AN ACT OF INEXPLICABLE CRUELTY. A FAMILY DESTROYED.
Constable Paul Hirschhausen runs a one-cop station in the dry farming country south of the Flinders Ranges. He’s still new in town but his community work – welfare checks and a light touch – is starting to pay off. Now Christmas is here and, apart from a grass fire, two boys stealing a vehicle, and Brenda Flann entering the front bar of the pub without exiting her car, Hirsch’s life has been peaceful.
Until he’s called to an incident on Kitchener Street, a strange and vicious attack that sickens the community. And when the Sydney police ask him to look in on a family living on a forgotten back road, it doesn’t look like a season of goodwill at all…
Bitter Wash Road, the first in this series,was one of my favourite reads of last year and here is book two which I also adored. Garry Disher writes beautifully with a quietly addictive style that pulls you into the story and you simply dont want to stop reading it until you are done.
The setting is so wonderful I kind of want to live there..although maybe minus the death and blood that occasionally happens – I’m such a huge fan of small town drama and aussie fiction currently that this was a pure joy to read first page to last.
The mix of the mundane and the more horrendous is cleverly achieved, all the characters pop from the page, especially our man Hirsch, local and often only copper, who seems to travel a lifetime every day, never knowing quite what will happen. He takes the reader on all those journeys with him, as he tries to leave the past behind him.
I won’t give any plot away but the mystery element is pitch perfectly done and they have a differing sort of twist on your crime fiction tropes as Hirsch might be trying to find a killer but could just as easily be trying to track down a missing dog. Either way it is compelling and you’ll be glued to the page.
Highly recommended.
You can purchase Peace (Viper) Here.
Happy Reading!
