sort of being in the park with my child but also on the phone to work going oh yeah like you know that you know whatever that deadline and you know this thing and and like having those things going through my head so like I'm with the child but I'm not with the child then I'm at work and then like I'll get the like the notification from kinda she's still crying you should come pick her up like or whatever because you know so so you know it was that constant sort of feeling of being pulled and stretched and and never quite getting either part right in the way that you could when you when you were single and sort of or or kidless and therefore your like your entire focus was on yourself so you could like balance out your life and have you know three you know what an hour for exercise and an hour for meditation and an hour for you know whatever whatever right like you could just like bum bang and your life was like you know and then you had your yearly holiday and you just and it was all very you know you could kind of organize it that way and then suddenly kids come and you're like oh yeah right okay that's my life now right but also it's freaking amazing like it's you know like I I I feel like I'm talking about it negatively but like it it really made me learn a lot a lot about myself and face this you know idea of myself like really see behind what I felt what my idea of my own self was and go oh actually no you're not that amazing let's just work on that you know you know what I mean and so yeah so it was like so it was a yeah and I felt like um through fiction like I could kind of process a lot of that um you know so so Kate is absolutely going through that um and and what I tried to do with taken sort of from the craft point of view was like I felt like the torrent was more sort of that slow burn it was it was you know this these kind of stories that you know it took a little while to get into it but it was like a slow burn and then you know and then things started happening. In Taeken I wanted her to be basically up against it from day dot like from the minute you open that page she was up against it and and and to re and and then it just kept getting worse and worse and worse and worse and worse until she was absolutely um at her limit um by the end of it. So so that was a really deliberate decision on my part because like with each book I'm trying to do something that I haven't tried before in my previous writing so I felt like in taken I wanted there to be sort of more action scenes more sort of like sort of that pacier writing so I really tried to instill all of that and so I felt like with a young mum who's like not a young as in like a new mum I should say like a mum with a newborn is what I'm trying to say not a young mum you know she's sort of breastfeeding and like she's forced to go into work so what will be the thing that would put her under most strain well a case involving a young baby at the exact same kind of pretty much the same age as her own Bob. So she has this real need to to to find the perpetrator of who took the baby because she you know she she puts herself in that situation goes oh my god you know like I have a baby in that exact same age so she understands and she feels that real need to find the perpetrator but by doing that by putting all her attention onto work obviously she's literally not putting that attention at home so then she creates that attention at home so she can't win in either way even though she has the best of attention uh best of intentions you know um for for both things so that was you know that's that central conflict with her so I I really tried to push that as as as much as I could with AKN yeah.

Speaker 1 28:10

Yeah I think you did definitely I really really really felt sorry for Kate because you pushed her to her limits. But one of the things that made me think about was your ability to write books that are clearly part of a series with the three but also can be read as standalones and I imagine that's probably not easy to do.

Speaker 2 28:32

So again was that a skill that you taught yourself or do you think it came naturally and then what do you have to do differently when you think about planning and writing each of the books to make them sort of stand on their own yeah look I mean I think again um we I mean I've we we talked about that like I I guess with the publisher as well like you know when we when we talk about series my publisher was very kind of clear on like it has to be a book that you can you know you can just grab off the shelf and read it and it would have to make sense both within the series and it and and as its own story and also create sufficient interest that hopefully the person reading it will at whatever like at you know whatever number of the series that they happen to pick up they will be sufficiently engaged with the characters that would make them want to either go back or keep going forward with it. So that's sort of the idea of a series to try and cover all those boxes if you know what I mean um you know it it has to work as its own story because I I I think it's unfair for readers to say okay well you know um sort of you can read this but actually the rest of the story is in another book like you can't you can't do that to a reader like it has to be a standalone mystery that gives them you know what they came for from a crime fiction book which is you know like all those thrills and and and the resolution of that mystery uh but then you have to have this kind of overarching arch for the for the characters or arch sorry for for the characters um for them to grow and for for for you to discover new aspects of their career so I mean of their personality sorry um and so when when you start off in a series obviously I I I didn't necessarily plan on all those things do you know what I mean like I didn't really okay well this book is going to be about this and you know but um you know obviously when you start doing a second book you go okay well what with Kate obviously the the central conflict is obviously the case but also her family so in each book I kind of focus on a different aspect of her family so so I would say sort of the torrent was very much I guess on her little family unit more so um the second book I had the opportunity to really explore her relationship with her father a bit more and like expand his character a bit more and like literally get to know him because again I hadn't necessarily planned that I I knew okay I think it would be nice for Kate to get to know her dad a bit more but I hadn't really planned where that would go. And then in the third one I I thought um we've only talked about her brother um like he's referenced in the books but he's not a living breathing character like he's his in Sydney and I thought okay well it's time to bring to make him sort of um yeah one of the key characters in in that book so then the third book naturally became sort of about him like what what like how would she go with um her brother being accused of a crime like that would push that central conflict which is across the whole series of family versus career like that would push that to the absolute maximum when your own family is accused of the crime that your station is dealing with so yeah so so that's how I tried to I don't know if that answered your question.

Speaker 1 32:02

No absolutely it did no because I think it's it's the bit around how you use the characters to tell different stories. Yeah it sounds like you're quite character driven for how you plot development yeah.

Speaker 2 32:17

Definitely I yes it's true like so I'm not a planner I don't sit down and plot sort of the the mysteries I need to have like sort of a bit of scaffolding um of like the the main twist and sort of where it's going to end up but but I am very much um I enter a story through character so um yeah so which is why it takes me so long because I'm you know the characters are completely changing and I'm like sort of discovering what their actual story is you know through that first draft. So yeah so I'm very much um yeah it's all that character for me.

Speaker 32:49

Yeah I have so many questions that I'm I'm starting to confuse myself but um no there's so many there's so many things I want to talk about here. I'll try and sort of pick that um because one of the things I wanted to ask you and we've sort of talked about this already is your ability to just constantly be raising the stakes and taking is a is just a wonderful example of that you just keep subtle. Whether it's on the personal front whether it's on the work front and I'm loath to use the term inspiring riders but I think the writers that are emerging at the early stage of their career. Your books are an amazing example of how you just raise the stack for a protagonist. And you've just said you're not a big plotter and planner I think one of the you do it so naturally though that taken was really like it was really anxiety inducing the decisions that she would make and the situations that she would keep getting herself into if if you're not a a super plotter and planner how have you managed to do that so naturally do you think because it's it just flows so effortlessly yeah um God I wish I had an answer to that um I like I I mean I mean it would be so helpful if I planned stuff but I you know I mean like maybe it would reduce the time significantly but but I guess um look what what I will say is what I try to do is I keep plausibility and realism as my core so so even though they are doing things I try not to make them do anything that is completely outside their personality or something that's just you know entirely implausible.

Speaker 2 34:42

So I feel like you know with with Kate in taken in particular in that situation where she was where she finds herself in literally three months after having a barb and coming back to work and basically taking on the biggest case of her career to to that point. I wasn't thinking straight I don't know how she was thinking straight you know so I feel like you know she she was a bit more um sort of she made some more questionable decisions in the in that um in that book compared to say when she was in the torrent for example because she was in that really highly pressurized mental state whilst her hormones were going crazy and she was you know dealing with this really overwhelming situation personally as well. So so I feel like that was true to her emotional state in that moment in in that particular moment in time. And so I felt like you just have to keep like sort of I think I think sometimes when you're trying to think of a book you you're looking at sort of where they're starting and then where you want to get them to um and and the thing is it's like it's not A to Z, it's but it's all the letters in between and it's like these little tiny little pressures that you keep adding and adding and adding and adding and adding and finally it's the you know whatever that thing is the straw that breaks the camel's back whatever that's saying is you know that you know it's just adding just one little extra straw you just keep adding it. And eventually that's going to break someone so um so so I I look at it sort of as they'll make a decision but then that decision will cut off a whole bunch of other you know possibilities in their life like they're now a whole bunch of other possibilities are off the table because they've done something which now swings everything over this way creates a whole bunch of other complications and then that snowballs into something else and you know you know what I mean so it it just keeps it just keeps snowballing because each decision has its own consequence and therefore it makes sense that then that new pressure will be added. So there are certain scenes where she'll you know she she goes to a suspect's house and that that particular scene snowballs in a way that she doesn't expect but that that situation then creates a whole bunch of additional complications for the case which then adds more pressure on her so so it's it's sort of like you you you know you create the situation and that situation automatically if you if you just follow it logically to the end that will automatically have its own complications if you want to that's kind of how I follow it through.

Speaker 37:41

Yeah and no it's an amazing skill though that it that keeps its natural feel and doesn't look like it's just deliberately oh let's just make this more complicated and let's make this more complicated. It just it it so naturally flows um and just does everything that you want it to do to sort of you know raise the state on the character. And I think Antonio you were saying before about um you know the aspect of family and I remember um reading the Torrent and then I had a little gap before I read taken but I remember um the um sort of story emerging in the first book and then I remember when it when it arose again in the second book it was a really nice flow on and then obviously into the third book. So it's um it's a remarkable bit of sort of catching all the pieces of the puzzle to put them together over over the flow. So um they've been the the three of them have been such fantastic books such fantastic books. I've enjoyed all of them for for different reasons. So if we do jump into the third um Kate Miles novel tipping point this time the Kate lands very close to home and as Alan what we talked briefly about before Kate's strange brother Luke comes back to Espin the farewell childhood friend aunt who has died by suicide and then within days another mate Marcus from that same type high school trio is found dead on his property. Almost 20 years ago the three of them were inseparable now two are gone and Kate's brother is suddenly in the frame as the investigation unfolds he's caught between family loyalty professional duty in the small town where everyone knows everyone's business. Another you know fantastic um story where you're just constantly sort of raising the stakes um how is this book different to write or was this book different to write than the first two as you sort of rounded out some of these arcs?

Speaker 2 39:40

Yeah absolutely I mean it was really interesting with uh tipping point because um you know as we spoke about before like I hadn't really written Luke before sort of he was again in the periphery um in the other two books and I think I think Kate had a phone conversation with him at some point but he wasn't really um you know a big character in that way and so it took me a long time to get into his head and I and I and I was only able to do it once I started doing uh point of view characters from his perspective and really kind of living them his skin and going okay well well why would he be sort of like what has he been doing in Sydney um what you know what is he trying to hide from his family why has he really excuse me why has he really come excuse me why has he really come to back to Eserton and then really trying to nut out that relationship between Kate and and Luke because I'm really interested in that idea of particularly as siblings or as family members when you have very specific sort of memories um of your loved one and you've grown up with them and you have shared a life with them and you feel in you and you know them or you feel like you know them and then there is this gap you know where they've gone off and they've become an adult with you know away from you right and then and they suddenly um they're they're off doing their own thing and and you've had this separation and then suddenly you find out something about them and there's a new piece of information about them that's that fundamentally changes you know who you thought they were and then I'm interested okay but then where does the love go? Like you have this love for this person you you have these years of memory with this person where does that go what do you do do you cut them out of your life do you try and like sort of make space for that new piece of information about that person you know are you able to live with that or or is it just an absolute you know um what they've done is too much so so that's what Kate is faced with you know she she thinks she knows her brother um and and her and her um and her dad Gray is very much like no we know Luke he would not do this you know we we know um who your brother is um whereas for Kate she is in a far more she has a kind of I guess a little bit more nuanced perspective in the sense that because she is an actively working police officer and she sees the the myriad of human behaviours every day kind of thing and she's constantly um having to deal with that so she has she's a bit more circumspect with you know maybe Luke could do it maybe he couldn't and and she has to kind of navigate that and grapple with that new information about her brother so I you know I'm like sort of always interested in sort of how human beings make space for each other and you know what we do like are there mistakes that we can come back from you know what are you know the kind of the myriad of awful and wonderful things that we do to each other and sort of that gray that we all live within. So that's kind of what interests me in in crime stories anyway. So I just found that really interesting to to to to get into that with with their relationship with you know with Kate and and um Luke's relationship and also when he comes back home and they kind of automatically kind of sink into their old dynamics of her being the kind of the older responsible sister and him being like the you know the brother who's always kind of you know the younger brother who kind of gets away with everything. So you know like it you know it's all of those things you get into those old patterns but you're also trying to navigate this new information. So I just I just yeah I love kind of sinking into that kind of marrow of of of human kind of interaction so that's what always interests me in writing. So yeah I'd have to do that with this book.

Speaker 43:48

And though all your books have this really lived in feel about them. Um and think about what you've just said then like perhaps a um a study of the human Sort of conditioned and psyche and relationships. How do you how do you approach researching this kind of stuff? Are you someone that sort of digs in early? Or do you write first and then chase down the specifics as you go?

Speaker 2 44:14

Yeah, I'm a chase down as I go. So I tend I tend to sort of research as I go and like with the uh police procedural science, obviously there's this there's a whole bunch of procedural stuff that you need to get right. Um so I tend to kind of like I I'm always story first, um, and I try to research as I go along so that when I get to the end, like I'm usually in the ballpark. Like, yes, there might be certain details that are wrong, but I'm in the ballpark, and only then will I go, okay, now this is the bit that I really need additional help on, and then I'll go and get that specialist advice um from whoever the tech specialist is. I mean, there's this huge and I'm usually in the ballpark, so I think for taken um when I ended up going back to like when I um ended up getting the forensic sort of review on it about stomach contents, etc. I I ended up having to change the whole thing, but it wasn't as much as you'd think, you know, like I was I was I was like 80% there. But then there was some final bits and pieces that I did niche. I'm like, okay, alright, fine, that that that food, etc., it is not gonna show up, etc. So so I have to change that. So so I try to research, and there's there's a lot online nowadays um that you know, even sort of five, ten years ago wasn't there, but now there's so much online that you can um I I feel like I'm pretty close so that the story is where I want it to be. Um, and then I go to sort of um the procedural advisors that I always um um go to to check my work, uh, and then they will tell me no, this is absolutely can't do this. But it's usually like very minor little details at that point, like it's not like whole scale changes.

Speaker 46:00

Um so use flashback chapters with the aunt and Marcus and Luke characters throughout tipping point, um, boys as teenagers running alongside the present-day investigation. Um it's a really great device because it sort of slowly sort of um fills in who they were without giving anything away too early. Um how do you plan that out? Are you someone that is a you're a scrivener user or colour-coded post-it notes who obviously you've said you're not a huge planner, or do you you literally just start writing and and go? I feel like you've got to be a good idea.

Speaker 2 46:39

I wish I had something I wish I had something like wonderful to say. I just write it. And and the thing is, okay, but like the only planning I do in the sense that that structurally I I think what you're trying to get get like up is like sort of how I see the whole story, if you know what I mean. Is that I think I think you're trying to yeah. Um and and how I see that whole story is like a word, you know, like the headings, you know, like I go and or whatever, or Luke or whatever. And so I see them, and so I can get a kind of idea where oh, it feels like there's a lot of Kate chapters here before I get to a flashback, for example. Like, I feel like, oh, that that's that feels like a lot. I think I think it needs a flashback chapter there. So it's to that extent, like in that in that bigger picture view, I can sort of see um uh what's that, that kind of scaffolding a little bit more with with that chapter headings, but that's literally all I do. There's no Excel spreadsheet, or there's no scrivenal, or there's no post-its, or I'm not I'm not a visual person in that way. Um like I I'm very inside my head. Um you know, in a light, and I tend to hold the whole story inside my head. Um, I I'm also very uh what's the word chronological? So I have to go from some of the so annoying. Uh I wish I could do the chest here and then come back, but nope, I have to go from here to there. Um and I'm not visual, so I like for example, I find setting very difficult because I'm not um it doesn't come easy to me because I tend to be inside my head in dialogue and in inside people's inside my characters' heads. So anything that external type stuff I actually find quite hard and have to really work on it. Um so setting and and and and so visual cues, like that actually that actually would make me anxious, like to have a have like sticky notes everywhere, that would make me anxious. Like because I would be like, wow, that's so messy. So so I can't do that. Like it has to be contained in a Word document and then you close it and it's done for the day, you know. There's not like I don't I don't walk into a room and there's stuff on the wall like that. Like, yeah. And I don't do mood boards and all of that. I can't, I'm just not visual in any way. Come on, you don't have to very so many people are so good at that, but I just it just doesn't, I don't know, it does nothing for me. So it's it's just I have to like I've I've come to the conclusion you just have to work with the brain and the experiences and stuff that works for you. I I wish I had someone else's brain, but this is what I've got, and so I have to lean into that, and there's no point trying to make my brain work in a different way because those visual cues just don't work for me. So it's pointless trying to insert it in there, you know. Like it just waste more time.

Speaker 1 49:52

Well, I think your brain works perfectly fine the way it is. We have no complaints as readers, goodness. So keep doing what you're doing. And goodness gracious, if um if post-it notes don't do all for you, then I don't think that's a bad thing either.

Speaker 50:07

Well, that's the end of part one of our chat with Dinuka McKinsey. Be sure to join us next week when we talk about her new book, She Lied First. Plus, she answers all our fast and the curious questions, and you won't want to miss it. Tune in then.

Speaker 1 50:52

Here in Melbourne, that's the Worundary Rurong people of the Kulin Nation. We honour their deep connection to storytelling, a tradition carried across more than 2,000 generations. Pay our respects to elders past, present, and emerging, and we extend that acknowledgement to First Nations people listening today.