Julieanne MacD

Most writers have quirks; Julieanne’s are as distinct as the sun‑baked landscape she inhabits. She rises before dawn, walks the 500‑metre stretch of sand that leads to the ocean, and drinks a mug of locally sourced coffee brewed with “rainforest rain.” A marketing term for water filtered through the rainforest canopy that the boutique roasters claim gives a subtle, earthy flavour. She then spends three hours scribbling in a battered notebook, always on the porch, where the sea breeze carries the scent of eucalyptus and brine.

Her writing desk is a reclaimed timber slab salvaged from an old wharf, its surface smoothed by the hands of fishermen who once mended nets there. “Every time I tap a key, I hear the echo of those old hands,” she says, “and it reminds me that stories, like boats, need to be sturdy enough to weather the storm.”

When the heat becomes oppressive, Julieanne retreats to the cool shade of the eucalypt canopy, where she reads aloud to the koalas and possums that have made her garden their sanctuary. She believes that “listening to the rustle of leaves is the same as listening to a story’s subtext—quiet, pervasive, and essential.”