Stranger than fiction
Novice author en route from Jakarta to Las Vegas to collect an international writing prize is almost killed in a car crash.
It sounds like the opening of a thriller but it actually happened to Warragul teacher and author Peter Wells last October.
He and his 11-year-old son Asher were in a taxi on the way to the Jakarta airport when it collided with a dump truck.
In a crowded conference room in Las Vegas, guests assembled for the announcement of the winner of the Clive Cussler Adventure Writers Competition were told the prize-winning author of The Kingdom of the Air had been seriously injured.
"All of us are saddened and shocked that C.T. Wells and his son Asher couldn't make it tonight,” said author Jeff Edwards, a previous winner, who accepted the award on Mr Wells’ behalf.
Mr Wells, who was principal of an international school in East Java, suffered abdominal and spinal injuries and is still in rehabilitation.
The family moved back to Warragul earlier this year. Asher has made a full recovery and returned to school and Mr Wells hopes to return to teaching at Chairo Christian College next term.
While it’s been difficult to concentrate on his writing, with everything that’s happened, he has begun work on his next novel, a sequel to The Kingdom of the Air.
The first novel is a historical thriller, set in wartime England as the Battle of Britain rages. A young German pilot is shot down over Dartmoor, captured and returned to occupied France having made an impossible deal with the British.
Competition director Peter Greene said of it: “It soars from page to page, from impossible, heartwrenching situations to a surprising climax.
“Adventure fans and history buffs will revel in this recreation of one of the darkest times in world history.”
The manuscript had already won Queensland’s CALEB Prize for unpublished fiction in 2014.
“It’s been great to see the book gather momentum,” Mr Wells said.
Although it’s his first novel, he’s been dabbling for years. “I was an English teacher for years. It was always on my bucket list to write a novel.”
He did a lot of research into the Battle of Britain and the period. “It’s of great interest to me. The stakes were so high. It’s a very compelling period of history.”
When he writes, he has two screens one, one for writing, and the other for research.
“I’m very visual. I like to know what clothes they are wearing, what the aircraft are like.
“It’s the details that enrich it, although it’s also essential to maintain the pace in a thriller.”
“Here’s hoping,” he says of the prospects for the novel being filmed, “but it’s going to need a huge budget.”
The Kingdom of the Air was published by Rhiza Press in April and is available in paperback and ebook from Amazon.