Dark Fires Shall Burn, by Anna Westbrook

This could be listed as historic crime or YA, but Westbrook has produced something that doesn’t neatly fit into any genre – a dark and fascinating exploration of a true, unsolved crime from the point of view of two teenagers deeply affected by it.

Westbrook delves into Sydney’s seedy underbelly for this story, based on a real crime, set in 1946.

Two girls – Frances and Nancy – play hide and seek in a cemetery, already too old for it, but enjoying being out on their own and taking time out of their difficult home lives. Their backstreets world is poor and rough, and often dangerous.

One night Frances sees something she shouldn’t have – an attempt by one local tough to kill another, the vicious Jackie Tooth. The terrifying moment brings her into contact with Templeton, the teenage brother of Jackie’s lover.

Templeton and Annie are on their own, getting by on the fringes, and find safety of a kind at a brothel run by one of the city’s most notorious madams. But the violence is building around them, and will affect them all.

Westbrook, a young Sydney writer, has created an atmospheric tale of post-war life, full of sly grog, war-damaged soldiers and prostitutes. The young people at the heart of the story are awakening to sex while trying to survive whatever way they can.

Templeton, in particular, is heartbreaking as he navigates a world without a home or family, and where being gay is a seriously dangerous choice.

Despite the lurid subject matter, which made it a sensational crime in the newspapers of the day, Westbrook carefully avoids taking an exploitative approach.

She explores the circumstances and the consequences of the crime, but allows the specifics of this young girl’s murder, and the terror she must have suffered, to remain off stage and out of our view. 

This review first appeared in the Herald Sun’s Weekend magazine. The book was published in April 2016

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The Case of the Hail Mary Celeste, by Malcolm Pryce

Steam locomotives, ancient curses, dark history and intrepid investigators – it’s an eccentric and charming mystery that’s fun for all ages.

Jack Wenlock is the last of a legendary group of railway detectives – known as the Goslings – to serve on the pre-nationalised railways of Britain.

In 1947, shortly to become unemployed, he is tempted into trying to solve the greatest mystery of his time – the disappearance of 23 nuns in 1915, last seen on the 7.25 from Swindon to Bristol Temple Meads.

With the persistent and unsettling presence of Jenny the Spiddler, who has come to him for help to solve a mystery of her own, he faces terrible danger as he delves into the darkest corners of the Empire for his answers.

Wenlock, an orphan like all the Goslings, manages to be both sweetly naïve and well able to look after himself in a crisis.

He’s a Boy’s Own golden-haired hero with just a hint of tough detective Sam Spade and he is armed, as necessary, with the formidable force of a Great Western Region fireman’s shovel.

Pryce’s book is a delight from beginning to end. It’s fast paced and funny, with some nicely judged nostalgia for a simpler and more honourable past – and steam locomotives.  With luck, Jack will be back with more adventures.

This review was first published in the Herald Sun’s Weekend magazine. The book was published in May 2015.

The Wolf Border, by Sarah Hall

Tags

commonwealth writers prize

 

Wolves stir a strong response in us, and this account of the reintroduction of wolves into a British estate is fascinating on may levels. 

Rachel Caine understands wolves. They certainly make more sense to her than families do.

Her work keeping tabs on a pack of the predators on a reservation in the US allows her exactly the kind of freedom she enjoys.

But a series of upheavals in her life changes her situation, and she accepts a job back on her home territory in England’s Lakes District.

Her boss is the eccentric and well-connected Earth of Annerdale who wants to reintroduce grey wolves to his massive private estate near the Scottish border, their first appearance on British soil since they were wiped out centuries ago.

It is a delicate, controversial task, and one that is not popular with all the locals. Equally difficult is re-establishing some contact with the remnants of her family while preparing for the approaching birth of her own child.

The local and personal turmoil sits against broader background of upheaval, as the nation contemplates Scottish independence.

Hall, a young British writer who has already won a multitude of awards including the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, writes evocatively about nature, freedom, independence and motherhood. It is the first of hers I have read, but the rest immediately went on my reading list.

This review was first published in the Herald Sun Weekend magazine. The book was published in April 2015. 

The Other Side of Silence, by Philip Kerr

Tags

berlin noir, bernie gunther

No one writes crime noir like Philip Kerr. Atmospheric as ever.

World weary, cynical, and battered, with a soft spot for a femme fatale, a chequered past and an almost buried urge to do the right thing. That’s Bernie Gunther, hero of what is now No.11 in this atmospheric series of detective noir novels.

The former Berlin detective is keeping a low profile in post-war Europe, working under a false name as a concierge in a flash hotel on the French Riviera.

He plays bridge, drinks and misses his wife, who has left him to return to Berlin. So bored and dispirited at the start that he considers suicide, Gunther is soon right in the middle of an international cesspit.

He is hired to be the middle man when an old enemy of his blackmails famous British author W. Somerset Maugham over some dangerous photos.

But the stakes rapidly climb when it becomes all about spies right at the heart of Britain’s establishment.

Before the end there are shocks, betrayals and vicious double-crosses, and even a hint of a broken heart. Just as there should be when there’s a beautiful, mysterious, dangerous woman involved.

The Gunther novels could be read as stand-alone, but are best read from the start of the series. They aren’t written in chronological order, but his past is always relevant, and the more you know, the more impact each episode has.

This review was first published in the Herald Sun’s Weekend magazine.The book is published in April, 2016