Why Bali Had to Be Part of My Next Book

I don’t think I consciously decided to write a book about Bali. It was probably more a case of Bali waiting patiently until I finally got around to it.

Before I moved back to Western Australia, I spent almost five years living in Indonesia. During that time I taught yoga, managed a surf lodge, took photographs, met people from all over the world and accumulated the sort of stories that only seem completely normal while you’re actually living them.

At the time, I didn’t think of any of it as particularly remarkable. It was just my life.

It’s only now, years later, sitting at a desk in Perth writing romantic comedies, that I realise quite how much those years shaped the way I see places, people and probably stories too.

And Bali was always part of that.

There’s a difference between visiting somewhere and living there

I love the Bali that people come for on holiday. The villas, restaurants, beaches, spas and that wonderful feeling that life has suddenly become considerably more glamorous than it was when you left home three days earlier.

But when you spend enough time somewhere, all of that starts to sit alongside ordinary life.

You have favourite places that aren’t in guidebooks, and perhaps only accessible by scooter. You learn which roads to avoid at certain times of day (that's not a shortcut!). You stop noticing some things and become oddly attached to others. You have routines, friends, frustrations, good days and terrible ones. Eventually, 'somewhere' stops being a destination and simply becomes the place where you live.

I think that’s the Bali I’ve been trying to find again while writing What Happens in the Villa. Not necessarily the Bali I remember perfectly, because I’m sure memory has been doing some fairly creative editing of its own, but the feeling of it.

Place has always sneaked into my books

I didn’t really set out to become an author who writes so much about place, either.

Van Life with Benefits took Lara and Jesse up the Western Australian coast, through places and landscapes I love. My Margaret River books are tied to that corner of WA in a completely different way.

And now What Happens in the Villa has taken me back to Indonesia.

I’m beginning to suspect I simply keep sending fictional people to places where I’d like to spend more time myself.

Whether that’s creative inspiration or I’ve accidentally found a way to justify my holidays, I’m not entirely sure. But I’m happy with either.

Put a group of old friends together at home and they can escape one another. They have jobs to go to, houses to retreat to, normal life waiting outside.

Put them together in a villa in Bali for two weeks and suddenly everyone is eating breakfast together in their pyjamas.

There are shared cars, shared plans, poolside conversations, late nights, too much time together and nowhere particularly sensible to hide when your ex-boyfriend turns up with his new girlfriend.

And that was when Bali stopped being simply the setting for this book and became part of what makes the story work.

Going back

Perhaps the strangest part is that I’m about to return to Bali while the book is still unfinished.

I’m looking forward to seeing what I’ve remembered correctly. I’m also slightly terrified to discover what I’ve got completely wrong.

But mostly, I’m curious about how it will feel to go back to somewhere that belongs to another period of my life, now that I’m returning as someone who writes books about the places she’s lived.

I suspect I’ll notice different things. And perhaps that’s the real reason Bali had to end up in one of my books eventually.

Some places are lovely to visit.

Some give you stories.

And some do both.

Sarah xx