In Conversation with Geoff Parkes

The heritage-listed location of ‘Collins Booksellers on Lydiard’ is a book lover’s paradise. With the wooden ﬂoors, old style bookcases, heritage style counter and open ﬁreplaces, adults and children alike are able to step back in time and enjoy the simple pleasure of browsing the pages of their next favourite book.The historic building, belonging to the Old Colonists Association of Ballarat, dates from 1888. It is glorious to look at and to wander into with a façade of architectural significance derived from Renaissance design.Set over four historical shop fronts with internal walkways connecting each, there are sections dedicated to fiction, non-fiction and children’s/young adult respectively. A place for everyone!

Collins Booksellers on Lydiard

Join us for an evening with author Geoff Parkes to discuss his debut crime novel set in 1980's New Zealand.

Seminar Theatre, Federation University Technology Park, SMB Campus

We are delighted to be hosting an evening with Geoff Parkes in Ballarat.'When The Deep Dark Bush Swallows You Whole' is set in 1980s in a small rural town in New Zealand and is rural noir with a twist! Geoff grew up in the area of New Zealand where the book is set and worked in a wool presser in his early years which helped form the setting for this novel (minus the crime!). About 'When The Deep Dark Bush Swallows You Whole':It’s January 1983. During his university summer break, Ryan Bradley returns to the remote town of Nashville in New Zealand’s rugged King Country. It’s a bittersweet trip: he’s working long, punishing hours as a woolpresser, he needs to sell his late mother’s house, and he’s increasingly feeling like an outcast in his childhood town. But mostly he’s haunted by memories of Sanna Sovernen, a Finnish backpacker and his secret lover, who worked with him in the shearing shed the summer before - then vanished without trace. Now Sanna’s sister Emilia has arrived from Finland, determined to get answers - and as he’s the workmate who reported Sanna missing, she wants Ryan’s help. Because Emilia knows her sister was not the first female traveller in the area to disappear . . . About Geoff Parkes:Born and raised in rural New Zealand, Geoff Parkes now lives in Melbourne. For the last twelve years he’s written a weekly opinion column for The Roar, Australia’s leading on-line sports website. This is his first novel.

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