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Speaker 1: And Amanda jam Nation.

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Speaker 2: Well our next guest, and I go back to our

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Speaker 2: university days. It was called Mitchell College then and now

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Speaker 2: now it's Charles Sturt Unian Baptist. We were both studying

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Speaker 2: well communications journalism, mish kind of a thing. You've gone

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Speaker 2: on to be one of the best selling authors in

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Speaker 2: the country, so selling your work internationally. I'm here doing

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Speaker 2: breakfast radio. How are you, Chris Hammer, so.

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Speaker 1: Lovely to be here with you and Jones.

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Speaker 3: Thank you, Chris, So I thought you guys might just

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Speaker 3: have a little bit of a gal pal catch up.

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Speaker 2: A gal pal catchup.

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Speaker 4: Days of pranking the Dean, throwing water bombs and stealing and.

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Speaker 2: All those food fights we had in animal House. That's it, Chris.

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Speaker 2: Your books are quite extraordinary. First, the first one I

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Speaker 2: read of yours was Scrublands, and that was just one

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Speaker 2: of the most page turning thrillers I think I've read

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Speaker 2: in years and years and years, because it's all about

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Speaker 2: sort of the Australian outback, regional Australia, regional policing. What

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Speaker 2: an incredible cost of carrys. Went out to your seventh

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Speaker 2: novel in a similar vein and the new was the

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Speaker 2: eighth the valley tell us about the valley.

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Speaker 1: The Valley brings back. Our homicide detective is Ivan Luki chanelb. Cannon.

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Speaker 1: There's a body found in this remote mountain valley. They

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Speaker 1: go to investigate. Starts off bog standard murder investigation, but

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Speaker 1: then they run DNA on the body and they find

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Speaker 1: out that the victim is a close blood relative of Nell. Now,

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Speaker 1: Nell has adopted and she knows the identity of her

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Speaker 1: biological mother, but she's never known who her father was.

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Speaker 1: And suddenly, don't give us any spoilers, No, this guy

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Speaker 1: is related to her father. So as the book unfolds,

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Speaker 1: Now on one hand is involved in a professional investigation

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Speaker 1: to find out who the killer was, but she's also

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Speaker 1: trying to dig back and discover what in the valley

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Speaker 1: thirty years ago, basically her own conception story. Yeah, it's pretty.

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Speaker 3: Emotionally because that relative is dead.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, she's this close relative she never knew she had,

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Speaker 1: and the only way she finds out about him is

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Speaker 1: because he's been murdered.

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Speaker 2: How do you come up with these stories? And I'm

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Speaker 2: sure it's a question authors get asked all the time.

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Speaker 2: Do you have a thousand stories in your head? When

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Speaker 2: you set out to write the story, do you know

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Speaker 2: its conclusion?

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Speaker 1: No, I've got no idea, which is quite handy because

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Speaker 1: it means, as the reader, you're unlikely to guess who

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Speaker 1: the killer is.

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Speaker 2: She don't know.

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Speaker 1: If I don't know, how can you really? Yeah, so

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Speaker 1: I don't know where the ideas come from. Sometimes I

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Speaker 1: can unpack it and go back and it's like, oh,

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Speaker 1: it's something from when I was a journalist, or something

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Speaker 1: I've seen in the news or something like that. But

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Speaker 1: other times, yeah, no idea. So where this one came from.

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Speaker 1: I can tell you where the setting it. It's loosely

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Speaker 1: based on a valley called the Arra Lawn Valley in

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Speaker 1: it's down there Braidwood in southern New South Wales. But

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Speaker 1: the storyline, know, it just sort of grew and evolved

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Speaker 1: over time as I was writing it.

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Speaker 4: There's a wealth of stories in regional Australia, isn't they

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Speaker 4: And people in regional Australia they're not as.

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Speaker 3: Chatty as we are with that, like they're chatty.

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Speaker 1: But they're not.

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Speaker 3: They hold their secrets and stuff like that. They don't talk.

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Speaker 1: It's too much. It's a great place to set, like

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Speaker 1: a murder mystery because in a small town, everyone knows

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Speaker 1: everyone else, everyone knows everyone else's business. And in a book,

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Speaker 1: you know, coincidences are believable in a way. You know

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Speaker 1: that two people might do something together or conspire in

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Speaker 1: a way that maybe in a place like Sydney going oh,

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Speaker 1: that's stretching it, you know, how do they know each other?

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Speaker 2: That sort of thing, But in the country town they would.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: And The Scrublands was made into a fabulous drama. Are

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Speaker 2: you going to be likely mri where all your stuff

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Speaker 2: gets made into fabulous productions and you'll have Nicole kidmanknocking

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Speaker 2: or saying can I be in it?

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Speaker 1: Yeah? You taught me into it like standing.

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Speaker 2: Out in the sun though, just be weird.

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Speaker 3: Well, Chris, you can't have the colon speed Dary needs

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Speaker 3: someone else.

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Speaker 1: No, it's they've finished filming the second series Silver. It'll

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Speaker 1: be on Stan early next year, I think. And the

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Speaker 1: production company Easy Tiger's brilliant. They're the ones who did

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Speaker 1: like the Jack Irish books, have done Rake Colin from accounts,

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Speaker 1: so they're yeah, they're very keen to keep the series going.

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Speaker 2: So fingers crossed, I mean holiday houses. You you a masked

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Speaker 2: Chris I.

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Speaker 1: Wish, I wish. I'm not quite in a well.

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Speaker 3: We can compare because you're both from the same album. Matter, Amanda,

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Speaker 3: what do you own?

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Speaker 2: I've got eighteen holiday houses and twelve speeds.

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Speaker 3: You's got this nice little hamlet called Port mcquarie.

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Speaker 2: I own all of Port mcquarie.

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Speaker 3: I don't think I've ever been to Port mcquarry.

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Speaker 1: What I do have is my mother has a holiday

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Speaker 1: house down on the south coast in New South Wales,

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Speaker 1: and that's my right writing bold whole. I can go

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Speaker 1: down there, lot myself away for weeks on end, not

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Speaker 1: talk to anyone, and just totally immerse myself in the book.

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Speaker 1: Every year at a certain time as it's getting towards

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Speaker 1: the crunch time. That's what I do.

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Speaker 2: I do the same, but I immerse myself in reading

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Speaker 2: a book as opposed to writing, and similarities are incrediblecket

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Speaker 2: of wine and a bucket of wine from my UNI

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Speaker 2: day because.

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Speaker 1: Where big fans you work, I do hope you're drinking

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Speaker 1: a better quality of wine.

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Speaker 2: God knows what that gut rot to drink musket, didn't

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Speaker 2: you know? I remember I joined the claret club at UNI,

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Speaker 2: and it took me years and years, did you realize

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Speaker 2: that claret could actually be read wine and it wasn't hideous?

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Speaker 1: You've just triggered me.

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Speaker 3: Are you in the Clark Club?

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Speaker 1: It was.

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Speaker 2: I saw someone do a fountain spume.

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Speaker 4: Get your hands on the Valley Now it's in all

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Speaker 4: good bookstores. Chris Hammer, It's always a treat to catch

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Speaker 4: up with you. Thank you for joining us.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much.