A beautiful Persian woman and a naive Western man are drawn together by love and desire in the rapidly changing Iran of the 1970s. But their romance is cut short when Manijeh and Ben are cruelly separated by family ties and cultural clashes. Just when all seems lost, violent revolution and political betrayal provide the incentive for them to start again, if they have the courage. In 2010 David Morisset published 'Conquest of the Persian Garden', a romantic thriller set in Iran at the time of the Islamic Revolution. 'Old Shemiran Road' is a thoroughly revised version of that novel. The central...

This revised edition of 'Butchers Parade' includes some new material and minor corrections. Like the original version it adopts a perspective sometimes described as nostalgic realism. It unfolds like a series of black and white photographs depicting a patchwork past. Set in the third quarter of the twentieth century, most of the stories of 'Butchers Parade' take place in Redgate, a meatworks town in Australia's southeast. The narratives are united by the presence of Horrie, a young meatworker, who spends his spare time playing rugby league and drinking at the local pub. Horrie is conscripted...

When a strange creature arrives from outer space and helps the police fight crime, what do you give him as a birthday present? You give him a time-machine. Can you guess where he goes with it? Back to the wild west of course

'Somayyeh' is the story of a beautiful and determined young woman whose quest for love, freedom and happiness pits her against religion-based doctrines of male superiority and an uncompromisingly misogynistic culture. Born into a wealthy family in the Iranian city of Shiraz in 1972, Somayyeh grows to womanhood as revolution brings a fundamentalist Islamic regime to power and a futile war with neighbouring Iraq rages for eight bloody years. When her marriage is destroyed by her husband's reckless infidelity, Somayyeh struggles to come to grips with the harsh realities of divorce while...

'The New Settlement' is a dystopian fantasy set in a fictional Middle Eastern theocracy during the last years of the twenty-first century. Seven decades have gone by since a nuclear war turned parts of Shemesh's homeland into radioactive netherworlds. The narrative highlights humanity's defencelessness against religious extremism, corrupt governments, and the murderous overreach of state-sponsored brutality. Amid the toxic shambles there is a longing for the better days of a possibly imaginary past usually referred to as the times of kings and queens. David Morisset is an Australian writer...