On the face of it, by the mid-1990s the Keneallys were doing well. Nonetheless, adult children were venturing into arts-related businesses that required seed funding, and all the research for The Great Shame had incurred travel costs and fees for research assistants. So, although the family's tax accounts for 1997 declared assets in excess of half a million dollars, they also registered an overdraft of more than $70,000. Retirement was not yet a viable option. In any case, Keneally was contracted to produce at least one more novel. By the time he was able to make good on his promise, Louise Adler had left Heinemann, which was undergoing radical restructuring. There was a concerted effort by several publishers in Australia to steal Keneally, and in November 1997, Publisher's Review trumpeted, ‘Transworld Wins Tom Keneally’.

This change was managed through Keneally's agents and it started a consolidation of his publishing. Transworld included Doubleday, within which Nan Talese's imprint operated. With mergers pushing towards the blockbuster, Keneally was now being offered a cash reward for every week a title got into best-seller lists. Other industry changes were also occurring. In 2000, Hodder (now Hodder Headline) reported increased access to chain outlets and a decline in library purchasing. The latter change suggested reduced access for older readers to books by a writer who was himself now 65. However, globalization meant increased sales in Europe (Hodder's were up 30 per cent), and Sceptre was refurbishing its Keneally backlist. A further development that promised new sales was the move into electronic media. Hodder talked of setting up websites and e-books.

While publishing was being transformed, Keneally was reading reviews of The Great Shame indicating that the Hugh Larkin story had not attained its full potential. Also, Tom and Judy had gone back to Eritrea twice in the 1990s to see how the country was progressing, and had en route accumulated experiences of the Sudan. Two stories were waiting to be shaped up. In December of 1997, Keneally wrote to Carole Welch at Hodder/ Sceptre, ‘The dinosaur [The Great Shame] is nearly off the premises, allowing space for the tenderer but, I think pleasing, Bettany to grow’. This was to be one of two novels, but Transworld pushed to combine them in order to market an epic.