Category Archives: Bangkok

On location: Bangkok 5

Posted on 03/01/2016 by

I’ve been reading Into the Badlands by British writer John Williams, an account of his two month road trip exploring ‘the underbelly of the American dream’, based on interviews with his favourite American crime writers. At one point, he drives through Chicago’s Hegewisch neighbourhood … Continue reading →

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On location: Bangkok 4 (Point of view)

Posted on 19/12/2015 by

In an earlier post, I mentioned taking my character for a walk around Bangkok, imagining how she would experience the city if she was feeling joyful. The following day, I imagined how the same streets would appear to someone feeling … Continue reading →

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On location: Bangkok 3 (It’s the little things)

Posted on 18/12/2015 by

One benefit of being ‘on location’ to do field research for my new novel is that the landscape is filled with ‘Show, don’t tell’ moments. For instance, I could write pages about how revered Thai Budhist monks are in Thailand. … Continue reading →

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On location: Bangkok 2

Posted on 17/12/2015 by

Something I love about travel: you can never anticipate what you will enjoy most about a destination. Yesterday, I took my partner and our nearly ten-year-old daughter to Jim Thompson House in Bangkok. I’d visited in 2008, when Miss Nearly … Continue reading →

Posted in Bangkok | 7 Comments

On location: IVF and hospital nursery

Posted on 16/12/2015 by

Some readers will know that the topic of my current work in progress (aka WIP) is commercial surrogacy between Australia and Thailand. Today’s fieldwork excursion took me to a hospital in downtown Bangkok, where I know local women acting as … Continue reading →

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Whitney and I

Posted on 12/02/2012 by

Only last night I was talking about Whitney Houston, reliving the memory of discovering karaoke on a study tour to the Philippines in 1989, when the sad news came through today of her untimely death at the age of 48. … Continue reading →

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If you’re wondering where I am…

Posted on 29/01/2008 by

I’m on sabbatical for six months with my partner and daughter, based in Phnom Penh in Cambodia. On the way here, we stopped over in Pattaya on Thailand’s central coast where my next book is set, and spent a day … Continue reading →

Posted in Bangkok, Books, Cambodia, Thailand, Works in progress | 2 Comments