I’m delighted to welcome as my guest this week, Liza Perrat, who’s going to tell us about the perils of magpies, to coincide with the release of her 1970s medical drama set in Australia, The Swooping Magpie. Never having heard of this scary form of magpie I asked Liza to give me the low-down.
Liza is an ex-pat Aussie who has been living in France for twenty years. She grew up in Australia, working as a general nurse and midwife. As well as being a successful novelist she draws on her nursing background to work as a part-time medical translator.
Over to Liza –
My book title might pique your curiosity but without giving away the storyline, I’ll say that swooping magpies have a become a real, and dangerous, problem for Australians.
From September to November each year in eastern Australia it’s magpie madness time. During this nesting season, magpies can transform into black-and-white flashing missiles, swooping down on unsuspecting humans and causing painful and dangerous injuries.
It has been reported that walking adults are rarely attacked, but children are, with boys – the main rock and stick throwers – prime targets, along with cyclists, joggers and post-persons.
The attacking bird is typically male, gliding down silently onto its victim from behind. They also dive bomb, using their full bodyweight to slam into the back of the intruder’s neck or head. Apparently it looks good to the females when they chase away this big predator.
It seems that some birds cannot be persuaded to change their ways: one man said he had been attacked as a boy and the same bird was still dive bombing him twenty-five years later!
Unfortunately, aggressive magpies represent a serious human–wildlife conflict that is not easily reconciled. In advice to people worried about magpie attacks, BirdLife Australia says it’s important to remember that magpies are native wildlife, so it is illegal to harm them. And that they only swoop for a few weeks during nesting season – mainly to protect the fledglings that have just left the nest.
The simplest solution is to avoid the area for a few weeks but if this isn’t possible, try waving a stick above your head. Cyclists have had some success attaching rigid plastic strips to their helmets, which project 10 -15cm above the head.
Dramatic as these attacks certainly are, my novel, The Swooping Magpie is not really a novel about dive-bombing birds. Rather it explores a young girl’s heartbreaking drama of lost innocence and deceit, amidst a scandal that shook Australia.
Liza kindly offered to whet your appetite with an extract from The Swooping Magpie.
I wrinkle my nostrils against the caustic smell of cat piss as we pick our way across the filthy footpath to the black gate.
My mother steps aside as the high gate creaks open, nods at me to go through. I scowl, don’t move.
‘You heard what your father said, Lindsay.’
With a sigh, I push past her.
The storm flushed away, the humidity has seeped back into the air at this tail-end of another scalding Australian summer. There’s no warmth in me though, only ice-blocks freezing my insides so that I become so cold I can’t stop shivering.
It’s not just the fear that sets me quaking, but the helplessness too. Like when I was a kid about to launch myself down the slippery dip. I’d hesitate, knowing that once I slid off there was no turning back, even if the metal burned my bum raw, or that once I reached the bottom I’d tumble forwards and scrape my knees.
My mother nudges me ahead of her. I don’t realise it yet, and I won’t speak of the whole sorry tale for years to come, since every time I thought about it, the memories would leave me frustrated, sad and angry, but I would recall walking through those black iron gates as crossing the threshold into the darkest hell.
Liza is the author of the historical The Bone Angel series. The first, Spirit of Lost Angels, is set in 18th century revolutionary France. The second, Wolfsangel, is set during the WW2 Nazi Occupation and the French Resistance, and the third novel – Blood Rose Angel –– is set during the 14th century Black Plague years. (CLARE – I’ve read Blood Rose Angel and loved it)
The first book in Liza’s new Australian series, The Silent Kookaburra, published in November, 2016, is a psychological suspense set in 1970s Australia.
Liza is a co-founder and member of the writers’ collective Triskele Books and also reviews books for Bookmuse.
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