What happens when a real-life story is ‘commercialised’ into novel form and as the author you believe the narrative ends up being more gloss than meat, more fiction, than truth, even though the finished product is a best-seller?

In Peter Yeldham’s case he sat back down at his laptop more than a decade later and re-wrote the work so that justice was done to the time period and those involved. Dragons in the Forest is the fascinating result.

20151014-PeterYeldham-Dragons-COVER-ONLY-RGB-220x334Peter Yeldham is an Australian screenwriter for motion pictures and television, playwright and novelist. With a long and distinguished career, Peter’s credits include being the author of over fifteen mini-series including 1984’s All The Rivers Run, and in 1987 Captain James Cook. He also adapted Bryce Courtenay’s book Jessica, which won an award as best mini-series, before turning his talent to writing novels. In 2014 Peter published his twelfth book, Above the Fold.

With the release of Dragons in the Forest, Peter dropped by to share his thoughts on the work.

I decided to write the novel about fifteen years ago, when my brother-in-law Alex Faure told me about his life in Japan during the war, as a neutral foreigner. This was because he was French, but had grown up in Japan and spoke the language.

It felt easier to write than fiction, because I had a recording of Alex recounting his life which I could listen to when I needed it. But there was one thing I missed. In a novel I rarely plot the full story. I begin with characters and a background, and the book often develops because a character becomes suddenly important, and helps to shape the story. These events often come as a surprise, and to me are one of the joys of writing without a set outline, something I often had to do when writing for television and feature films. So the answer is, the non-fiction was easier, but fiction is sometimes more exciting.

When I first wrote about Alex’s life in the book eventually published as Land Of Dreams, it became a different story because my then publisher Pan Macmillan wanted more of an Australian focus. Almost half of the book was devoted to a fictional character called Florence Carter, who was depicted as his Aunt, who had managed to keep in touch with him throughout the war. This in turn put Alex in danger from the Japanese secret police, so there was a thriller element introduced. Through Florence, a lot of the war as seen by those living in Australia at the time was depicted, giving the book the necessary ‘Australian’ element. I also used my own knowledge, being a schoolboy in Australia when we faced possible invasion, and when the Japanese mini submarines entered the harbour. But in my opinion the story was not as good as the original one based on Alex’s reminiscences, thankfully, that has now been published as Dragons in the Forest.

  1. Do you think your close relationship with Alex Faure allowed you to provide a greater depth of characterisation within this story?

My close relationship with Alex certainly provided a greater depth of characterisation.   Knowing him so well, we could laugh and reminisce over lots of incidents, he was also more forthcoming with the details, and hence in this way I think there is much more humour in his exploits and adventures in Dragons in the Forest, despite the enormity of the war.

  1. You seem to focus on Japan and its history, particularly in wartime, in many of your historical fiction novels, what is your connection to the county?

My use of Japan occurs in the two books that are derived from Alex Faure’s memory of his life there, and a recent book Above The Fold, where I used some details of my own early life. At the age of 18 I went to Japan as a part of the Occupation Force, and wanted to use some of this material, in particular the true incident of the young boy in Hiroshima after the atom bomb was dropped, who died from radiation. It had a great influence on my life, as did some of the things I saw in my 18 months there. There is no focus on Japan in my other eight books which have been classified as historical fiction.

  1. Many of your historical fiction novels focus on war, what is your perspective on war and the conflicts you write about?

War is a central theme in many of my novels, obviously in Dragons in the Forest, Land of Dreams and also Above the Fold; Dragons in the Forest and Above the Fold being my most recently published. It is fully occupied in Barbed Wire and Roses to depict the horror of the First World War. I also deal with this as a background to what happened to the German population living here in A Bitter Harvest, and towards the end of the book one of the main characters volunteers to fight in France. Four of my other books don’t focus on war.

But I make no apology for using it often, trying to depict the sheer insanity and cruelty of war. It was also five years of my life when I was a schoolboy and after that as a radio writer for radio, it made such a huge impact on my life.

  1. Your last two novels Dragons in the Forest and Above the Fold have been focused on your own life and the lives of people close to you, would you say that these personal novels are the ones you have been most passionate about writing?

No the novels I have a personal connection with haven’t been my most passionate endeavours. A Distant Shore about asylum seekers, another passionate one was A Bitter Harvest, as I felt strongly about the injustice against German immigrants, and Barbed Wire and Roses because of the way those who volunteered to fight were badly treated.

Do visit Peter’s website to view some of the wonderful stories he has written.