Bush heritage tied to thrilling novel
AUTHOR Andrew Pfeiffer dips into tales of the Outback and his family history to tell the story of spy Harry Quartermain, a modern thriller that has frightening ties to today’s COVID-19 pandemic.
Pfeiffer stopped in Charters Towers recently, the place where his great grandfather made a name for himself on the goldfields, to discuss the book Quartermain exclusively with the Townsville Bulletin.
A landscape designer, Pfeiffer has lived in Europe, Australia and the Subcontinent where he’s written three books about a subject that has shaped his career.
But his enjoyment of reading sparked a desire to write a book of a different kind.
“I’ve always liked the idea of writing fiction,” he said.
“Its been many years since I wrote my last book, and so I started writing this novel.
“It’s what I call an ecological thriller, because it’s about the impact that humanity has on the environment.”
The novel centres around Harry Quartermain, a halfAustralian, half-french spy who works for the French Secret Service.
Quartermain is called to investigate the crash of a cargo jet carrying vials of a deadly flu pathogen in the South Pacific.
Much of the book is set in Australia, as Quartermain is pursued by the world’s most wanted terrorist, a man he was tasked with catching by the CIA before being sidelined as a loose cannon.
“I’m a boy brought up in the bush,” Pfeiffer said.
“I believe the person you end up being is the person you were for the first 10 years of your life. I’m a boy from Cooma and the Bega Valley.
“It’s the same for Quartermain, he spent the first 10 years of his life living in the bush in Australia, and even though he went to school in France and England, he’s Australian.”
Pfeiffer said his journeys throughout Australia had led him to Charters Towers in the 1980s to see where mining magnate Frederick Pfeiffer built his empire.
He said his father remembered Frederick and some of the stories he was told about the family have found their way into the novel.
“I talk about Lennon’s Hotel in Brisbane and that was the hotel that the Pfeiffers always visited when they were in Brisbane,” he said.
“I find the people that live in the country in Australia are very different to people who live in the city.
“I find when I come back here now, from the city and overseas, that the people I’m at home with most are the people in the bush.”