Crime author Jane Harper’s favourite holiday reads
The British-Australian writer, who has sold more than 3.5 million books, including The Dry, reveals the places that inspire her stories.
British-Australian writer Jane Harper spent more than a decade working as a newspaper journalist until she completed her debut novel, The Dry, through a writing course. It won the Victorian Premier’s Unpublished Manuscript award in 2015, went on to sell more than one million copies worldwide and was made into a movie staring Eric Bana as beloved police officer and protagonist Aaron Falk in 2021.
Harper has since written a further four crime novels and sold 3.5 million copies of her books. The film adaptation Force of Nature, the sequel to The Dry, is in cinemas now and her most recent novel, Exiles, is the third and final book in the Aaron Falk series.
Tell us about the film Force of Nature: The Dry 2?
The story centres around a group of five women hiking into the dense bushland for an overnight corporate retreat. When only four emerge at the other end of the trail, Aaron Falk must find out what really happened in those missing days. The beauty and brutality of the landscape takes on an important role in the novel, and I was delighted by how that’s been brought to the big screen.
What was it like watching one of your novels being made into a movie for the second time?
My books mean so much to me, so it is a big leap of faith to entrust your work to someone else to make a film. It helps a lot when I know it’s going into such good hands. Director Robert Connolly and I have a great working relationship, and we very much have a shared vision in terms of how we hope the finished film will look and feel.
Why do you set your stories in rural areas?
The Australian landscape is absolutely bursting with potential for authors, especially for books like mine that have a strong element of mystery and suspense. I want a setting that is going to form part of the mystery, not just serve as a backdrop. It needs to help shape what has happened, and also inform the characters in terms of their relationship with the place and with each other.
Where do you get ideas for the next book?
When I’m thinking about a new novel, I tend to start from the end and that moment of big reveal where the reader discovers what has really happened. What is the truth and what has brought the characters to this extreme moment? I’m also thinking early on about what kind of setting would support this story, and what characters I would need to tell it well. Everything is built out from there, and all the decisions and red herrings and clues are funnelling towards that key ending.
Choosing a location for my books
The setting is something I consider very early in the planning process for a novel, and so far I’ve enjoyed taking readers somewhere new each time. I always go and spend some time in the location when the first draft is coming together. Survivors was set in Tasmania and Exiles is set in South Australia’s wine country (pictured). I don’t write on the road, but I visit at a point where I know where the gaps in my knowledge lie, but also have enough wiggle room in the novel to adjust depending on what I discover. I always find out new things, so I want to make sure I can incorporate
that great colour.
Most memorable trip
My journey to published author started with winning the Victorian Premier’s Unpublished Manuscript award for The Dry. The prize was $15,000 and that is still the best $15,000 I’ll ever earn in my life. My husband and I used part of it to go on holiday to the US. We went to Los Angeles, Yosemite National Park (pictured) and the Grand Canyon and loved every minute. I look back on that as a really special trip where it felt like the door of opportunity had been flung open.
Where I like to holiday
I love Sorrento in Victoria. It’s not too far from my home in Melbourne but being there always makes me feel like I’ve really been away. It’s a lovely place to go as a family for a weekend. Taking a ride on the ferry and splashing around in the water and having fish and chips, what more could we want?
My favourite destinations
I love the beaches here, even more so since I’ve had two children, and we often spend a few hours with the sand and water to relax. But I think it’s the huge range of Australia’s landscapes that makes this such a special country. We have everything from desert to surf, and it’s a gift to be able to enjoy that. All my family live in Australia now, so I haven’t been back to Britain for a while. When I used to go back, I would visit my family in North Yorkshire and enjoy the countryside and the village pubs.
What books I pack on holiday
Benjamin Stevenson’s latest novel, Everyone on this Train is a Suspect, is such a fun, smart read set on The Ghan. While it has a little more intrigue and murder than I personally look for in a holiday, the train journey shone and I’d love to make that trip one day. With regard to packing, I still take my Dad’s advice that as long as you have your passport and a credit card, anything else can probably be found at your destination. I tend to pack as light as
I can. Usually, when I travel these days, it’s one shared suitcase for me and my husband, and a thousand other bags for the kids’ bits and pieces.
Where I am going next
We are cruising as a family on Disney Wonder later this year, and couldn’t be more excited. We’ve been lucky enough to do it once before and had a blast, so we can’t wait to experience all the fun again.
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