Cirrus@Austlit

'A retired couple stumbles on an old mystery ...

'... they don't suspect the power of history, and the modern danger it creates.

'Water, ships, boats, and boatmen are part and parcel of Venice. When Denise and Roger arrive by yacht, they're bewildered by the mystery of a missing map; a convent's tourist attraction. 

'An ancient quest leads the couple into modern dangers; both of them alarmed and panicking. But even the help of brilliant Professor Bryn Awbrey can't stop the ruthlessness of crooks, who care only for money. 

'Everyone has their own particular brand of fear.  

'It interrupts, slows, and stops us all. But it must finally be faced.

'Through history, the missing map fills whoever finds it with dread; from a luckless sea captain to an impatient nun.

'Can fear keep the map hidden forever? 

'The Cartographer of Venice is a story that straddles two timelines. The history, food, locations, and mystery of Venice are as vivid today as they were in the 1500s. Become enchanted by the canal city's magic, and let yourself feel that subtle tingle of fear. You will never look at a map in the same way again.'

(Source: publisher's blurb)

'"A clever and complex cross-genre novel that doesn't quite fit your typical time-travel or dual era genre."  -- Money in the Mattress

'Loretta Groombridge thinks she's made a friend when Tikki Foy arrives in Venice as her employer's house guest. Professor Bryn Awbrey is renowned for his brilliance in solving literary puzzles ... and for his cluttered home, which Loretta is paid to organize. 

'But the newly-arrived guest distracts the professor and pulls him away. Something she's found hints of lost papers by Franz Kafka, famous Czech short-story writer of the 1920s. The possibility is tantalizing, but Loretta suspects a more sinister side to Tikki's story. Her weird behaviour and the danger and complication she attracts seem exaggerated and unwarranted. Who is pushing her to this; her library colleague, or a weird character who doggedly follows them? A chase takes place, tugging the women to Perth on a dizzy pursuit.

'Loneliness, suspicion, and fear of losing her place in Bryn Awbrey's life whirl Loretta into a spiral of distrust and disappointment. Tikki pitches against her. Venice becomes a haunting, suspicious place.

'What is found in the end confounds even the professor's logic.
 

'The Frozen Sea is a literary adventure, a chase for treasure and truth, and an exploration of what it means to be lonely. Historical vignettes bring Kafka and his 1920s contemporaries to life, and weave together history and present-day dilemmas.

'You'll think of it as one of those novels you couldn't put down.'

(Source: publisher's blurb)

'At a crumbling but beautiful villa on the Fiesole hills outside Florence, four siblings reunite for the funeral of their mother, Nina Larkin. They bring with them light suitcases, and hearts heavy not only with grief, but also with small mysteries from childhood, grown large with age and time. All in their fifties now, and all with their particular variety of experiences, they remember what it was like to holiday in those hills. Youthful memories rarely match; the four recall their mother very differently. The inheritance they hope to take away is bound up in Nina Larkin’s will. The only thing they agree about is its complexity. A Funeral in Fiesole is a four-fold weave of memories told in turn by Paola, Brod, Suzanna and Nigel. Their youthful dreams are revealed, together with their hopes for the future. Their problems – which might be solved by their mother’s will – threaten to make something simple rather complicated' (publication blurb).

'A doctor returns to a dilapidated mansion after 25 years, seeking something he thinks he saw on his honeymoon. Obsessed about the house and its history, he has dreams of restoring it and starting a business. Uncertain whether his deteriorating marriage will sustain such a plan, unsure whether a madcap scheme to start a guesthouse is even worth considering, he becomes as haunted as the locals say the house is. Memories, visions and dreams merge to present something inescapable; the story of a young woman whose life, whose possessions, could not be extinguished or destroyed by time or death.

Based on local anecdotes and landmarks, The White Lady of Marsaxlokk is a melancholic story of the melding of history into present day. It takes the reader on a captivating journey through time, on a feasible excursion that is both enchanting and just a little bit eerie.'

[Source: Yellow Teapot Books]

'Selby Green tries to change her life, but finds she cannot control the events that take her life and turn it inside-out. Edmund Eben's life is changed by war and politics, he thinks, but women exert the most significant, moving shifts in him. Whether these two people ever meet is up to how successfully they disappear from their ordinary existence. How to Disappear is a heart wrenching, heartwarming novel in two parts, which links the lives of a disappointed woman living a grey existence and a man whose harsh migrant experience does not prepare him for love' (publication blurb).

When Richard Wagner died in Venice in 1883, it was the end of a creative and tumultuous life. His family grieved, and the world lost a brilliant composer. Nearly 130 years later antiques dealer Nic Manton is led to a valuable pendant he feels provides a solution to his precarious finances. With no idea of its meaning or provenance, he is mystified why the pendant creates such fear and confusion, and aggravates rather than solves his problems. Its apparent owner is beautiful but erratic. As she leads him from Rome to Venice and then to Malta, Austria and Germany, Manton becomes increasingly aware that there is a perplexing secret about Richard Wagner’s life and works, and that this secret is also dangerous. A melancholic widow and a brilliant but vague professor are willing to help. But Manton doubts whether they can.

The Hidden Auditorium is a companion novel to According to Luke (2011). Both works feature the secondary character Prof Bryn Awbrey, an expert in semiotics ('Rosanne Dingli, The Hidden Auditorium And Why Writing Never Ends,' interview with Nick Wales 2013).

[Source: Yellow Teapot Books]

'It is 1877. The city of Antwerp in Belgium is throwing open its gates to the world of trade and commerce. Using only primitive equipment and experimental chemicals, a promising photographer attempts to make a visual record of his rapidly-changing city. Obsession and toxicity are severe hurdles, which the love of his young wife might temper and ease.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Photojournalist Bart Zacharin's camera doesn't lie, but his mysterious new lover, Minnie Cuff, lies for a living. Love-struck Bart can't get that into focus until he follows her from Australia on her flimsily excused trip to Europe and becomes embroiled in an obscure web of international organised crime, deception and death' (publisher blurb).

'Inspector Cloud Maslin investigates a murder in a prosperous leafy suburb, where the genteel sheen seems to have an underlayer of seedy distrust. The subtle stink of decadence and immorality is disturbing, when inhaled among beautiful antiques and family silver. What secrets are to be unearthed in Claremont?

'Maslin takes on a new partner, Senior Sergeant Martina Williams. His fiancee leaves him for reasons he's known for some time. His peace of mind is rattled by a baffling case with a shattering conclusion.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Award-winning literary fiction author Rosanne Dingli follows the success of The Astronomer’s Pig and Counting Churches – The Malta Stories with another volume. Read fourteen atmospheric stories crammed with exotic ingredients and locations, which engage and somehow ring with the familiar and the unexpected. Historical fiction, folkloric tales, and anecdotes linked strongly with their location are this author's favourite forays into storytelling. Each short story or novella has indelible links with the facts that form its base and background' (publisher's blurb).

The collection comprises all the stories published in Vision or Delusion (2010) and Over and Above (2011) - both out of print.

'Music has the ability to change moods, to soothe or excite. These short stories are gathered loosely around a musical theme. The romance, the passion, the inspiration of music, and how it affects people' (publisher blurb).

'Nine atmospheric short stories, in each of which the location is as important as the characters that move through it' (publication blurb).

Set in various European historical settings, each of the stories in this collection plays in its own way on the theme of the relation of the individual to the sum-total of human history and geography.

'This is a collection of nine stories that treat the emotions of human interaction; between lovers, friends, siblings, and the fine thread that binds daughters to their ageing fathers. Rosanne Dingli, an award-winning short fiction author, takes locations, art and aspects of complex human relationships and weaves them into a memorable fabric. From the longings of a lonely old man, to the rage of an envious artist, emotion textures the narratives and salutes the reader’s sympathy for imagined characters so similar to those encountered every day of one’s life' (publisher's blurb).

Some of the stories in this collection were previously published in slightly different versions (Rosanne Dingli, iii).

The short stories in this collection combine diverse meanings of intimacy experienced by a fascinating assortment of characters, at different times, in different places.

According to Luke is a thrilling romantic novel of secrecy, symbols, faith, and forbidden love. It takes the reader on a quest for an ancient truth so powerful it disturbs the Catholic Church: a truth so explosive it attracts violent separatists and demands a ransom of millions. Follow a chase that charges from Venice to Malta, and then to Ravenna: a chase that escalates to disaster in Damascus, until a solution is found in the Victorian countryside in Australia (author's website).

According to Luke features the secondary character Prof Bryn Awbrey, an expert in semiotics. He later appears in Dingli's 2013 novel The Hidden Auditorium ('Rosanne Dingli, The Hidden Auditorium And Why Writing Never Ends,' interview with Nick Wales 2013).