Meet the Author: Shelley Burr

Shelley Burr is an Australian author who is an international bestseller and award winner. When not writing, Shelley is working to establish a small permaculture farm and is studying agriculture at the University of New England, with a focus on soil science. She is an alumnus of the ACT Writers' Hardcopy program (2018) and a Varuna fellow.

Wake was a Top Five bestseller, won the CWA Debut Dagger Award in 2019, was shortlisted for the Indie Book Awards Debut Novel Award, the Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award and the Bath Novel Award. Shelley also won the ABIA's 2023 Matt Richell Award for New Writer of the Year for Wake. Shelley's latest, Murder Town is published in the UK by Hodder & Stoughton in December 2023 and is also available from our catalogue.

Who were your influences as you were growing up and what part did books play in your early life?

I was born in Newcastle, NSW and grew up there with my mother and brother, but also spent a good chunk of time with my father and grandparents on their property outside Glenrowan, Victoria.

My father is a big science fiction and fantasy reader, and raiding his bookshelves meant that I read a lot of Anne McCaffrey, Raymond E. Feist, Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov growing up. These days I’ve noticed more and more crime fiction appearing on his shelves.

My maternal grandmother also encouraged a love of reading. She wasn’t a big reader herself but knew it was important to me, so visiting libraries around Newcastle was our special time together.

What was your path to publication?

I didn’t pursue the arts/writing as a career from a young age. I’ve always loved to write, but considered it a hobby. I studied commerce at university, then worked in the public service as an accountant and later in environmental policy. Writing was something I did for myself at night or on weekends.

I started writing Wake because it was a story that would not leave me alone until I got it onto the page. It was the first full novel I finished, and polished to the point I thought it could be worth pursuing publication.

To that end, I submitted it to several unpublished manuscript awards. It won one, the CWA Debut Dagger, and was shortlisted for the Bath Novel Award and an Australian award, the Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award.

I then met my agent, Sarah McKenzie, at a pitching event run by the Australian Society of Authors. After some more edits she submitted the manuscript to publishers in Australia. Three publishers were interested, which meant I got to choose the right home for it, which is a real privilege. My Australian publisher was so keen they showed the manuscript to their UK counterpart Hodder & Stoughton so they could present a joint offer, which is how I came to be published in the UK.

Your debut, Wake, won the CWA Debut Dagger. How did you cope with the sudden transition from debut author to 'international bestseller'?

The Dagger really marked the moment writing went from my private hobby to something I was ‘known’ for. That was an odd transition! At the same time, I still had to get on the bus that day, go to work and write a report on meat exports.

Living in a small town keeps me grounded. Very few people here are impressed by me. I think I’m better known for the time I left a gate open and let all my neighbour’s cows out.

Wake has several twists. Are you a plotter with everything mapped out or do you let the story develop as you write it?

I’m a big plotter. I like to start with a detailed outline, and refer back to it constantly while writing my first draft. I’m working on the outline for book three right now, and can’t imagine working any other way.

Can you tell us a little about Murder Town and how it was to write?

Murder Town is set in the fictional town of Rainier, which was terrorised by a series of murders in the early 2000s. The town’s name is now inextricably linked to the ‘Rainier Ripper’, and everyone who lives there still grapples with the trauma of what happened.

Now in economic decline, the town is approached with a proposal: let a ‘dark tourism’ company run a walking tour of the murder sites. This will bring desperately needed customers to the town’s struggling businesses but means trading on the memory of their lost friends and family. Before they can come to a decision, the tour operator is murdered in a way eerily reminiscent of the first Rainier Ripper murder. The initial idea for Murder Town was sparked when I read this article about Snowtown, South Australia. The fictional Rainier Ripper murders are not in any way based on the tragic events in Snowtown, but the present-day circumstances in Rainier and the terrible choice they’re facing are directly inspired by the questions posed in the article.

How did the character of PI Lane Holland take shape in your mind?

In Wake, the character of Mina McCreery came to me first. I needed a character to shake her out of her self-enforced isolation and set the story in motion.

I read an article about an unusual type of private investigator, who make their living solving crimes where the police have offered a reward for information. These investigators are generally older, often retired police officers. I wanted Lane to be close in age to Mina, so I needed a reason why a younger person would have all the necessary skills and education to solve crimes, but chose to walk this precarious path over a safe career in the police.

Is there anything you can share with us about your latest project?

Here’s what I can tell you about book three:

• Lane is the main character.
• It’s set on a farm in the Murray River region, very different to the farm setting of Wake.
• It grapples with the question: what is the line between an intentional community and a cult?

Outside of your writing career you have an interest in permaculture. How did that come about?

When I was growing up my grandparents had a property outside of Glenrowan. They grew a lot of their own food in gardens and an orchard, and kept chickens and goats. My husband also grew up on a bush block. Getting to grow up that connected to where food really comes from was special, and we wanted our family to have that too.

I’m really interested in soil, and I’m slowly working my way through a graduate certificate with a focus on soil science. It’s a precious resource, and caring for it is satisfying work. I’m really grateful that writing has allowed me space to work on it.

One book, piece of music or work of art that everyone should experience?

Melissa Lucashenko’s book Too Much Lip. A really gripping noir story and family saga, set on Bunjalung country. It rightfully won the Stella Prize, a major Australian award for women writers.

Can you tell us one thing about yourself that your readers may not know?

I love horror storytelling but I’m too much of a wuss to watch horror movies. I love to hear other people talk about them, so I’ll happily sit while a friend gushes about a great movie they just saw, or listen to podcasts and videos dissecting them.