Minnie Darke

Minnie Darke is the invention of writer Danielle Wood. Minnie’s first novel Star-crossed was published to critical acclaim in Australia and picked up by publishing houses around the world. Now translated into over twenty languages, Star-crossed continues to flirt with the prospect of becoming a television series. Minnie’s subsequent novels are The Lost Love Song, With Love from Wish & Co, and Three Juliets.

Here, in an excerpt from an essay published in Island magazine, Danielle describes the process of becoming Minnie:

‘One day at my writing desk, I became Minnie Darke. It was as easy as that.

Either I knew, or I decided, that she was a Gemini – a twin. Also, that she was a librarian, although she had once wanted to be an actor. She owned two British giant rabbits and a street terrier, was a formidable Scrabble player and drank a lot of Russian Caravan tea.

At the time I became Minnie, I would have been about eighteen years into my writing career. Steadily, book by book, I had pieced together a minor reputation as a ‘literary’ writer, while at the same time holding down a day job and raising three children. Now I wanted to do something different. Something new. I wanted to write what is called a ‘commercial’ book – a joyful romantic comedy complete with astrology, a huge cast of characters, a pervasive sense of destiny, a thoughtful dog and a cathartic, tied-up-with-a-bow happy ending.

So I slipped on Minnie, as you would a costume; and like any magic dress, she fitted me perfectly. If anything was surprising, it was how much fun it all was. I felt a surge of that special mischief that I’ve learned to recognise as the harbinger of a sustained period of creativity and enthusiasm. Had I stood up from my desk and twirled, a cloud of tiny gold and silver stars might easily have spiraled up, Disney-style, off my/Minnie’s skirts.’