Books
The Wild Date Palm
From a bestselling Australian author comes a gripping novel of espionage, passion and sacrifice set in the Middle East during World War I. Based on an astonishing true story, it asks what are you willing to die for? For readers of Geraldine Brooks, Heather Morris and Alli Parker. During a train journey across Turkey’s Anatolian Plain in 1915 during World War I, Shoshana Adelstein witnesses the slaughter of the Armenians and knows she has just come face to face with…
Dancing with the Enemy
Set in Jersey, in the Channel Islands, during the German Occupation, Dancing with the Enemy is based on the extraordinary experiences of people who lived through that traumatic time. It is the story of Dr Jackson, who pays a heavy price for his loyalty to his patients, and of teenager Tom Gaskell whose audacious plan leads to tragedy. It is also the story of young Sydney doctor, Xanthe Maxwell who visits Jersey in 2019. Traumatised by the suicide of her…
The Collaborator
It is 1944 in Budapest and the Germans have invaded. In the violence that follows, Miklós Nagy has the audacity to confront the dreaded Adolf Eichmann to try and save thousands of Jews from the death camps. But no one could have foreseen the tragic consequences. It is 2005 in Sydney, and Annika Barnett sets out on a journey that takes her to Budapest and Tel-Aviv to discover the truth about the mysterious man who rescued her grandmother in 1944….
Empire Day
Empire Day, 1948. A back street in Bondi is transformed as the fireworks of Cracker Night cast a magical glow over its humble cottages. But Australia as a whole is being transformed in this postwar era and the people of Wattle Street know that life will never be the same again. The ‘reffos’ have moved in, and their strange ways are threatening the comfortable world of salt-of-the-earth locals like Pop Wilson, deserted mum Kath and sharp-tongued Maude McNulty. With suspicious…
Nocturne
It is Warsaw in 1939, and Elżunia is an indulged teenager dreaming of heroism and romance. But when war breaks out, her illusions are shattered. As bombs fall, she meets Adam, a taciturn airman who becomes an activist in the Polish Underground, and later flies bombers for the RAF. Meanwhile, in occupied Warsaw, Elżunia discovers her own strength in ways she never imagined. Nocturne is the story of two people whose relationships are played out against the turbulent events of…
Winter Journey
Winter Journey, Diane’s first work of fiction, is now available in HarperCollins’s Perennial edition. This includes a section at the back giving personal details about Diane, what inspired her to write this novel, how she researched forensic dentistry, and how all the strands came together. A mother’s silence, a village with a terrible secret, and a woman’s journey to discover the truth…. Halina Shore is a Polish-born forensic dentist who lives in Australia. When she travels to Poland to take…
The Voyage of their Life
On a sultry summer’s day in August 1948, 545 passengers boarded an overcrowded clapped-out vessel in Marseilles with light suitcases and heavy hearts. They were leaving behind their familiar world to face an uncertain future in Australia and New Zealand. They came from displaced persons’ camps in Germany, death camps in Poland, labour camps in Hungary, gulags in Siberia and stony Aegean islands. There were those who had been hunted by the Nazis and those who had welcomed them; those…
Mosaic
Starting in the Polish city of Krakow in 1890, this memoir spans over a hundred years, four continents and five generations. Mosaic is Diane Armstrong’s moving account of her remarkable and resilient family. This story begins when Daniel Baldinger divorces the wife he loves because she cannot bear children. Believing that “a man must have sons to say Kaddish for him when he dies,” he marries a much younger woman, and by 1913, Daniel and his second wife Lieba have…