Review of Dead Set by Kel Robertson (Text Publishing, 2009)

Chinese-Australian Inspector, Brad Chen, has seen better times. The one time Rugby League star has been crippled by a hit and run accident that’s left him on crutches, addicted to drink and painkillers, and on the sick list. When Tracey Dale, the immigration minister, is found dead in her house, strangled with a coat hanger and a plastic bag tied over her head, he's called back to help his former protégé. The minister was seeking to implement a new immigration bill that would open the door for a wave of non-white immigrants, and there seems to be no shortage of people who would be happy that she was no longer in office. Into the bargain comes a new recruit, the beautiful Kate Malone. Her job is to shepherd Chen, his to mentor her first few days on the job. Tasked with following one particular strand of the murder investigation, Chen and Malone have a knack for discovering new bodies, all with some kind of link to Dale, and various kinds of trouble as they ruffle various feathers.

I thought the first half of Dead Set was a terrific read. The characters are well introduced, the police procedural elements are well handled, and the story just flies along. Robertson’s writing has a nice balance between dialogue and description, and whilst quite functional in style, it’s engaging to read. Chen is intriguing character with his sardonic wit, selective approach to procedure and various vulnerabilities. The second half of the book tails away a little and I increasingly found myself asking why questions as holes in the plot started to appear. And the end was a bit of a letdown, despite the blockbuster climax. Overall, Dead Set is a good, solid, entertaining read and it’s certainly whetted the appetite for the second Chen book, Smoke and Mirrors, which recently won the Ned Kelly Best Fiction Award in his native Australia.

Review of Stiff by Shane Maloney (Text Publishing, 1994)

Murray Whelan is the electorate officer for the Minister of Industry, Charlene Wills, the sitting Labour representative from Melbourne Upper, a multicultural district to the north of the city. His home life is a mess – his wife has upped sticks to Canberra and he’s looking after his young son, Red, in a house that’s seen better days – and his work life is not much better, spending his days fending off disgruntled voters, fixing relations with a variety of local self-interest groups, and smoothing over internal party squabbles. When a recent immigrant from Turkey is found frozen to death in a local meat packing plant he thinks nothing of it until one of Wills’ ministerial advisors, the snake-oiled, Angelo Agnelli, sends him off to investigate whether it’s anything the Minister needs to worry about. Whelan knows that this is probably a wild goose chase, but agrees to take a look to keep Agnelli and Wills happy. Pretty soon though it’s clear that there is more to worker’s death than a simple accident and, what is more, Whelan’s attention is definitely unwanted. And if he won’t drop the case, and walk away, then somebody is prepared to silence him before he discovers the real reason for the death. What should have been a straightforward look-see, instead has him struggling to stay alive.

In many ways Stiff is more of a political satire, than crime novel. Yes, the story charts Whelan’s attempt to uncover the reason for the worker’s death, but this adventure is used as a foil to expose and point fun at the machinations of political wheeler-dealing at the grassroots level. Mahoney is particularly good at detailing the life of an electorate officer - the slippage from ideologue to party hack, the flotsam of constituents, and the tedium of organising local party meetings. In Whelan he has created an interesting character; someone who is world weary, reflexive, crafty, and who has his own unrealised, political ambitions. The other characters are also well drawn and the dialogue realistic. The story itself though is a little contrived and the ending is telegraphed a little too early. All in all, Stiff is an enjoyable read, with enough snide humour and interesting insights into the political and social landscape of Australia in the late 1980s to keep the reader hooked to the end.

Review of The Build Up by Phillip Gwynne (Pan Macmillan, 2008)

Dusty Buchanon used to be the rising star of Darwin’s police force with an uncanny knack of solving difficult cases. That changed, however, with the failure to prosecute Evan Dale Gardner on circumstantial evidence for the rape and murder of a young backpacker. A couple of years on and Dianna McVeigh’s body has been found, but the case has been assigned to a hated colleague by the new, hardnosed commander. Frustrated at being sidelined, when Dusty hears that the body of another young woman has been found in a billabong, deep in the outback near to a Vietnam vets camp, she heads off to investigate. Only when she calls in reinforcements the body has disappeared and she is demoted back to uniform. Determined to prove that a murder has taken place and to catch the killer, she enrols a ragbag collection of friends to continue the hunt. All the while the heat and humidity continues to build-up prior to the monsoon rains falling.

Like Marshall Karp’s ‘The Rabbit Factory’ (reviewed here), The Build Up seeks create a police procedural underlain with dark humour, mostly mobilised through some comic set pieces and the ragbag collection of friends (including a gay art dealer, an aboriginal rock star, a German twitcher, and a pet pig). For the most part it kind of works. I enjoyed the book, but was not blown away by it. The writing is fairly perfunctory, the characters a little stereotypical, and plot a little haphazard. What should have been twists and turns in the story came as little surprise, and it kind of peters out towards the end rather than coming to a climax. The story has some nice observational asides about the Northern Territories and its inhabitants, but mostly the story felt quite shallow, contra Adrian Hyland’s ‘Diamond Dove’ (reviewed here). Overall, an okay read that has its amusing moments that will appeal to readers who enjoy comic crime capers.

Review of Diamond Dove by Adrian Hyland (Text Publishing, 2006)

Emily Tempest has always felt a bit of an in-betweener, not quite in the world of her white, mining father, nor the aboriginal world of her long dead mother. Having gone for an extended walkabout through Australian cities, drifting from one unfinished course to another, and around the world, now in her mid-twenties she has returned to Central Australia and the scruffy camp of Moonlight Downs, unsure what to expect or how she’ll be received. Her mob welcome her back, but within hours her former mentor is brutally murdered and the group scatter to the winds in grief. Emily retreats to Bluebush, the nearby, rough and ready, mining town, determined to track down the killer. Only the clues point in different directions – to a loner, aboriginal who is a law unto himself, and a white, cattle farmer who has his eye on the sacred lands of the Diamond Dove. What soon becomes apparent is that finding the truth in part means finding herself.

Diamond Dove is a wonderful novel. Engagingly written, with good prose, a well crafted, multi-textured plot, and perfectly paced, Hyland transports the reader into the natural and social environment of the Australian outback, the worlds of aborigines and white settlers, and their interface. In both the bush and the town, Hyland evokes a rich sense of place conveying their respective sights, textures, sounds and smells. The characterization is excellent, with Emily Tempest particularly well drawn, with just the right amount of back story that the reader understands the context but is always kept in the present. The scenes and dialogue are well constructed, with a good blend of observations, pathos, wit, and social commentary without it ever becoming a sermon. Indeed, Diamond Dove cleverly explores race relations and social and political tensions in contemporary Australia without straying from Emily’s quest to discover who killed her friend and mentor. I’ve already started recommending it to friends.

A parcel from Oz

My guest from Australia arrives next week, but an advance parcel turned up today with the five imports recommended to me here. I'm looking forward to reading these as a quick scan of the first few pages of each suggests that they all hold a lot of promise. Their arrival creates two questions though: (1) where to slot them into a TBR pile that's getting out of hand and (2) which one to read first!

Seeking Oz crime novel suggestions

I've a colleague visiting from Griffith University in Brisbane at the start of December. I was going to take the opportunity to try and load him up with some Australian crime fiction to bring over with him. To give him enough time to order them in I want to let him know what I'm after as soon as possible. But there's the rub - I'm not sure what I am after! The only book I have on my list at the minute is Phillip Gwynne's, The Build Up, and to my shame I think the only Oz writer I'm familiar with is Peter Temple, of whom I'm a great fan.

So, what I am after is some recommendations for four other books, preferably in paperback and relatively easy to get hold of, that I can pass on to him to order for me and lump over in his suitcase. Any suggestions? Pointers to reviews would be good as well!