How a motorbike trip sparked a novel set on the Otago
Two years ago, twenty-four graves were exhumed from a property in Lawrence, including one that contained a woman and a young child. The Androssan Street cemetery had been in use since the early days of the goldrush, when Gabriel Read first discovered gold in Otago in the early 1860s. Author Kirsty Powell has imagined the story of the woman in child in a new book called The Strength of Old Shale. Many parts - and characters - in the book are real. She's woven in the stories told to her by Wally Dalziel, a friend she met on motorcycle trips in China, Peru and Turkey. Wally's ancestors worked the goldfields for years, finally buying the farm he continues to run even now. Kirsty's first novel The Strength of Eggshells won the 2020 New Zealand Booklovers Award for best adult fiction.
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