Behind the story

And All the Stars began as a discussion on Goodreads about another of my novels, Stray. Two readers, Flannery and Wendy Darling, were particularly taken with the first section of Cassandra's story, and encouraged me to write a survivalist or post-apocalyptic novel. I shrugged and said I don't write survivalist or post-apocalyptic novels...and promptly began thinking about what kind of survivalist or post-apocalyptic novel I would write, if I were ever to write such a thing.

Sydney was a natural setting, and I decided I wanted a "curly haired girl" as the lead. I ended up with two curly-haired girls, who went through various shapes and forms (strongly influenced by a cover image I'd found and fallen in love with). At the same time I was thinking of Blake's Tyger Tyger, particularly the stanza:

When the stars threw down their spears,

And watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

And from this came the spires (spears -> spires) and the idea of stars and some kind of attack. I decided my character would be at ground zero of a spire's arrival. Briefly this was Centrepoint, but I shifted it to St James Station, and decided the form of attack would be dust...