My New Project

September 1 2022 is the day. I start actually writing my second full manuscript.

After much deliberation as to which of numerous ideas I would work on, I have decided to tell the story of a young woman who is committed to a mental asylum in the 1890’s. This story is inspired by my great grandmother who spent 10 months in the Kew Mental Asylum.

Since publishing my first book in early July, I have been seriously researching what life would have been like in the Kew Asylum. Much has been written in the newspapers of the time so there was a lot of reading to do.

One of the most interesting and relevant articles I read was written by a female journalist who spent time as an attendant in the Asylum.

I also watched the movie The Mad Woman’s Ball which is set in a famous french asylum and is based on the book by Victoria Mas. The similarities of the treatment of the women in both asylums was notable.

As I write this I am in Avoca getting the feel of the places where my great grandmother lived and where part of the story will be set. After a visit to the Avoca Historical Society and armed with cemetery records we went to the cemetery only to find that the area where my 2x Great Grandfather is supposed to be buried was an unmarked grave. I don’t understand why this would be the case becuase according to his will he was quite well off when he died. Maybe the records were incorrect. But there were many unmarked graves in the Avoca Cemetery. Rather sad really. I apparently have many ancestors buried there but we were unable to find evidence of any of them.

Ruins of the Grand Duke Mine

We also visited the Grand Duke mine in Timor where my 2x great grandfather is likely to have worked as a mines carpenter for a period of time. The arch is all that is left of a massive pumping station. The ground was very wet when mining started in the 1860’s so a huge cornish pump was imported to deal with the problem of keeping the mine dry so that the men could work below ground in the mine.

But eventually the research has to take a back seat and that time is now. I have set the goal of writing 10,000 words per month so here goes…….