Thank you so much to The
LovecatsDownunder and Rachel Bailey for having me visit, I’m so thrilled to be
on this blog as a guest! Wahoo!!!
Living in Australia for 14
years, I often forget that I still have a different accent, since I have been a
citizen for most of those years. And while I am Australian in many ways, some of
my own mannerisms are still different to those of my adopted country. E.g. If I
was to suddenly ‘dunk’ my biscuit in my hot chocolate at lunch, my friends
would be horrified, and yet – in South Africa, this as a totally acceptable
custom to dunk your ‘rusk’ into your beverage. I also eat biltong and love droĆ«
Wors (sort of like beef jerky, and dried sausage), South African snacks at
their best…
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Rusks: http://creative-cooking-with-muriel.blogspot.com.au/
2010/06/all-bran-flakes-rusks.html
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A few years ago, I was with
my writing friends at lunch. (Yes lunching again…) I was planning a trip home
to South Africa and Zimbabwe, and I passed an innocent comment that I was
thinking of ‘arming up’ so that if I came into a difficult situation, I was
armed and could fight for me and my children, if I had to. I still have the horrified
expression of my author friends imprinted on my mind forever with the
realisation that not only was I prepared to carry a gun, and the fact that I
knew how to use the weapon too. The fact
that we actually were had a shooting team, and our own range at school was a
concept that to them was as foreign as snow in The Simpson desert.
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| droƫ Wors: Photo: http://munchiesbiltong.wozaonline.co.za |
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| Biltong: Photo: http://munchiesbiltong.wozaonline.co.za |
Much of what they had simply
assumed as ‘research’ in my work, was real life experience, and knowledge. I
was suddenly an alien to them, because to my passive and peaceful friends, this
was a part of me I had never revealed before, and by then I had known some
close on ten years…without conscious effort, I had blended into the society I
was in now.
But what if you can’t?
What if you have a
compulsion so strong that you would say ‘damn you’ to society, and just do what
you wanted... or were driven to do?
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| http://www.darylvisser.com |
In Shooting Butterflies, two
of my characters, Buffel and Shilo Jamison, are involved in horrendous war
crimes against humanity. But once the war is over, they integrate into society
once more. Well one of them does… and you learn that he’s a good man, a man of
heart, courage and honour. But the other one, he is caught between the belief
of an ancient culture and religion, and what’s acceptable to modern society.
But the conviction to hunt down the butterfly is stronger than the pull of
society and you travel the slippery road of PTSD with him. And along the way
you meet some pretty strong other characters who will try and stop him killing
the butterfly.
This is the official blurb
for Shooting Butterflies:
He sees ‘the butterfly’ in his dreams.
She is the key to setting a child’s soul
free.
She is the perfect sacrifice.
Ex-soldier Kirkman ‘Buffel’ Potgieter
lives by the motto of his former military unit: Tiri Tose, which is Shona for ‘we are together’…but also for ‘there
is no escape’. So when Shilo Jamison Khumalo betrays Buffel by saving a
neighbour’s child, Tara Wright, from becoming the latest addition to his
sinister ‘butterfly’ collection, it sparks Buffel’s obsession with hunting them
both down.
After Tara witnesses the murder of her
father and uncle, she and her remaining family leave Zimbabwe for a new life in
South Africa. There, a teenaged Tara meets Wayne Botha, but finds she isn’t
prepared for the price she is asked to pay for falling in love. After Tara
secretly flees the conservative rural community, Wayne never gives up hope of
ever seeing his one true love again.
But years later, out of the blue, Tara makes contact
with Wayne to reveal a secret and some potentially devastating news. In a twist
of fate, Wayne and Jamison find they have far more in common than just a
passion for African wildlife and join forces to protect Wayne’s new family. But
the threat of Buffel is still looming and Jamison knows only too well that
there will be ‘no escape’ for him and Tara, ‘The Butterfly’.
I’m writing this on a day
when I am as hyped up and totally amazed that I have been nominated for the
People Choice Award, in the Queensland Literary Awards. This is an amazing
recognition for my previous book, My Brother-But-One and
I am grateful and humbled by this, but I’m also looking at it as the ultimate
in an acceptance of me, the person, as a ‘fair dinkum’ Queenslander. So now I can finally call Australia home,
despite the accent! LOL... If you are an Aussie, the public get to vote for
your favourite book, would love it if you
could nip over and cast your vote for me.
So its my turn to give away
a book… as I have won a number from this very blog, and loved every one! My new book Shooting Butterflies, published
by Harlequin Mira will be released on 1st December 2014, if you
would like to win a copy please comment below and we will draw the winner tomorrow evening. And when I get copies, I will sure be sending the winner out one...
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| http://www.darylvisser.com |
Thanks for visiting with me
and thank you again Rachel, for having me on this blog!
Thanks for dropping by, Tina! And if anyone wants to check out Tina's new book, you can find it at Harlequin, Amazon, iTunes, Booktopia, Kobo, and, if you live Down Under, you'll find it on the shelves of Target, K-Mart, Big W and all good bookstores!
