Until the Red Leaves Fall

Author of the bestselling and much-loved At the Foot of the Cherry Tree, Alli Parker, returns with another engrossing and moving novel of courage and conviction, Until the Red Leaves Fall.

Emmy Darling has a secret. She has a few. Her lemon meringue pie is a recipe from a women's magazine, she's always wanted to be a playwright, and the best parts of her husband Sebastian's plays are the scenes she's written during edits. But when charismatic theatre impresario and leading lady, Virginia van Belle, insists Emmy write about her wartime experiences as the lead play in her 1957 season, Emmy is faced with every writer's dilemma.

Because Emmy's biggest secret is that her name is actually Emiko Tanaka. She and her Japanese-Australian family were arrested, brutally split up and held in internment camps by the Australian government after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. And it's this secret that Virginia wants to bring to the masses.

As Emmy struggles to determine where the edges of truth and fiction blur, Virginia's vision of the story morphs into something more sensationalised. Emmy can't ask for Sebastian's help - he has his own history with Virginia - but she confides in Isadora Westlake, a dancer at a nearby coffee lounge, who knows a thing or two about keeping secrets.

As opening night looms and rewrites threaten to transform Emmy's personal history into something unrecognisable, wounds of the past are torn open, jeopardising everything Emmy holds dear. As the cast take their places and the curtain goes up, Emmy must decide which is right: tell the story or tell the truth.

From barbed-wire fences to the lush velvet seats of the Belleview Theatre, Until the Red Leaves Fall is a stunning tale of secrets and betrayal in the aftermath of war that asks: what happens when you let the truth get in the way of a good story?

About the Author

Alli Parker is a Japanese-Australian author and screenwriter, with a background in script editing and script co-ordinating. Her debut novel, the bestselling At the Foot of the Cherry Tree, was based on the true story of Australia's first Japanese war bride, who was Alli's grandmother. It was shortlisted for the 2023 Dymocks Book of the Year and for the 2024 ABIA Matt Richell Award for New Writers, and longlisted for the 2024 Indie Book Awards. Her credits as a script editor and co-ordinator include Irreverent, Jack Irish series 1, 2 & 3, Shantaram, Secret Bridesmaids' Business, Ms Fisher's Modern Murder Mysteries, Ride Like a Girl, Please Like Me and Utopia.