“Place is important to me because I have a strong spiritual connection myself to the country, to nature,” says Viggers who has set her latest novel, The Orchardist’s Daughter, in the old-growth forests of southern Tasmania.

“We're really fortunate in Australia to have so many places that are relatively untouched that we can still escape to.

“Part of my purpose for writing is to remind Australians about what we have, hopefully inspire them to go out there and enjoy it and think about the sorts of things nature can give you in terms of healing and peace and solace and comfort.”

The Orchardist’s Daughter is the story of three young outsiders struggling to find their own place in a small timber town, where rugged mountains and old-growth eucalypt forests dominate the landscape. Leon is a parks ranger, Miki is a 16-year-old girl with a mysterious past who’s being controlled by her older brother, and Max is a 10-year-old boy being bullied at school.

“What this book is about is the ways people can connect and trying to belong in a small town when you're different, when you're an outsider,” Viggers says.

“A small town is a great study for human behaviour because you get a whole mixture of different people trying to get along.

“You've got these three outsiders, all young people, and that was deliberate … belonging is difficult for all of us at different times but especially difficult for young people and people in their teens people who are trying to find out who they are at the same time as trying to belong.”

As the mother of two teenagers herself, Viggers understands how that journey can be fraught with danger.

“The journey of shepherding teenagers into adulthood is not easy,” she says.

“My children are in a family that is really supportive and so when I look at Miki and think of her life, I was thinking of teenagers who don't have that support or come from a background of oppression or poverty or abuse and domestic violence … how do they cope with that transition of finding themselves and who they are and where they fit in.”

Viggers lives in Aranda, in Canberra, a suburb nestled in the foothills of Black Mountain, where eucalypt trees line the streets and kangaroos are often found in the open spaces in the  evening. Her husband is Professor David Lindenmayer, one of Australia’s leading researchers into forestry and environmental management, and Viggers works part-time as a veterinarian and nightly discussions around the dinner table often involve issues which appear in her novels.

She spent time in Tasmania researching The Orchardist’s Daughter and previously for The Lightkeeper’s Wife.

“I’ve a long-term bond with Tasmania. I went to Antarctica twice in the 1990s as a research scientist with the Australian Antarctic Division. This was another wild place that moved me deeply and had a major influence on my life. I spent a lot of time in Hobart around that time, hiking all over that south-east area, there’s this real sense of isolation and the light and the forests and the wilderness.”

There is a sense of Australianness to Viggers' work so it’s somewhat ironic she’s far more successful in Europe than she is in her own country.

Her work has enjoyed great success in France, selling more than 800,000 copies to date. The Lightkeeper's Wife (as La Memoire de embruns) was on the French national bestseller list for more than 42 weeks, going as high as No.3, and in 2016 the book won the Les Petits Mots des Libraires Prix Litteraire for a Discovery Novel and was also short-listed for the Livre de Poche Readers Prize.

“The Lightkeeper’s Wife sold 100,000 copies in the first month in France,” she says, admitting it can be frustrating thinking about how she can gain more recognition in literary circles here.

“The French like their rural landscapes, they revere their farmers and they love small towns. They like nuanced stories of character and real life journeys, it’s a different audience.”

The Orchardist's Daughter, by Karen Viggers, Allen & Unwin, $29.99.

Karen Viggers will be in conversation with Alex Sloan for an ANU/The Canberra Times Meet the Author event on February 14 at the Small Theatre, Kambri Cultural Centre, ANU. Bookings at anu.edu.au/events

She will also be appearing in Brisbane, Sydney, Bowral, Melbourne, Launceston and Hobart. For full details head to karenviggers.com