Rhiannon’s Last Look, getting closer!

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I don’t have much more to tell you regarding the progress of Rhiannon’s Last Look but it will be ready on 2 November as promised! You can pre-order the Kindle version now, and I am hoping the print pre-orders will be available in the next couple of weeks.

This is Book 5 in the Rhiannon Series is described as ‘a real page turner up until the last page’.

‘It is great, really loved it.’

‘I can’t wait to get it off a shelf somewhere and say, I know this author!’

How many times a day does the thought ‘if only’ run through our minds?

When Detective Rhiannon McVee’s young prodigy Constable Zoe Chesney disappears in the remote Australian outback, she is faced with the biggest ‘if only’ of her career.

If only she could untangle the web of murder, lies and deceit her missing people have weaved before it’s too late.

If only. If only.

What happens when a family member goes missing?

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When someone goes missing, your life is forever changed

I received an email the other day from a German exchange student from my old high school, Antje. She sent me photos of the fun and good times we had, aged 17 going on 18, some of which are too much 80s classic to share!!

This is a photo at Antje’s deb ball, with me on one side and my best friend in the whole world, Rellie, on the other. The camera man behind us? The crime writer in me goes straight to stalker vibes!

Keeping in mind we would only ever get one shot at the photo, nobody could ever check if our eyes were open, or if it was our best angle – in every photo I’m smiling, happy, joyous and having the time of my life.

Yet, how could I be so happy, when just a couple of years earlier my beautiful cousin Ursula had gone missing and still hadn’t come home?

I know the answer, and it’s largely through writing so extensively about missing people in my seven novels I have discovered an even deeper understanding of this.

We all face trauma in our lives, in one form or another. Sometimes our trauma is so traumatic, we wonder how we can go on. For family and friends of a missing person, the continual loop of not knowing, referred to as ‘ambiguous loss’ is one of the worst traumas imaginable.

I still remember the awful, debilitating feeling of when it dawned upon our family that Ursula was ‘missing’. I also remember the awful, heartbreaking day when Ursula’s Mum, my Aunty Cheree, arrived in hysterics to tell us she knew in her heart that Ursula was dead. This was when I was 20, and Ursula had been missing for five years.

But Aunty Cheree also set the tone for the whole family, insisting we always put our best foot forward. She had a wicked sense of humour and told side-splitting stories. I’m not even halfway as entertaining or funny as she was but she did teach me to seek laughter above sadness.

When Ursula went missing I surrounded myself with my friends and did what all teenagers do – kept incredibly busy, laughed until my belly and cheeks hurt, made new friendships like the one with Antje, and held on tight to my closest friends like Rellie.

At some point I believe we make a conscious choice not to let our trauma define us completely.

This is why, when you read one of my crime fiction novels, I won’t let you linger too long on the trauma or devastation of my characters who are affected so terribly, in many different ways, by not knowing what has happened to their missing person.

We all need put our big girl pants on, walk into the void, follow our dreams and seek out happiness wherever we can find it. Not only for ourselves, but to honour the memories of our missing loved ones and the joy they brought to our lives.

Melissa x

Soggy spring provides outback crime novel inspiration

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In Australia it’s been raining. A lot. The impact has been devastating for many communities, and I am among those who have been significantly impacted. But if there is one thing I’ve learnt having grown up on the land and living a big part of my life in rural Australia – you can’t control the weather.

However, you can use it for inspiration in your next crime novel.

I am taking my sweet time with the new crime fiction novel which Candice Fox and I planned on a napkin during the Sisters in Crime festival weekend, and it’s a whole new experience for me. Despite being tempted to launch in and write randomly every spare moment I have, I am holding onto the incredible opportunity of being around seven of Australia’s top crime writers for a whole weekend (for those who are new, check out my website for the full story). Even though Sulari Gentill seems to be able to write brilliant books as a ‘pantser’, I’m determined to change my approach and put the time into figuring out what is going to happen and when. It’s already made a big difference to how the story is evolving, and I’m finding plot holes and fixing them before I’m knee deep in them!

Forget dry dusty outback scenes, this crime novel will show a whole other side of the Australian outback in flood.

Although water is life and people in these far-flung Australian landscapes have lived through more droughts than they’d care to remember, there are so many devastating and heartbreaking stories that are not being told in the news from this flood so I will be using these as inspiration in my narrative. Like the family who have not been able to return to their home for several months because the roads are cut off by floodwaters, only to discover when a neighbour flew over in a helicopter that their beautiful homestead which they had been hoping was spared was under water. Then having to wait for goodness knows how long for the water to recede to go in an assess the damage.

Or the families who haven’t left their remote properties in months and are getting groceries and mail via helicopter, and are spending their days waist deep in water trying to save their livestock while dead animals float by. Whole towns are cut off, entire crops have been wiped out, and all the rural businesses who rely on being able to move around and get from here to there have ceased trading.

All the while watching the skies and wishing it would stop bloody raining!

Please don’t despair though, there are flood stories that will warm your heart and give you faith in humanity again – but then again, it is a crime novel so be prepared for a plot twist you didn’t see coming!

Meet the author: Melissa Pouliot Search for Sky

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Australian crime thriller fiction writer and bestselling author Melissa Pouliot is releasing her much awaited sixth crime thriller mystery novel, Search for Sky.
To kick this book baby into the world, I am going to be lurking in my favourite bookstore in the whole world on launch day.
Please feel free to come and hang out with me in Collins Merimbula next Tuesday 22-2-22 between 10 and 12. Extra points if you bring coffee! (PS I also like cake!)
Collins Merimbula have been super fans of my work since I published Write About Me in 2013.
They have had my crime thriller fiction books on their shelves ever since, and encouraged me to keep writing, and a whole lot more. And now they’ve taken on the distribution of my print books Write About Me & Found from The Missing Series, along with Find Me, When You Find Me, You’ll Never Find Me & Search for Sky from The Rhiannon Series. This is an absolute blessing for anyone who understands how much coordination goes into mailouts!
Over the next few months I will be involved in a range of book events around Merimbula, Tathra and the Bega Valley and if you would like me to come and speak at your book club, social gathering or bookish event, please don’t be afraid to ask.
  • Did you know I have created questions and answers for Book Clubs? I absolutely love Book Clubs, as I used to have one of my own. It expanded my depth and knowledge of books so much, plus it was a whole lot of fun! And discovering new authors was such a delight! Check out my book club Q&A page, and if you have any questions to add, get in touch!

Search for Sky coming soon

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Missing people, the stark landscape of the Australian outback and the police system in the mid 90s combine for Melissa Pouliot’s next page-turning crime novel, Search for Sky. The fourth instalment in the Rhiannon Series picks up the story of detective Rhiannon McVee who has made a name for herself with her new approach to investigating missing persons cases. Her approach is simple – find them – but it’s not how the culture of the police system works. When someone starts leaving clues in the remote outback, leading Rhiannon closer and closer to a suspected serial killer, will the next body she discovers be the people she is searching for, or someone else?

Search for Sky is my much awaited sixth book after I took a break from writing when Kings Cross Detectives found my cousin Ursula in 2017 after a 30 year search.

Prior to that I released a book a year in an effort to keep public scrutiny on the disappearance of Ursula in 1987 when we were teenagers.

I’m thrilled to back into my fiction writing after taking a break. It has been a fairly intense few years for everyone that I know. For me, discovering what happened to Ursula and going through the coronial process, bushfires, COVID and moving house created the (im)perfect storm. Every time I tried to pick up this book which I started in 2017, the words wouldn’t come. It’s an age-old excuse for writers, but life definitely got in the way!

What is it about?

Hope can come from the most surprising of places.

In Australia Ayala Philips is still missing.
So is Keely Johnson.
So are thousands of others.
Their cases are getting colder and Rhiannon McVee’s hopes of solving them are fading.

When someone starts leaving clues in the remote Australian outback, leading Rhiannon closer and closer to a suspected serial killer, will the next body she discovers be Ayala, Keely or someone else?

Crime fiction inspired by real life, written by the cousin of one of Australia’s most compelling and heartbreaking missing persons cases.