Authors In-Conversation: Anita Heiss and Sara Foster

Internationally renowned authors Anita Heiss and Sara Foster will join us for an evening of conversation about their latest books.

Dirrayawadha is another groundbreaking historical novel from award-winning author Anita Heiss about resistance, resilience and love during the frontier wars.
When She Was Gone is the pulse-pounding new psychological thriller from bestselling novelist, Sara Foster.

If you are a lover of compelling stories well told, this an opportunity too good to miss!

Brought to you in partnership with Dymocks Booksellers.

About Dirrayawadha
Bathurst, 1820s
Miinaa was a young girl when the white ghosts first arrived. She remembers the day they raised a piece of cloth and renamed her homeland 'Bathurst'. Now she lives at Cloverdale and works for a white family who have settled there.
The Nugents are kind, but Miinaa misses her miyagan. His brother, Windradyne, is a Wiradyuri leader, and visits when he can, bringing news of unrest across their ngurambang. Miinaa hopes the violence will not come to Cloverdale.
When Irish convict Daniel O'Dwyer arrives at the settlement, Miinaa's life is transformed again. The pair are magnetically drawn to each other and begin meeting at the bila in secret. Dan understands how it feels to be displaced, but they still have a lot to learn about each other. Can their love survive their differences and the turmoil that threatens to destroy everything around them?
From the bestselling author of Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray (River of Dreams) comes another groundbreaking historical novel about resistance, resilience and love during the frontier wars.
Praise for Dirrayawadha (Rise Up):
‘Dirrayawadha is a story of the courage of the Wiradyuri nation and the love of their Country. Anita Heiss is a remarkable writer.' Tony Birch
‘To read the book is to enter a lost time, a retrieved war, and to learn much, not least Wiradyuri. With dhuluny (truth) and marrumbang (love) of story, Heiss makes something good. And that is something for which modern Australia can be grateful.’ The Age
'Historical in tone, yet absolutely contemporary in scope, Dirrayawadha is a beautiful triumph.' Mirandi Riwoe
'Dirrayawadha is a beautifully written and masterful telling of a pivotal point in our history.' Nicole Alexander

About Anita Heiss:

Dr Anita Heiss is an internationally published, award-winning author of 23 books; non-fiction, historical fiction, commercial women’s fiction and children’s novels.

She is a proud member of the Wiradyuri Nation of central New South Wales, an Ambassador for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation and the GO Foundation, and Professor of Communications at the University of Queensland. Anita is also the Publisher at Large of Bundyi, an imprint of Simon & Schuster cultivating First Nations talent, and a board member of the National Justice Project and Circa Contemporary Circus.

As an artist in residence at La Boite Theatre, she adapted her novel Tiddas for the stage. It premiered at the 2022 Brisbane Festival and was produced by Belvoir St for the Sydney Festival in 2024.

Her novel, Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray, about the Great Flood of Gundagai, won the 2022 NSW Premier’s Indigenous Writers' Prize and was shortlisted for the 2021 ARA Historical Novel Prize and the 2022 ABIA Awards.

Anita’s first children’s picture book is Bidhi Galing (Big Rain), also about the Great Flood of Gundagai. Anita enjoys running, eating chocolate and being a creative disruptor.

About When She Was Gone

Rose once walked away from her daughter.
Now, is she the only one who can save her?

Former London police officer Rose Campbell has been estranged from her daughter, Lou, for almost a decade. But when Lou disappears from a remote Western Australian beach, and the police suspect her of kidnapping the two young children in her care, Rose is asked to help bring Lou home. The police think Rose’s insights will lead them to Lou, but they don’t realise that Rose hardly knows her daughter any more.

This is the final case in DSS Mal Blackwood’s illustrious career, and there’s a lot riding on it. The missing children are heirs to the Fisher property empire, and while their multimillionaire grandfather is breathing down Blackwood’s neck for results, the media storm is intensifying. Faced with a deluge of evidence and accusations, Blackwood doesn’t know who he can trust.

Rose arrives in Australia intent on proving her daughter’s innocence, but how can she be sure of that when she’s no longer part of Lou’s life? Meanwhile, as Blackwood begins to expose the Fishers’ secrets, the investigation takes a much darker turn. Shadows of the past gather around the Fishers and Rose, and soon it’s clear that every hour is critical. What has happened to Lou and the children? And can Rose and Blackwood find them in time?

Praise for When She was Gone
‘I was gripped by When She Was Gone, I couldn’t bear being away from it. The characterisation is top-notch: such interesting, flawed, nuanced people. And the plotting is excellent – I was guessing and guessing and getting it wrong. I absolutely LOVED this book.’

Marian Keyes, international bestselling author of My Favourite Mistake

“Foster is back! When She Was Gone is a masterclass of suspense, an edge of your seat story that kept me up all night.”

Dervla McTiernan, bestselling author of What Happened to Nina? and The Ruin

About Sara Foster

Sara Foster is an internationally published, bestselling psychological suspense author living in Western Australia. Her next novel, When She Was Gone, will be released in April 2025.

Sara has previously published seven novels: the near-future acclaimed thriller The Hush, and suspense thrillers You Don’t Know Me, The Hidden Hours, All That is Lost Between Us, Shallow Breath, Beneath the Shadows and Come Back to Me. Her novella, The Deceit, was first released as an Audible Original and is published by Blackstone in the US and Canada.

Sara is passionate about writing strong female characters and often incorporates contemporary cultural themes into her stories. She graduated from Curtin University in 2023 with a Vice Chancellor’s Commendation for her PhD work on maternal relationships in dystopian fiction with young adult heroines. Two of Sara’s novels have been optioned for television and You Don’t Know Me was turned into a chart-topping crime podcast dramatisation by Listnr.

Sara writes for her readers on substack at Story Matters, and for writers at The Resilient Author.