AUTHOR Paula Astridge was born in Inverell but left at age 12. She still holds the town close to her heart.
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Paula has recently released her fifth piece of historical fiction titled Bad Hand.
The book is a gripping account of the life of Captain William Bligh and his expulsion from Australia. Paula paints Bligh as a maligned, but ultimately brave and determined man.
Bad Hand combines Paula’s thorough research about her subject with a breathtaking sweep of action making history anything but dry. Paula hopes to proved her readers with a “moreish read”.
In 2001, Paula left her successful career with her ad agency to pursue her writing full-time. Her love of both history and writing found a home in historical fiction.
Her first three novels, Golden Boy, In the Way of the Reich and Kill the Fuhrer led the reader deep into the machinations of the Third Reich.
The first book, Golden Boy, is about Hitler’s chief architect Albert Speer. Paula said she remembered seeing the man on trial at Nuremberg.
“Even as a child, I remember seeing this man, and thinking ‘Oh, he looks interesting’ I never dreamt I’d be writing a book about him.”
She turned her sights to the US in book four, Waltzing Dixie, about Australia soldiers fighting in the American Civil War. Her agent had encouraged her to write about Australian history.
“I said I’m not interested in Australia. There’s not much happening.’ Boy, was I wrong,” Paula said.
Paula said as a writer, she portrays both the familiar deeds, but the humanity and frailty of her characters. They become alive.
She delves deep into her subjects. Paula said while William Bligh has been maligned over the mutiny on the Bounty and Rum Rebellion among other things, as a man, he was a riveting character.
“He’s always been portrayed as a coward, and he was the furthest thing,” she said.
“When I started to read his story, I think he was the bravest man I’d ever read about.
“(After his return to England) he then went back, and he was fighting with (Admiral Lord) Nelson, at the battle of Trafalgar, and no one ever mentions those things,” Paula said.
“He was really quite a phenomenal man.”
Bad Hand is available though www.paulaastridge.com.