Shirley LaPlanche – writer’s statement on her new book, THE FATAL PATH

This is my bucket list book – the novel I always wanted to write before I die. I’ve been a journalist, travel writer, photographer and I have written a non fiction book called ‘Stepping Lightly On Australia- A Traveller’s Guide to Eco Tourism’ (Harper  Collins). In this novel I’ve let my imagination fly and its pure fiction. My friends are surprised by how dark it is but as all writers know, what is inside doesn’t necessarily show on the outside. This book is about the psychological undercurrents that run in families and, in my story specifically, between twin girls.

I like to describe my book as being about innocence and evil. It starts with a killing by an assassin not yet revealed. Then you meet twin girls whose lives are changed forever when one learns a shocking family secret. Their parents are creative, loving and unfaithful in their marriage. Can the love the twins share survive the lies, the competition, the lovers and the damage? How far should ambition be allowed to go? The sessions one twin has with a psychiatrist add illumination as demons surface and power scenarios play out. Dare you travel with the twins from their home in Sydney and the southern beaches to the US and England. A reviewer in the Weekend Australian said this novel is “ripe for a TV series but not for airing on family channels”. I don’t totally agree with this because although the people may deceive each other there is no blood and guts, no broken bodies lying about and no explicit sex.

THE FATAL PATH has been published by the MoshShop and is widely available online as an ebook and also as a paperback with Booktopia, Amazon and also from her website at 

https://www.shirleylaplanche.com.au/

26  October 2021