Two books, two awards for author

AUTHOR: Stephen Daisley signs a book for Mary Bryan. PICTURE / PAUL BROOKS

Stephen Daisley has recently received his second literary award, for his second published book.
His first, Traitor, took the Australian Prime Minister's Literary Award for Fiction in 2011, and recently, Coming Rain won the fiction category of the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards.
Two published books, two awards. It's pretty good for a lad who was raised in Raetihi and has spent most of his life doing the kind of work his characters do.
He's done five years as a soldier in the New Zealand Army, been shearing, driving trucks, cutting scrub, delivering papers, construction work ... and a bit of writing on the sly. Even so, he was 55 before he published Traitor.
He and his wife Sylvia live in Kalamunda near Perth, Western Australia, where she runs a small retail business called Elsewhere Clothing. The shop is the main income earner, but with Stephen's two literary awards behind him, that could change.
Stephen was in Whanganui recently, and on Friday, September 2, he spoke in front of a capacity audience in the Opera House annex at an event organised by the Whanganui Literary Festival Trust.
Chairs were laid out amphitheatre-style, facing two chairs against a side wall. The servery became a bar, staffed by Opera House people Doug Simpson and Shirna Matthews, serving beer, wine and soft drinks.
Among the audience were friends and relatives of the author, including good mate and old army buddy Adrian Firmin, who opening the proceedings after a word from Gillian Tasker, Whanganui Literary Festival chairperson.
Warm, friendly, well-read, articulate and entertaining, Stephen told stories about his life and his writing in what was meant to be a question and answer session. In reality, he held the floor, reading from his books, talking about other novelists and poets and demonstrating his love for the written word. Occasionally he would pause, sit down and look to the "interviewer" for the next question.
He quoted poets and philosophers, the next minute talking about how he grew up reading westerns by JT Edson and Louis L'Amour. Just as we like our successful people to be, he is self-deprecating, modest, humble. Some things he wouldn't talk about in any depth, like his time with the army in Singapore. At that juncture he looked at Adrian, a not-so-subtle message passing between them and the subject was skated over and he moved on.
He talked of his family and others who have inspired and helped him, some hands-on, some with their writing. Some unwittingly urged him on. His mother, when he told her that he wanted to write, said he would grow out of it. That, he said, added impetus to his desire to be an author.
Stephen is 61 now, in his writing prime and tasting the first fruits of success. He says he is writing his next novel, a work set on the Whanganui River, which we hope will be published by the time of the next Whanganui Literary Festival.
Stephen Daisley has been interviewed by Owen Marshall, one of his own literary heroes, and he has been written about by journalists of repute. Early this month he fought the poor acoustics of the Opera House annex in Whanganui to show his love of language to a crowd of local people who all came to appreciate this "overnight success" from Raetihi.
Copies of his books, published by Melbourne-based Text Publishing Company, were available for sale at the end of the evening.