Albany 2026: Historical fiction author David Wray uses story to explore WA’s complex colonial history

The bicentenary of WA’s oldest city is the perfect time to dig into the State’s colonial past, historical fiction author David Wray says.

Wray is a Perth-based writer, and travelled to Albany last week to give a talk at the Albany Public Library focused on using fiction to explore WA’s real colonial history.

His debut novel Diamond Of The Desert is a historical fiction novel that follows three very different characters as they arrive in WA in the mid-1800s from England and Ireland and work to build their lives.

The book’s emotional heart was found in Wray’s family history.

When his mother was researching her lineage, she came across a birth certificate with the word “bastard” scrawled across it.

She unlocked a generations-old family secret: that her great grandfather was born a bastard, but had still used his family’s surname, not the surname of his real father.

“Imagine that moment, at 92, to discover the family name that you’d grown up with was not truly yours, nor had it ever been,” Wray said.

“That story fascinated me, and we spent hours researching and discussing the possibilities of how this turn of events might have come to be, what was the story behind the angry word scrawled on a birth certificate, and the shame that followed that was sufficient for future generations to carry forward a family name to which they had no claim?”

The book’s three central characters become entangled in a complicated family story of a similar nature, inspired by the true story of Wray’s own history.

However, Wray said he wanted to lean more into the State’s factual history, using fictionalised elements to weave the truth together into an enjoyable yarn.

“I wanted a book that told WA’s story accurately and sensitively, a warts-and-all account that we could be proud of, as well as shocked by,” he said.

“So, Diamond Of The Desert draws heavily on actual letters and newspaper articles from the time, as well as a great many historical books and resources.

“All of that information is already out there, but while these non-fiction historical accounts are widespread, they’re also typically piecemeal, telling only one part of the history, so fiction really gave me the opportunity to stitch all of those pieces together and make them come live again through the experiences of the characters.”

An aspect of research Wray particularly wanted to include and get right was how Indigenous people were portrayed throughout his novel.

At his talk on Thursday, he spoke about how the relationship between colonisers and Indigenous people devolved over time, belief of colonisers that their way was “the right and proper way of the future, and the natives would surely come around to it soon enough”, and the laws and policies that allowed colonisers to steal lands and mistreat Indigenous people.

Wray said it was important to him not to gloss over the complexity of WA’s past, and to represent even the parts of history that were not something to be proud of.

He said his research had also made it clear how instrumental Albany was to the future of the Swan River Colony and the wider State of WA.

“I reckon there’s no better time to learn about our history and from our past than in commemorating Albany’s and soon Perth’s 200th anniversary of colonisation,” he said.

“My book was prepared quite deliberately ahead of those occasions.

“I’m pleased to be listed in the Albany 2026 program because while the story in my book is set in the 1840s-70s, it touches on the earlier years and importantly, it highlights how the future of the colony was built from its earliest roots, including those right here in Albany.

“Albany is not a local footnote, it is the point of entry for the story that WA needs to tell more honestly.”