AustLit

'From the residue of meaning, an ensemble of shadows. From the glint of souvenir, pliable impressions. In this paper, we work a poetics of encounter, of being, keeping, homage, of paying homage to fragility, to object and to interspecies—ways are found to engage motion from within and around co-extensive bodies. With the consolation of images, we follow the terse rhythms of routine and street where dwelling is a case of affective dissent. Zones of departure appear through testimony as well as chance, taking their own form. A footfall brings us as observers into quiet spaces which refuse self-estrangement as we travel by way of an unquiet ground. Breath, respiration, aspiration. Precipitation. Sculptures of mist are also the language of lives, of kinship between object, footfall and air. A language of brackets, questions, ellipses. There may be a man, a dog, a barrow. There may be a woman, a cart. Air. How shall this image be made?' (Authors abstract)

'The storm led me to Padthaway. I could never resist the allure of dark swirling clouds, windswept leaves sweeping down cobbled lanes or a view of the sea stirring up its defiant nature. The sea possessed a power all of its own and this part of Cornwall, an isolated stretch of rocky cliff tops and unexplored beaches both enchanted and terrified me.

'It is not a lie to say I felt drawn out that day, led to a certain destiny...

'So begins this new mystery series featuring young Daphne du Maurier, headstrong, adventurous, and standing at the cusp of greatness.

'Walking on the cliffs in Cornwall, she stumbles upon the drowned body of a beautiful woman, dressed only in a nightgown, her hair strewn along the rocks, her eyes gazing up to the heavens. Daphne soon learns that the mysterious woman was engaged to marry Lord Hartley of Padthaway, an Elizabethan mansion full of intriguing secrets.

'As the daughter of the famous Sir Gerald du Maurier, Daphne is welcomed into the Hartley home, but when the drowning turns out to be murder, Daphne determines to get to the bottom of the mysteries of Padthaway--in part to find fresh inspiration for her writing, and in part because she cannot resist the allure of grand houses and long buried secrets.' (Publisher's blurb)