Fiona McKenzie Kekic in conversation with April Mackay

Join us as we celebrate the release of Fiona McKenzie Kekic's debut novel, Eva Reddy's Trip of a Lifetime. She will be joined by MasterChef Executive Producer/friend, April Mackay.

Eva Reddy's Trip of a Lifetime:

When Eva Moore wakes up on her fiftieth birthday, her drab middle-class life immediately starts to unravel. First, she receives an anonymous Facebook message claiming her husband is having an affair. Next, she is restructured out of her job by her obnoxiously young boss. Then, just when she thinks her life can't get any worse, her elderly parents wilfully go missing from their group tour of India. All they've left behind is an increasingly bizarre series of TikTok videos.

Eager to put some distance between herself and her failing marriage, Eva undertakes a rescue mission, determined to save her parents from certain disaster. She wants to find them. But what Eva really needs is to find herself. If she can do that, she might get a second chance at life and love - and, along the way, become an inspiration to anyone who fears their best days are behind them...

Fiona McKenzie Kekic:

Fiona McKenzie Kekic is a recovering television professional with credits ranging from 60 Minutes to Married at First Sight. Her face even featured on the Sale of the Century Fame Game board back in the day. This remains an unlikely and slightly absurd career highlight.

Television has always been cutthroat, but it was an especially tough road for a woman back in the eighties and nineties. After way too many scarring years in commercial news and current affairs, Fiona co-wrote Boned with her equally disgruntled colleague Jane Hansen. They lived through every hideous, misogynistic moment they recounted anonymously in that novel. Boned was published in 2008. Judging from the constant scandals and million-dollar payouts, nothing much has changed. But they did make the bastards squirm for a while.

Television and its dastardly cast of characters continue to appear in Fiona's stories. But she's now stepped away from that world to concentrate full time on writing and to make the most of life's next stage. She believes absolutely that middle age is just the beginning and that women only get stronger as they age. There is a world of both figurative and literal mountains out there to prove it.