Even in space you can write what you know

I guess you guys all know I write mainly space opera. So you might be forgiven for raising an incredulous eyebrow (maybe even two) when I talk about writing what I know. And sure, I take out the space opera tool kit for the space bits. FTL travel, artificial gravity, shields to divert radiation (and attacks) etc etc. But not everything happens out there in the wide black. I usually have some goings-on planetside. And the WIP is no exception.

Senior Commander Thad Butcher was Grand Admiral Saahren's adjutant in the Iron Admiral series, but this time, he's getting his own story. Newly promoted to captain after the events chronicled in the Iron Admiral, he's gone home to Validor for a brief holiday before he takes up his new command - a battle cruiser. It's a boyhood dream come true. But he arrives on planet just in time to become embroiled in an attack on the Ruling family, where he's reunited with Tarlyn, who had been the unattainable love of his life before he left Validor, aged seventeen, to attend the Fleet Academy.

I've had a vague plot floating in my head for several years now, but distilling that ephemeral essence into a working story takes time. Although we'll get back up into space later down the track, at the moment Thad and Tarlyn are on a boat, heading for a meeting with the Ptorix - and some other amazing, intelligent creatures.

And this gave me the opportunity to write what I know.

A few years ago ago I was privileged to go on a three-day sail in the Whitsunday Islands off Queensland. It was a memorable experience, and one of those appears in the WIP. Thad and Tarlyn take a boat out of a bay between two headlands. That's based on my experience when we sailed through the Solway Passage, with its churning waters and whirlpools, all overlooked by a stormy sky and the towering red cliffs of a distant island. My scene isn't exactly the same, but I've drawn on that journey to lend some colour.

But that's not the end of the sea adventure, and here I dragged out another recent experience, when I went to Horizontal Falls, in Western Australia's far north, six years ago (gosh, was that really so long ago)? I wrote about it here. I used that image, of a tide roaring through a narrow gap, in another exciting scene.

Crisis at Validor is a fun read, my usual combination of action, intrigue, and politics, all served with a large helping of romance.

Newly-promoted Captain Brett Butcher is about to achieve his life-long ambition to command a battle cruiser. But before he takes up his new posting, he goes home on leave, hoping to perhaps catch a glimpse of his first love, the unattainable Lady Tarlyn.

When the queen is assassinated in a terrorist attack, Tarlyn’s life is thrown into turmoil when she, too, becomes a target. The last person she expects to rescue her is her childhood sweetheart, Brett Butcher.

As Validor’s Ptorix and human populations face off over a group of islands neither owns, the calls for war grow louder. Torn between duty and ambition, Butcher and Tarlyn struggle to prevent an inter-species conflict, while the ember of love that has smouldered for so long bursts into flame. But with planetary peace at stake, both will be forced to choose; love or duty.

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