I am walking alone on a beach. It is very cold. In front of me, I can see the wet, brown sand. Further away to my left there are dunes covered with snow and long, green-yellow grass. I have never seen snow on dunes before. It is raining but it is so cold that the rain turns to ice as it falls and lands on the sand in front of me, only to be swept away immediately by the wind. To my right is the sea. As the waves make their way to shore, the foam at the edge of each wave also turns to ice as it is carried away by the wind. I look at the wonder around me, the snow, the rain, the ice, the wind and the sea. It is all quite magical. As I watch the waves in the distance … it is 1944 … it is grey and muddy, I can hear gunfire all around me as tanks make their way out of the water … soldiers are being shot as they try to make their way across the beach to the dunes … there is carnage all around me … The sound of a seagull brings me back to the present …

My inspiration for writing this book was an ongoing concern that students just weren't reading enough. The speed at which Millennials and Generation Zs function seemed to be the rationale for this lack of interest. I decided to give them the benefit of the doubt and focus on academic writing itself because, let's face it, academic writing can be dry. It is not always easily accessible and it is not always easy to maintain focus.

I wanted to consider how I could make academic writing more enjoyable, not only for students but for anyone who may be interested in gaining a bit more knowledge about a subject, even if they are not a student or within an academic environment. How could I open spaces for interaction with those who are within but also outside of tertiary education? Within the university we were actively engaging with curriculum transformation. How could I extend that to reading and writing as well?