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While living in Singapore for a few years her short stories Award winning Australian author Alison Stuart always wanted to be a writer. As a teenager she scribbled turgid historical novels in shorthand notebooks, some of which are still in existence. Only when she dislocated a shoulder in a skiing accident, which left her stranded in a snow bound chalet in the Australian Alps with nothing for company but a notebook computer, did she dare to write the story that had been tugging at her sleeve for so long.
Her family moved from Kenya, where she had been born, to Australia in the late 1960s. Alison had imagined Australia as a place where kangaroos roamed the streets (just as, no doubt, children in Australia imagined Africa as a place where lions roamed the streets), but the inner suburbs of Perth seemed short of roving marsupials.
She studied Law and Arts at university and has worked all her life as a lawyer, both in private practice and in a range of different organizations including the military and the emergency services and a fatal attraction for men in uniform (including her husband) may explain her leaning towards soldier heroes!
Prior to publication Alison had been a finalist in competitions, including the shortlist of the Catherine Cookson Fiction Prize. In 2007 her first two novels BY THE SWORD and THE KING’S MAN were published. BY THE SWORD won the 2008 Eppie Award for Best Historical Romance.
These days Alison is writing full time and is officially an empty nester, with a wonderfully supportive husband (and resident military expert) and two needy cats to keep her company.
Visit Alison Stuart at http://www.alisonstuart.com
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