About Me
- Satima Flavell
- Perth, Western Australia, Australia
- I am based in Perth, Western Australia. You might enjoy my books - The Dagger of Dresnia, the first book of the Talismans Trilogy, is available at all good online book shops as is Book two, The Cloak of Challiver. Book three, The Seer of Syland, is in preparation. I trained in piano and singing at the NSW Conservatorium of Music. I also trained in dance (Scully-Borovansky, WAAPA) and drama (NIDA). Since 1987 I have been writing reviews of performances in all genres for a variety of publications, including Music Maker, ArtsWest, Dance Australia, The Australian and others. Now semi-retired, I still write occasionally for the ArtsHub website.
My books
The first two books of my trilogy, The Talismans, (The Dagger of Dresnia, and book two, The Cloak of Challiver) are available in e-book format from Smashwords, Amazon and other online sellers. Book three of the trilogy, The Seer of Syland, is in preparation.I also have a short story, 'La Belle Dame', in print - see Mythic Resonance below - as well as well as a few poems in various places.
The best way to contact me is via Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/satimaflavell
Buy The Talismans
The first two books of The Talismans trilogy were published by Satalyte Publications, which, sadly, has gone out of business. However, The Dagger of Dresnia and The Cloak of Challiver are available as ebooks on the usual book-selling websites, and book three, The Seer of Syland, is in preparation.
The easiest way to contact me is via Facebook.
The Dagger of Dresnia

The Cloak of Challiver, Book two of The Talismans

Available as an e-book on Amazon and other online booksellers.
Mythic Resonance
Mythic Resonance is an excellent anthology that includes my short story 'La Belle Dame', together with great stories from Alan Baxter, Donna Maree Hanson, Sue Burstynski, Nike Sulway and nine more fantastic authors! Just $US3.99 from Amazon.
Got a Kindle? Check out Mythic Resonance.
Follow me on Twitter
Share a link on Twitter
For Readers, Writers & Editors
- A dilemma about characters
- Adelaide Writers Week, 2009
- Adjectives, commas and confusion
- An artist's conflict
- An editor's role
- Authorial voice, passive writing and the passive voice
- Common misuses: common expressions
- Common misuses: confusing words
- Common misuses: pronouns - subject and object
- Conversations with a character
- Critiquing Groups
- Does length matter?
- Dont sweat the small stuff: formatting
- Free help for writers
- How much magic is too much?
- Know your characters via astrology
- Like to be an editor?
- Modern Writing Techniques
- My best reads of 2007
- My best reads of 2008
- My favourite dead authors
- My favourite modern authors
- My influential authors
- Planning and Flimmering
- Planning vs Flimmering again
- Psychological Spec-Fic
- Readers' pet hates
- Reading, 2009
- Reality check: so you want to be a writer?
- Sensory detail is important!
- Speculative Fiction - what is it?
- Spelling reform?
- Substantive or linking verbs
- The creative cycle
- The promiscuous artist
- The revenge of omni rampant
- The value of "how-to" lists for writers
- Write a decent synopsis
- Write a review worth reading
- Writers block 1
- Writers block 2
- Writers block 3
- Writers need editors!
- Writers, Depression and Addiction
- Writing in dialect, accent or register
- Writing it Right: notes for apprentice authors
Interviews with authors
My Blog List
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Favourite Sites
- Alan Baxter
- Andrew McKiernan
- Bren McDibble
- Celestine Lyons
- Guy Gavriel Kay
- Hal Spacejock (Simon Haynes)
- Inventing Reality
- Jacqueline Carey
- Jennifer Fallon
- Jessica Rydill
- Jessica Vivien
- Joel Fagin
- Juliet Marillier
- KA Bedford
- Karen Miller
- KSP Writers Centre
- Lynn Flewelling
- Marianne de Pierres
- Phill Berrie
- Ryan Flavell
- Satima's Professional Editing Services
- SF Novelists' Blog
- SF Signal
- Shane Jiraiya Cummings
- Society of Editors, WA
- Stephen Thompson
- Yellow wallpaper
Blog Archive
Places I've lived: Manchester, UK

Places I've lived: Gippsland, Australia

Places I've lived: Geelong, Australia

Places I've lived: Tamworth, NSW

Places I've Lived - Sydney

Sydney Conservatorium - my old school
Places I've lived: Auckland, NZ

Places I've Lived: Mount Gambier

Blue Lake
Places I've lived: Adelaide, SA

Places I've Lived: Perth by Day

From Kings Park
Places I've lived: High View, WV

Places I've lived: Lynton, Devon, UK

Places I've lived: Braemar, Scotland

Places I've lived: Barre, MA, USA

Places I've Lived: Perth by Night

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Wednesday, 4 April 2007
Thick and Fast


I can see my blogging is defeating the capacity of my readers to keep up. That's because new experiences are presenting themselves so often I'm posting far more frequently than usual. Yesterday's New Experience was a whole new country. A very little, blink-and-you'll-miss-it kind of country - Luxemburg.
Elfriede shouted me a coach ride to Luxemburg city from Wiesbaden. Getting to Wiesbaden was an adventure in itself: up at 5.00am (ye gods, I haven't done than since I was in the monastery!) and on the train by 6.15. A hurried dash to the coach, fortunately standing only 30 metres or so from Wiesbaden's lovely railway station. And a three-hour ride through rolling hills dotted with vinyards, villages and glimpses of Father Rhine on our way to meet Mother Mosel.
The Mosel - or Moselle, as most of us would call it - flows from the French alps through Luxemburg to meet the Rhine at Koblenz. She is loved by people of all three countries for her charm and benificence. In these river valleys, winters are mild and spring is utterly gorgeous. Right now the magnolias and tulips hold sway, but hyacinths, daffodils and primroses are still much in evidence and the smaller trees are just starting to green up. The forests are still drowsy, though, and except for the firs, the big trees are bare.
Forestry here is very different from that of southern Australia, where monoculture of Pinus Radiata or Redgum is the norm and public access is restricted. Here the forests belong to the people. Stands of fir and beech jostle with the tall, straight oaks that form the principle crop and here and there one can spot a copse of silver birch shining in the still-wintry sunlight. There are plenty of pathways for hikers and trampers to use and even this early in the season they are put to good use. Elfriede belongs to a walking group and almost every weekend they go "wandering" in the forests.
Luxemburg city, however, is not in the forest. It is centred on a huge rocky hill that for centuries stood impregnable, as it is guarded by a deep ravine. Today the ravine is bridged and its other bank bears the weight of New Europe - modern buildings of glass and steel overshadow the older part of the city, which dates back to Roman times and probably earlier. The old part, of course, is the part I liked best. We have glass and steel a-plenty in the Land of Oz. What Aussies of European or Asian descent lack is access to the history of their ancestral homelands before their forebears travelled south.
A hop-on, hop-off bus tour with multi-lingual recorded commentaries accessed with headphones enabled Elfriede and me to get a quick overview of the city and its history. We did a hop-off at the Chemin de la Corniche, which overlooks the impressive ravine and its fortifications, and from there we shanks-ponied it to the wonderful old St Michael's church and the National Museum of History and Art.
A word about churches here: every single one I've been in - and I've seen a dozen or more now - has had devotees sitting or kneeling quietly, undisturbed by the presence of tourists. In the Rhine Valley, bells ring out every morning and the faithful are called to prayer. Religion is not dead in Europe; far from it.
My religion, however, makes room for history. Respect for those who have gone before and for their works forms a large part of my personal ethic, so visiting a museum is, to me, almost as meaningful as kneeling in a house of worship. In the Luxembourg Musée I found plenty of things to honour. Grave goods, tools and household effects from not only the Middle Ages but also Roman days are impressively displayed and described in French, German and English. The very best exhibit we saw was a complete
Roman mosaic floor, found in excellent condition in 1995 and skilfully shifted and restored to be displayed in its own balconied gallery at the Museum. I was happily snapping photos when an official came along and explained, very kindly, that photography was prohibited. He didn't make me delete the ones I'd already taken, but in any case I later purchased, for only €1, a brochure with a much better picture than I ever could have captured. The subject matter is the Nine Muses, demi-deities close to my heart, with eight of them circling the figures of the ninth, Calliope. She sits in discourse with Homer, who must be the earliest known fantasy writer:-) I gave thanks at a Jupiter shrine on our way out.
After a very pleasant lunch served in the museum's café by a tri-lingual waiter (I ordered in French, he spoke with Elfriede in German and when he came back he addressed us in perfect English!) we re-boarded the bus for a final round before catching our coach outside the Grand Ducal Palace, a tastefully restrained but very lovely edifice, for the four-hour journey back to the Rheingau. What a wonderful day!
Elfriede shouted me a coach ride to Luxemburg city from Wiesbaden. Getting to Wiesbaden was an adventure in itself: up at 5.00am (ye gods, I haven't done than since I was in the monastery!) and on the train by 6.15. A hurried dash to the coach, fortunately standing only 30 metres or so from Wiesbaden's lovely railway station. And a three-hour ride through rolling hills dotted with vinyards, villages and glimpses of Father Rhine on our way to meet Mother Mosel.
The Mosel - or Moselle, as most of us would call it - flows from the French alps through Luxemburg to meet the Rhine at Koblenz. She is loved by people of all three countries for her charm and benificence. In these river valleys, winters are mild and spring is utterly gorgeous. Right now the magnolias and tulips hold sway, but hyacinths, daffodils and primroses are still much in evidence and the smaller trees are just starting to green up. The forests are still drowsy, though, and except for the firs, the big trees are bare.
Forestry here is very different from that of southern Australia, where monoculture of Pinus Radiata or Redgum is the norm and public access is restricted. Here the forests belong to the people. Stands of fir and beech jostle with the tall, straight oaks that form the principle crop and here and there one can spot a copse of silver birch shining in the still-wintry sunlight. There are plenty of pathways for hikers and trampers to use and even this early in the season they are put to good use. Elfriede belongs to a walking group and almost every weekend they go "wandering" in the forests.

A hop-on, hop-off bus tour with multi-lingual recorded commentaries accessed with headphones enabled Elfriede and me to get a quick overview of the city and its history. We did a hop-off at the Chemin de la Corniche, which overlooks the impressive ravine and its fortifications, and from there we shanks-ponied it to the wonderful old St Michael's church and the National Museum of History and Art.
A word about churches here: every single one I've been in - and I've seen a dozen or more now - has had devotees sitting or kneeling quietly, undisturbed by the presence of tourists. In the Rhine Valley, bells ring out every morning and the faithful are called to prayer. Religion is not dead in Europe; far from it.
My religion, however, makes room for history. Respect for those who have gone before and for their works forms a large part of my personal ethic, so visiting a museum is, to me, almost as meaningful as kneeling in a house of worship. In the Luxembourg Musée I found plenty of things to honour. Grave goods, tools and household effects from not only the Middle Ages but also Roman days are impressively displayed and described in French, German and English. The very best exhibit we saw was a complete

After a very pleasant lunch served in the museum's café by a tri-lingual waiter (I ordered in French, he spoke with Elfriede in German and when he came back he addressed us in perfect English!) we re-boarded the bus for a final round before catching our coach outside the Grand Ducal Palace, a tastefully restrained but very lovely edifice, for the four-hour journey back to the Rheingau. What a wonderful day!
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