I am a writer, composer and performer resident in Australia since 1982, born in South Africa.

For twenty-five years I balanced concurrent lives in the arts and information technology. Music eventually won the day, and I went on to lead the world-jazz group MOSAIC on six national and international tours and three CDs.

I had written many short pieces, poems, articles and song lyrics when the call of my first book, The Silver Tea Service, took hold in a serious way, driven by curiosity about the mysterious ruin of my illustrious great grandfather. An epic search brought me face to face with unpalatable facts about my heritage. It also cast a more nuanced light on the strange family I’d so deftly left behind: my mother, the angel, and my father, the villain who imposed a decades-long multiracial ménage a troix on our family in Apartheid South Africa. Tricky.

From 2014 to 2016 I attended retreats and several workshops led by author Joanne Fedler. She offered me a mentorship. In 2016 I received a two-week writer’s residency in the USA, and my first book, a blend of memoir and cultural heritage fiction, took flight. The Silver Tea Service was published in 2019 by the kind press, and launched at events in Sydney, Cape Town and Auckland. It is distributed by Booktopia and available in print and digital formats.

My research bore additional fruit, including insights into the complex, contentious politics of South Africa, and an ongoing fascination with the ironies of history in the area of racial discrimination. It uncovered my 7th great grandmother, Anna of Bengal, a slave who arrived in the Dutch Cape Colony in 1696. Her insistent whispers grew to a clamour and it became clear she would provide the basis for my next book. I completed the manuscript in 2023 and am working towards publication in 2024.I am a member of Writing NSW and the Australian Society of Authors.

I have commenced research on my next book, also a work of historical fiction, set in Australia.