Allison Tait's The Wolf's Howl is inspired by Nowra's august winds

The book centres around Maven and Reeve, a maid and squire who find themselves in a far-flung gloomy castle where they have to solve the mystery of a missing cook.

Partly influenced by COVID-19 lockdown isolation as well as Nowra's August winds and the sense of irritability that it brings, the story's world is driven by a tempest called The Wolf's Howl.

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Ms Tait said the theme of irritability and isolation were an embodiment of her subconscious during a particularly uncertain time.

"There's a lot of shifting ground in this book, there's a lot of the protagonist having to work their way through information that may not be what it seems," said Ms Tait.

"And I think that is also the subconscious picking up on that uncertainty that we've all been feeling over the last 18 months."

In the first novel, Maven and Reeve were thrown into a world where they had to team up to solve a mystery whereas this novel is an extension of the trust they had built.

"They were interesting characters to create and it's been lovely spending more time with them and watching them develop as characters and watching their friendship develop as well," said Ms Tait.

Ms Tait spent a lot of her formative years in the Shoalhaven but moved to Sydney to worked as a journalist for Cleo and Vogue before moving back to the Shoalhaven ten years ago.

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Before moving to the Shoalhaven, Ms Tait said she was writing fiction while raising her kids and working as a busy journalist.

"What I found when I came here, even though I was still working as a freelance journalist and raising my kids, is I found a space here to really allow my fiction writing to take off," she said.

"And it wasn't until I actually sat down and tried to write a story for my own boys that I found my storytelling voice."

She said she could write another 20 stories set in this world but it all would depend on how well the book sells - something that may or may not be held back by the fact her book launch has been forced online due to COVID.

"I know that there was a big rise in sales last year during the lockdown as there was a lot of support for local book shops and people were buying more books because they had more time to read them and because we wanted to make sure that our kids were reading more," she said.

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"How that will pan out this year I'm not exactly sure at this stage. But from my perspective it's difficult because you rely very much on word of mouth, and I rely very much on going to schools and talking to kids about books and writing.

"I'm disappointed of course that not only did my first book in this series come out during the big lockdown last year, but this one is coming out just as we're having a big lockdown in Sydney."

Signed copies of the book will be available at local bookshops.

Ms Tait will be holding an online zoom book launch on Tuesday, August 10 between 6pm and 7pm.

The hour-long author talk will be aimed at kids and tickets will include a special postcard and a signed copy of The Wolf's Howl.

Tickets are $25 a head and can be purchased here.