Author Talk with Paula Beavan

Join us for an author talk with Paula Beavan, speaking about her latest title ‘Rebel Spirits’!

Paula J Beavan has been an avid reader since childhood, growing up on a small property in the Hunter Valley, where she rode horses, mustered cattle, and listened to the stories of local farriers, cattlemen, and farmers. A serendipitous discovery of family connections to early settler William Harpur of Oswald, along with a link to a transported convict assigned to a property near Singleton, deepened her curiosity about the past. Inspired by these connections, Paula now writes stories that bring to life the struggles and triumphs of Australia’s colonial era.

Rebel Spirits is an Australian historical novel with elements of mystery and romance. Irish immigrant Ellen Maguire is struggling to hold her family together as their roadside inn, The Harp and Hound, slides toward ruin. With the railway bypassing their village and her father lost in grief, Ellen turns to an illicit solution — distilling poteen from her grandmother’s old remedy book — never imagining where the venture will take her. When injured Englishman Jack Bell stumbles into her life searching for his missing niece, Ellen offers him shelter, unaware that his mission is entwined with her own growing danger.