Cirrus@Austlit

'Story's Crossing, a small country town where the train doesn't stop anymore, & the highway bypasses the town. Inner Urban Man, Traven, was raised here. The place that formed him, the place that nearly doomed him.

'Traven knew he'd never return but a chance turn on a road to somewhere else, and here he is.

'The old town looks the same as he steps down... yeah, right! No, something is rotten and Traven isn't looking for trouble but trouble has a mind of its own... Old love, old betrayal, and you can't go home again. Murder will out, brussel sprout. Yadda yadda...

'Has Traven been cast as the Small Town Hamlet? That is the Question... now read on...'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'What's a 'Krome-Plated Yabbie'? Did the 'Little Boy Lost' ever get found? When 'The Carnival is Over', do you say 'Ciao Baby?' Was 'Little Boy Sad' 'Living in a Child's Dream?' Who would answer the Royal Telephone?' These and many other important questions are answered in this book. David N. Pepperell & Colin Talbot are two Rock & Roll writers who were there!...and they answer this most important question: What were the 100 Greatest Singles made by Australian artists in the 60's? In the 1960's Australian Rock & Roll singles were as good as those made anywhere in the World. Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs' "Poison Ivy" even knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts when the Fab Four were touring here in 1964! John Lennon was so amazed he asked to meet Thorpe in person. This book attempts, for the task can only be attempted, to list the best 100 singles of that remarkable decade - the Sixties - by Australian artists. Looking at this list, every genre of music is represented - pop, country, soul, folk, instrumental, psychedelic, ballads - all that diversity which drives our interest in pop music and glues us to our radios and record players. We've tried to showcase the best, yet we expect there will always be some song that didn't make the cut that you the reader will regard as a glaring omission. Well, that's the way the turntable spins! Take a trip back to these classic records of the 60's to listen once again and remember those heady times when long hair and short skirts changed the world.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Traven Collins is a sort of detective. He's not really a detective, more what you might call a burnt-out case who was a writer and now who'll take most any kind of writing job to pay the rent. If it's interesting. He lives in a nice seaside suburb of Melbourne with down-and-outers, stand over merchants and ice addicts at one end and pimps, thieves, hookers and transexual rent boys at the other. Traven takes a job from an old friend to promote the visit of the last American beat poet, Duke Weston, who claims to have been a friend of Kerouac & Burroughs etc. Things are going averagely until the first death – which is seems to be a hit & run but proves to be a murder. And then the next one...that's murder too. Both of the victims were poets. With his trusty sidekick, the brilliant border collie Maynard G Crabs, Traven sets out to make sure he doesn't become embroiled in these murders most foul & most horrid. And he has to protect Lexi, the young lady who couldn't possibly be his daughter - could she? ' (Publication summary)

'A beautiful young woman, Juliette, casts a spell on her lover. Caught up in a war of style and passion, Juliette opts to go her separate way and leaves her lover searching the night for his new Juliette.'

Source: Screen Australia.