By Helen Eva
Popular myth would have us believe that authors are a strange lot. Especially
that rare and much-envied breed who actually manage to get their books published.
Not that you catch a glimpse of them that often, given their self-imposed isolation
in some local garret and a propensity to bury themselves under a barrage of
discarded manuscripts and unwashed coffee cups. 
Or so the story goes. Now meet Monash BA graduates Hazel Edwards and Goldie Alexander, authors who have traded notebooks for laptops and garrets for email-linked studies in their comfortable suburban homes.
The two women have co-written a book for the 12 to 15 age group, taking it in turns to email each other with their latest draft. The result, not entirely coincidentally, is a 124-page book published by Longman, E-mail Murder Mystery, with the plot revolving around mysterious email messages received by the central character, Ben, while recovering in hospital from an accident.
Edwards and Alexander, who were both mature-age students at Monash in the early 1970s, have also just completed a 'how to' book called The Business of Writing for Young People, again using their innovative email system and incorporating cartoons by The Age's Jane Cafarella.
While the tricky business of jointly writing books has not been a problem for these two friends and fellow Holmesglen Institute lecturers - "we like and respect each other a great deal, which is important" - the technological process has proved a steep learning curve. Here they were helped immeasurably by Monash graduate Damien Kennedy, a former literary 'mentoree' of Edwards' and now an international electronics consultant based in London.
Describing themselves as Luddites, Edwards, 52, and Alexander, 61, often found themselves sending E-mail Murder Mystery chapters into cyberspace, losing whole chunks of text with the push of a wrong button and loading new versions onto old.
But, says Alexander, author of 12 previous books, the process has also been great fun. "Just as our main character was uncovering email intracacies, we were also learning how to use the whole Internet system. And while we had a few minor disasters along the way, the pros far outweighed the cons. As well as teaching us the practicalities of using email, it was bliss to be able to work from home and to have two brains firing off each other."
Edwards, author of 130 books including the acclaimed children's story There's
a Hippopotamus on My Roof Eating Cake, believes that co-writing on creative
projects will become increasingly important for authors in the future, and email
will be central to this development. 
Monash graduates and co-writers Goldie Alexander, left, and Hazel Edwards.