Never Sharpen a Boomerang

About the Book

Never Sharpen a Boomerang is a novel about an international conspiracy to split Australia into two separate countries, which involves powerful, highly placed people in America, Britain, Japan, and China.

For security reasons in the Asia Pacific region, America wants the conspiracy stopped at all costs.

During a secret visit to Australia, a Deputy Director of the American CIA is accidentally killed on a marlin fishing boat off the country's rugged north west coast. His death sparks a chain of events that threatens to cause military conflict between America and China on Australian soil.

Dan Holland, a journalist and former editor of TIME Australia magazine, has just resigned his position as chief media adviser to the Australian Prime Minister.

But despite leaving the media and politics behind him, Holland reluctantly becomes embroiled in the separatist conspiracy and all the dangers associated with it. Holland also has a brother who is a federal politician, who becomes an unwitting participant in the conspiracy.

The skullduggery and intrigue driving the book is made even more compelling by Holland's internal conflict between his desire to drop out of politics, his patriotic duty to help destroy the conspiracy, and his loyalty to his brother.

The book is set in a political climate where there is increasing public discontent with Australia's perceived lap-dog relationship with the USA. Many Australians believe their country is becoming little more than the 51st state of America. An equal number however, strongly believe that without America, Australia cannot ensure its future independence. For them, questioning Australia's alliance with America is like sharpening a boomerang.

Much of the novel's action takes place in the spectacular Kimberley wilderness of Australia's north west, and in the nearby historic pearling port of Broome.

About the Author

Roger McAuliffe is a freelance journalist and scriptwriter. In writing Never Sharpen a Boomerang, he has drawn on his bushcraft and survival training experience in Australia's Kimberley wilderness, and his years working in Canberra, the nation's political capital. He lives in Australia's Southern Highlands, between Sydney and Canberra, where he paints landscapes when he's not writing.