She knew immediately, she told Rae later that day, that it would make a good book. Joan had woken that morning with the flecked remnants of a peculiar dream imprinted on the edges of her conscious. It was, Joan mused to Rae Clements, their long-term, live-in housekeeper, the perfect day to stay inside and write. In the grim midwinter light, the landscape looked thoroughly dispiriting. A sinister midnight gale had whipped the few remaining leaves off the old roses in Joan and her husband Daryl's side garden and a huddle of voluminous dark clouds had also moved in, crossing the countryside like black-coated villains in a Victorian Gothic novel. It was the same time she normally started her writing day, but this day felt different. It was 9.30am on a bleak winter's day in 1966 when Joan Lindsay sat down to sketch out the plot of Picnic at Hanging Rock.
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