Settlers in Australia brought European plants with them, often to the ruination of local ecology. Scottish immigrants often planted rowan trees at their doorways to protect against evil. Here's a snippet I wrote this morning — Rosie and Matt are visiting a ruined farm.
“It looks dead.”
“It’s a rowan tree. Quickbeam, from northern Europe. Deciduous, of course. It has new buds, see? Old magic, to mark the threshold, or keep evil away.”
“Didn’t work, really, if she was widowed twice.”
Another excellent but annoying insight. Rosie ignores it.

I started work on a new project today. It's a second mystery / romance set in the Rakali Springs world, and will include some of the characters from Wipptee. The story centres around the arrival of a city girl, Rosie, who is recuperating from illness. When she starts asking questions about her family history trouble follows. 
I've played with some title and cover ideas but it's early days. A silo fire figures in the story, so here's my fancy image of a grain silo. (This is the silo at Temora, New South Wales, original image licenced from iStock).

I'm starting a new blog here today, St Patricks Day 2022. I hope it will be a lucky day for everyone.
My old blog was on Blogger. You can stilll see my historic ramblings there at https://jaibaidell.blogspot.com/. 
This blog will focus more on writing and my books.

Independent publishers like me do all the work! Choosing titles is hard. Deadset Mongrels seemed like a great title for the first Detective Jud Jeffreys book. Australian lingo, atmospheric. But maybe I should have gone with something more evocative, say, The Detective and the Rich Girl. Girl seems to be a popular title ingredient. What do you think?