About the Books
Ballot — When Fate Called Their Name
It is 1969, and the American war in Vietnam is raging. The Australian government has agreed to the US President’s request for military support in the struggle against Communism.
Australia unhesitatingly responds by enforcing conscription. Twenty-year-old men are selected by ballot of their birth dates drawn from a lottery barrel, sending them to the war-ravaged jungles of Vietnam.
When their birthday numbers tumble from the call-up ballot drum, Mitch Masters, a talented motorcycle speedway competitor, destined for international fame and fortune, Jay Petrovitch, the son of Russian refugees, Greg Sunderland, dentistry school dropout, and wannabe rock star, and Kiwi, a construction worker from New Zealand, find themselves on the sharp end of the fog of war and political duplicity.
For years following the end of the war, rumours of POWs shipped off to the USSR filtered through the ranks of the war’s Australian veterans. Was it possible that Aussie Diggers were among them?
The Australian authorities said no.
Is this Australia’s greatest cover-up?
From the inner suburbs of Sydney, through the jungles of Vietnam, the Closed Cities of the Soviet Union, the horror of combat, the oscillations of xenophobic and patriotic pressures, and the collisions of ingrained world-views, Ballot is a gripping novel of allegiance and identity. Of mateship that transcends three decades, three continents, and opposing political and social philosophies.
Where The Truth Was Buried — A story of espionage, betrayal, and the long shadow of WW2
Thirty years after James Hamilton was forcibly migrated to New Zealand as an orphan child, an unexpected inheritance draws him back to Cornwall, where he stumbles on a long-dormant WW2 secret concealed in the shared memory of the small fishing village he once considered home.
The mystery deepens when James begins clearing out the cottage he has inherited and uncovers a bundle of letters that suggest the cottage’s owner, a retired lieutenant commander in the Royal Navy, participated in a clandestine operation that has remained suppressed in the village’s core and has direct links to James’s true identity.
Determined to uncover the truth about his past, James digs into the background and context of the letters he has found, and the results are more disturbing than he could have imagined. His attempts to unravel the past reveal a shadowy world of British Intelligence, the French Maquis, and Nazi sympathisers within Allied ranks.
Against the backdrop of WWII exploits spanning North Africa and France, Where the Truth Was Buried is a story of divided loyalties and extreme courage. A tale of love, deceit, and sacrifice.
About the Books
Ballot — When Fate Called Their Name
It is 1969, and the American war in Vietnam is raging. The Australian government has agreed to the US President’s request for military support in the struggle against Communism.
Australia unhesitatingly responds by enforcing conscription. Twenty-year-old men are selected by ballot of their birth dates drawn from a lottery barrel, sending them to the war-ravaged jungles of Vietnam.
When their birthday numbers tumble from the call-up ballot drum, Mitch Masters, a talented motorcycle speedway competitor, destined for international fame and fortune, Jay Petrovitch, the son of Russian refugees, Greg Sunderland, dentistry school dropout, and wannabe rock star, and Kiwi, a construction worker from New Zealand, find themselves on the sharp end of the fog of war and political duplicity.
For years following the end of the war, rumours of POWs shipped off to the USSR filtered through the ranks of the war’s Australian veterans. Was it possible that Aussie Diggers were among them?
The Australian authorities said no.
Is this Australia’s greatest cover-up?
From the inner suburbs of Sydney, through the jungles of Vietnam, the Closed Cities of the Soviet Union, the horror of combat, the oscillations of xenophobic and patriotic pressures, and the collisions of ingrained world-views, Ballot is a gripping novel of allegiance and identity. Of mateship that transcends three decades, three continents, and opposing political and social philosophies.
Where The Truth Was Buried — A story of espionage, betrayal, and the long shadow of WW2
Thirty years after James Hamilton was forcibly migrated to New Zealand as an orphan child, an unexpected inheritance draws him back to Cornwall, where he stumbles on a long-dormant WW2 secret concealed in the shared memory of the small fishing village he once considered home.
The mystery deepens when James begins clearing out the cottage he has inherited and uncovers a bundle of letters that suggest the cottage’s owner, a retired lieutenant commander in the Royal Navy, participated in a clandestine operation that has remained suppressed in the village’s core and has direct links to James’s true identity.
Determined to uncover the truth about his past, James digs into the background and context of the letters he has found, and the results are more disturbing than he could have imagined. His attempts to unravel the past reveal a shadowy world of British Intelligence, the French Maquis, and Nazi sympathisers within Allied ranks.
Against the backdrop of WWII exploits spanning North Africa and France, Where the Truth Was Buried is a story of divided loyalties and extreme courage. A tale of love, deceit, and sacrifice.