Headland by John Byrnes

‘A cold, fat drop of rain slapped onto the back of Craig Watson’s neck and rolled down his spine.’

Detective Senior Constable Craig Watson has issues. He is drug addicted and in trouble with his seniors. Surely, he should be sacked but instead he is posted to the small beachside town of Gloster, NSW to replace another officer.  Hmm.

In Gloster, under the command of Sergeant Thomas Philby, Craig Watson joins Senior Constable Ellie Cameron and Constable Larissa Brookes. It quickly becomes clear that Philby is incompetent and misogynistic, but the town is facing bigger issues. A teenage girl is missing, and Gloster is under threat of flooding because of constant heavy rain. A recent fatal car accident killed a councillor and his daughter: was it deliberate?

The river breaks its banks and while the town has been evacuated, Watson, Cameron and Brookes have been left behind. And when Ellie Cameron disappears, leaving a trail of blood in her wake, it is clear that they are not alone. The pace of the story accelerates and the suspense increases.

‘There’s no need for you to feel guilty about anything. Anything at all.’

It took me awhile to move beyond my initial antipathy towards Craig Watson but as the story developed and I learned more about the influences that had shaped him and his road to addiction, my sympathy grew.

Highly recommended.

Warning: some readers will find aspects of this novel confronting. The issues Mr Byrnes traverses in this accomplished debut novel include sexual exploitation, drug addiction and suicide.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

In the Cut by Susanna Moore

‘I don’t usually go to a bar with one of my students. It is almost always a mistake.’

In summary, this 1995 novel is a psychological thriller that follows the story of Frannie Avery, a New York City English teacher, who becomes embroiled in a murder investigation while engaging in a dangerous and taboo affair with a police detective.

The novel deals with themes of sexuality, power dynamics, and the relationships between men and women. It received mixed reviews upon its release, with some praising its graphic and frank depiction of sexuality, while others criticized its gratuitous violence and depiction of women. It was adapted into a 2003 film directed by Jane Campion.

Okay. I bought this book last century, intrigued that Bret Easton Ellis labelled it ‘Shocking.’ I read it, and promptly forgot it. I recently decided to reread it before passing it on. It’s only a slim book, but I found it challenging.  Why? Could it be the depiction of gender roles, with Frannie seeing brutish men as desirable? Frannie’s own engagement with others seems superficial and while I (mostly) liked Frannie the teacher, I did not like Frannie the woman.

I read a lot of crime fiction: violence is often part of that territory. I admit, I am interested in Frannie’s secret dictionary of street slang and would like to speak with her about language and words. But the choices Frannie makes and the risks she takes had me horrified. I wanted to focus on the thriller aspect of the novel but kept being side-tracked by Frannie’s life choices. Which is kind of ironic, given the ending.

‘If I’d only known.’

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Freedom, Only Freedom: The Prison Writings of Behrouz Boochani by Behrouz Boochani, Moones Mansoubi (Editor), Omid Tofighian (Editor)

‘Here in these pages is everything we must face if we are to save ourselves from the horror of repetition.’ (From the Foreword by Tara June Winch, 2022)

Behrouz Boochani, a Kurdish-Iranian writer, journalist and refugee activist was detained on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea for several years. He now lives in New Zealand. This book contains a collection of essays and poems that provide a first-hand account of his experiences in detention, and the struggles faced by those in offshore detention seeking asylum in Australia. Behrouz Boochani’s own writings are accompanied by essays written by other activists and by historians and journalists.

‘If we wanted to describe life in the Manus Prison, we could sum it up in just one sentence:  A prisoner is someone who needs to line up in order to fulfil even the most basic needs of every human being.’

This is a powerful and confronting work. Behrouz Boochani writes about individuals, about people. He tells us their stories, their hopes and tragically in some cases their illnesses and deaths. We may be able to ignore people anonymised as numbers, but how many of us can ignore the stories of individuals and the impact detention had on them?

Behrouz Boochani writes of a kyriarchal system, a term borrowed from feminist writing, which he describes as ‘best described as interlocking and mutually reinforcing structures of violence obsessed with oppression, domination and submission, structures also characterized by their replication and multiplication.’ (page xviii)

I found this very uncomfortable reading. Australia’s colonial past should be history, uncomfortable as it is. Australia’s colonial past should not be shaping the institutions we build now and thereby influencing the decisions we make about the future. The people of Papua New Guinea and Nauru also deserve better treatment.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Book 5 in my 2023 Nonfiction Reader Challenge. I’ve entered as a ‘Nonfiction Grazer’ and this book should be included under the heading of ‘Politics and Government’.

Old God’s Time by Sebastian Barry

‘Exhausted youth is different from exhausted age. It can be repaired.’

Tom Kettle is a retired policeman, living alone by the Irish Sea in Dalkey, south of Dublin. His days are full of memories of his wife June, and their children Joseph and Winnie, all now dead, together with his observations of those who are his neighbours. Tom finds some comfort in the solitude and beauty of his surroundings. And then, one day, he is visited by two policemen who hope that he can help them. They are reopening a case Tom worked on some thirty years earlier, in the 1960s.

‘There were many terrible stories in the world, and he had heard most of them.’

This visit and what follows takes Tom into the past, into uncomfortable memories of abuse perpetrated on children, on him and his wife as children by priests, and this impact of that abuse. Tom is surrounded by memories. The good memories he has of June and their children, the bad memories occasioned by the wretched distress of abuse, of powerlessness. Can good memories balance the bad? Is it ever possible for the adult to escape the fetters abuse places on a child? Tom is comforted by his love for June, but he cannot forget or ignore the impact of the abuse she suffered.

Revisiting the case takes Tom back into his life both in the army and as a detective. His memories, shared with the reader, are not chronological and may not always be accurate. I found myself reading slowly, turning back pages trying to follow Tom’s thoughts. Stream of consciousness does not always work for me but in this case, it served to highlight Tom’s story, to amplify the paralysing widespread effect of abuse.

I finished reading this novel some time ago and am still thinking about aspects of it. In the hands of a lesser writer, it would not have had the same impact. This is a sad story dealing with uncomfortable issues. A harrowing but recommended read.

‘His story was told and he had told it to no one.’

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Faber & Faber for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Deep and Deadly: Murder on the Scottish coast by Keith Moray (Inspector Torquil McKinnon #7)

‘The old writing box had a musty odour and was unremarkable to look at.’

The island of West Uist in Scotland may be remote, but it is not immune from protest. The local ferry is blocked by eco-rights activists who are protesting about seals being shot by local fishermen.  While the protest is peaceably dispersed by the local police, they then discover a celebrity disembarked from the ferry and has caused quite a stir amongst the locals. And, just as singer and actor Declan O’Neil is escorted away, Detective Inspector Torquil McKinnon is called to investigate the discovery of a dead body.

Arran MacCondrum, owner of the salmon farm which has led to the protests, has been found dead in one of the fish pens. Initially, his death is thought to be suicide but investigations reveal that he was murdered. But by whom, and why? Could his murder be connected to the protest?

Meanwhile, several islanders have received threatening poison-pen letters from ‘Mungo’. Torquil McKinnon has his hands full with the investigation (not to mention that he is about to marry) and while some of the islanders mean to help (especially the intrepid reporters of the West Uist Chronicle), danger abounds. And what is Declan O’Neil doing on the island?

This is the seventh instalment in the Torquil McKinnon series (note to self: you’ve missed a couple), and is every bit as entertaining and engrossing as the others I have read. A few(!) red herrings to sniff out, some unexpected twists and quite a bit of information about fish farming. Alas, while I had my suspicions, I didn’t work out who ‘Mungo’ was before the end.

Mr Moray is a prolific author, and I’ve enjoyed quite a few of his books across different genres. Highly recommended. Excuse me while I hunt down a few books in this series that I have missed.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Sapere Books for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Deep and Deadly: Murder on the Scottish coast by Keith Moray (Inspector Torquil McKinnon #7)

‘The old writing box had a musty odour and was unremarkable to look at.’

The island of West Uist in Scotland may be remote, but it is not immune from protest. The local ferry is blocked by eco-rights activists who are protesting about seals being shot by local fishermen.  While the protest is peaceably dispersed by the local police, they then discover a celebrity disembarked from the ferry and has caused quite a stir amongst the locals. And, just as singer and actor Declan O’Neil is escorted away, Detective Inspector Torquil McKinnon is called to investigate the discovery of a dead body.

Arran MacCondrum, owner of the salmon farm which has led to the protests, has been found dead in one of the fish pens. Initially, his death is thought to be suicide but investigations reveal that he was murdered. But by whom, and why? Could his murder be connected to the protest?

Meanwhile, several islanders have received threatening poison-pen letters from ‘Mungo’. Torquil McKinnon has his hands full with the investigation (not to mention that he is about to marry) and while some of the islanders mean to help (especially the intrepid reporters of the West Uist Chronicle), danger abounds. And what is Declan O’Neil doing on the island?

This is the seventh instalment in the Torquil McKinnon series (note to self: you’ve missed a couple), and is every bit as entertaining and engrossing as the others I have read. A few(!) red herrings to sniff out, some unexpected twists and quite a bit of information about fish farming. Alas, while I had my suspicions, I didn’t work out who ‘Mungo’ was before the end.

Mr Moray is a prolific author, and I’ve enjoyed quite a few of his books across different genres. Highly recommended. Excuse me while I hunt down a few books in this series that I have missed.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Sapere Books for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

My Brilliant Friend (Neapolitan Novels #1) by Elena Ferrante and translated by Ann Goldstein

‘I feel no nostalgia for our childhood: it was full of violence. ‘

Yes, I have had this book on my reading shelf for years. And yes, I’ve delayed reading it because when people tell me I ‘must’ read a book, I wait until the hype dies down. I waited a long time, but a comment on one of the blogs I follow jolted me into action.

The novel opens with a phone call. Lila’s son phones Elena to say that his mother is missing and asks whether Elena has seen her. Elena suspects that Lila has gone missing deliberately and reflects on their lives and shared friendship which started in the 1950s.

Elena Greco and Rafaella ‘Lila’ Cerullo are friends. They grew up in a poor area of Naples in the 1950s. While Elena is our narrator, it is Lila who captured and held my attention. I want to know more about her, and why she has gone missing. Elena takes us back to the beginning of their friendship. Both families are poor, but Elena has opportunities that Lila does not. And yet, Elena feels second-best in comparison. Why?

Elena recounts their childhoods, their growth into womanhood. Elena continues with school, while Lila goes to work in her father’s shoe shop. Lila dreams of designing her own line of shoes, and with her brother’s help makes a prototype. A young man, the son of a powerful local family, wants to marry Lila, but she makes a different choice.

Many different themes are woven into this story. These themes include power within small communities and their politics, the impacts of poverty and violence, obligations within families, friendship, and responsibility.

I finished this novel, annoyed that other obligations prevent me from immediately jumping into the second book of the series. I need to know what happens next.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Dawnlands (The Fairmile #3) by Philippa Gregory

‘I never give up.’

Spring, 1685. England is on the brink of another civil war. King Charles II has died without a legitimate heir and his brother James is to take the throne. But the English people are bitterly divided, and neither James nor his second wife, Mary of Modena, are universally welcomed.

Ned Ferryman in Boston, New England, hears of the prospect of a rebellion against James II and returns from America with his Pokanoket servant to join the uprising. Ned swears loyalty to Charles II’s illegitimate son, James Scott, the Duke of Monmouth who leads a rebellion against the monarchy.

Livia Avery, who is surely one of the most manipulative, opportunistic, and dislikeable characters in fiction, joins the court as a lady-in-waiting to the new queen. Her actions put the Reekie family at risk. After inveigling Matteo into helping save the queen from Monmouth’s invasion, Livia secures the manor of Foulmire for him. Foulmire is where Ned, Alinor and Alys once lived, and the family can return ‘home’ to the TiIdelands. But Livia has not yet finished meddling.

While I enjoyed the setting and much of the story, I kept wishing that Livia would meet her comeuppance. And I wondered whether King James II and his wife were really so vapid. Possibly. But the main characters for me were members of the Reekie family together with Ned Ferryman and his Pokanoket servant. The story shifts between England and Barbados, where sugar is king, and slavery makes Britain’s fortunes as a superpower.

Now that I have finished, I want a fourth book to find out what will happen next. The Fairmile series is an expansive family saga set during a tumultuous period of history.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

William Cooper: An Aboriginal Life Story by Bain Attwood

Who was William Cooper?

 ‘On Saturday 7 August 1937 an unusual event occurred. An Australian newspaper published a feature story about an Aboriginal man that was based on an interview one of its leading journalists had conducted with him.[…] The Aboriginal man was William Cooper.’

William Cooper (born in 1860 or 1861– died 29 March 1941) was a Yorta Yorta man, an Aboriginal Australian political activist and community leader. He was the first Aboriginal Australian the first to lead a national movement recognised by the Australian Government.

After reading a review of this book, I needed to read it for myself. I had not heard of William Cooper and knew nothing about his activism. This should have been part of the history I learned at school during the 1960s: much more relevant than the British monarchy, or John Macarthur’s single-handed (tongue-in-cheek) development of the Australian wool industry. While I am old enough to remember the 1967 Referendum (which sought to change two sections of the Constitution in relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples), I naively thought that equal rights would follow. More than half a century later, I can only hope that the ‘Voice to Parliament’ referendum is passed later this year.

‘This book seeks to tell the story of William Cooper’s life and times, but it necessarily diverges from traditional biography to some degree. The historical sources an academic historian requires for such a study—extensive private papers that are created by the subject of the biography—simply do not exist.’

As I read about William Cooper’s life and campaigns, about his petition to King George V for an Aboriginal representative in the Australian parliament, his call for a day of mourning after 150 years of colonisation, the walk-off of the Yorta Yorta people from Cumeroogunga reserve in 1939 and his opposition to the establishment of an Aboriginal regiment in the Second World War, I was filled with admiration. This self-taught man, full of dignity, campaigned tirelessly.

‘The rights that Cooper and his fellow Aboriginal campaigners mostly called for were the same rights that other Australians enjoyed—what they called ‘equal rights’ or ‘citizenship rights’—rather than Indigenous rights, which are the rights that only Indigenous people can claim on the basis of being the descendants of the country’s First People.’

The 1967 referendum went some way to providing citizenship rights, but more was needed then and is still needed. And then, there is this:

‘But what distinguished him [Cooper] from other campaigners was the fact that he called for Aboriginal political representation. He realised that historical difference meant that Aboriginal people saw the world differently: they thought black whereas whitefellas could not do this. This meant that in order to hear the Aboriginal voice the federal parliament had to agree to changes being made to the nation’s constitution.’

It is time!

If, like me, you have never heard of William Cooper, then I recommend reading this book.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Book 4 in my 2023 Nonfiction Reader Challenge. I’ve entered as a ‘Nonfiction Grazer’ and this book should be included under the heading of ‘Biography’.

Locked Ward (Natalie King, Forensic Psychiatrist #4) by Anne Buist

‘The day started badly, but a pretty standard type of badly for a Monday.’

Natalie King reluctantly signs into the Mother-Baby Unit at the Southside Private Hospital. Her baby daughter, Sienna, does not sleep well at night and lack of sleep is a major trigger for Natalie’s bipolar disorder. Five days and nights at Sleep School may give Natalie and Sienna the nocturnal routine they need. Natalie is hoping to be just another patient in the unit, but the arrival of another patient who knows her puts paid to that.

There are eight beds in the unit, six of which are occupied by new mothers needing psychiatric help. The women come from a range of different backgrounds, have different issues and family situations. And one of the nurses seems to rub most of the patients the wrong way. Natalie doesn’t stay for the full five days: Sienna has established a good sleeping pattern, so they leave early.

Not long after Natalie leaves, the nurse that hardly anyone liked is murdered. The evidence seems to point to Jamilla al-Azari, a Sudanese woman transferred to Melbourne from Nauru. Jamilla is found at the scene with a bloody knife in her hands. Jamilla is transferred to the Yarra Bend hospital where Natalie works.

‘But I was in an unusual position for a forensic psychiatrist. I had seen her the day of the murder: before the murder. I had seen that she wasn’t psychotic.’

Natalie is not convinced that Jamilla is the murderer: several aspects of the case do not make sense. In her quest for the truth, Natalie manages to clash with the police involved (whom she knows) as well as her boss at Yarra Bend. Add to this Natalie’s complicated domestic life: Sienna’s father, her former partner, is Detective Damian McBride, one of the police officers investigating the murder. Her current partner, Liam, has problems of his own with his ex-wife.

Natalie persists. The set up at the Mother-Baby Unit makes it highly likely that the murderer was one of the patients or a partner. As Parveen (the murdered nurse) clashed with most patients, almost everyone is a suspect.

‘So which of them had murdered Parveen—and why?’

I really enjoyed this novel. Ms Buist provides an intriguing set of characters and several twists in the story which kept me guessing until the end.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Text Publishing Australia for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

My Dream Time by Ash Barty

‘I hear two voices when I’m playing tennis. I always have. One whispers, ‘Ash, you’re not good enough,’ and the other replies, ‘Yes, you are – come on, Ash!’

I was not sure what to expect when I picked up this book. While I am not a great fan of tennis, I have enjoyed watching Ash Barty play. And I was intrigued to read a memoir from an accomplished young woman who retired from professional tennis still ranked #1 in singles.

In this memoir, Ash Barty deals with the highs and lows of her career in tennis, of the struggles she faced and of the team effort behind her. There’s a humility evident in this memoir: Ash Barty writes of those who have helped her, of the sacrifices her family made to enable her to achieve her dream and of knowing that it was time to quit. This book spans the twenty years between when Ash Barty first picked up a tennis racquet as a five-year-old in Ipswich and her retirement at Melbourne Park after winning the 2022 Australian Open.

‘The people in this crowd make me wonder about that separation professional athletes strive to find, between who we are and what people think of us – the psyche versus the story. They’re two separate entities, of course – the person and the persona – but they’re both real. They overlap, compete and sometimes coalesce.’

I wonder what the future holds for Ash Barty? She is a proud First Nations woman committed to creating sport and education opportunities for youth around Australia. As an advocate for children’s literacy, she’s published the six book Little Ash series for children aged 5+ (illustrated by Jade Goodwin) about school, sport, friendship and family.

Whatever Ash Barty does, I am sure she will tackle with the same purpose and sense of perspective as she did her tennis career.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith