The Beaumont Hills resident wrote of an evening throughout 2011 and is in the process of editing her second book. Her first, Butterfly Kisses, was published two years ago and well received.

Reincarnation and rebirth are a key theme in the novel which draws on Ms Niriella's own life and travel experiences, set in corners of the world which include her native country, Sri Lanka, as well as Australia, Japan and Indonesia. She began to write it on the night that her son was born.

"I had my other two kids in Sri Lanka and the two experiences were very different so I actually put it down that night and eventually it became a story," she said. "With a new baby it took three years for me to finish the book.

"I was brought up in a Buddhist country so reincarnation or rebirth is a very close topic for Buddhists . . . I like to write in a manner that my reader gets a glimpse of all different cultures, all different ways of life."

Ms Niriella comes from a family of writers. Her father writes business studies texts, her mother is a children's author and her brother a medical writer.

She has previously worked as a journalist, writing business and feature articles.

"Each time a book comes out, everybody in their house has a separate bookshelf to keep the family books," she said.

Ms Niriella said she got to relive her recent experiences in Paris when she chose it as a setting for her next book.