The Simple Death by Michael Duffy

On finishing reading The Simple Death by Michael Duffy (pub. Allen & Unwin) I was struck by the way in which life and death is dealt with depending on the hand that circumstance deals you.

The Simple Death is Duffy’s second novel featuring Sydney Detective Nicholas Troy following on from his impressive debut novel, The Tower. The story starts with the disappearance of a man off the Manly Ferry which is eventually found to be a murder. It is this investigation that occupies Troy’s time, but he is also being troubled by a few other events in his life.

His long-time mentor and friend, Father Luke Corelli is lying in a cancer hospice close to death and facing accusations of child abuse from many years ago. Troy’s wife has moved out of home and taken their young son to Queensland following some of the harrowing events from the first book. And finally, Troy’s immediate superior, Detective Sergeant Jon McIvor appears to be contemplating leaving the force to become a singer full-time. There’s a lot to take in, both for Troy and the reader.

Introduced to the story comes a woman named Leila Scott who has smuggled a drug into the country for her mother who is terminally ill with bone cancer. It is her involvement with a voluntary euthanasia group that appears to somehow tie back to Troy’s case.

Exactly how is a complete mystery.

It is this process that Duffy proceeds to perform with great dexterity. Not only does he deliver a relevant and clever story he does so while expanding on the characters that were first introduced in the first book. Mystery surrounds many diverse parts of Troy’s investigation and with the problem of a boss whose mind is not entirely on the job, the distraction of a wife and son who may never return and the struggle to understand the plight of his friend there is a great deal to hold together.

The Simple Death is more than a crime novel. At times it provides commentary on today’s society and the way in which popular opinion is manipulated. The battle between the law and a merciful death is one of the arguments that is inevitably going to arise when broaching a subject that is far more complex than it first appears on the surface.

It is the issue of euthanasia that makes a lie out of the title of the book, mocking the concept that the death or deaths in this novel are simple. In fact they are all very complex, particularly when tying to come to terms with the motivation behind them and the justifications used in carrying them out.

The Simple Death highlights the fact that there is nothing simple about death.

Line of Sight by David Whish-Wilson

Line of Sight (pub. Viking Penguin) is the second novel by Western Australian author David Whish-Wilson following his debut novel The Summons (2006). This is a chilling fight conducted by one straight policeman against the might and power of a rotten to the core police force and state government. The following brief review is the one that I have psoted on the Crime Down Under website and I am reposting it here for those who missed it.

Review of Line of Sight by David Whish-Wilson

The year is 1975 and a Royal Commission into police corruption has been called in Perth, Western Australia. The murder of Ruby Devine, a brothel madam, has opened up countless questions over the operations of some of the highest ranking police in the state.

Detective Superintendant Frank Swann has blown the whistle on his colleagues and they have closed ranks against him using every dirty trick in the book to discredit him. The judge that has been brought out of retirement and flown in from Melbourne quickly finds out that his appointment has been made with the expectation that the Royal Commission will come to the conclusion that the police have no case to answer and that Swann’s claims are those of a man who has already suffered one breakdown and could be going through another.

Then there is the hit man who has flown into town with a quick in and out job to do. His presence is noted but the target is not made clear. Certainly there is more than a little intrigue over his presence in Perth.

Whish-Wilson creates a pertinent metaphor for the predicament that Swan has found himself in while Swan goes for a swim in the surf: “If he was in the wrong place it would spear him down into the sand and hold him under until it passed; if he was in the right place he would ride it until his weight dissolved and he found himself delivered gently onto the shore”.

When it’s one man against the world thoughts must inevitably turn to chucking it all in and giving up. The burdens carried by Swann as the story unfolds become increasingly clear until you are left with a deep admiration for the resolve of the man. However, one also can’t help but question his common sense.

There is no doubt that Whish-Wilson has drawn deeply from the well of corruption that rocked WA a few decades ago.

For more details about the book you can visit the page on Crime Down Under devoted to Line of Sight by David Whish-Wilson.

Reading Notes: No Weather For A Burial by David Owen

The Pufferfish series was one of those fortunate discoveries that allowed me to lose myself in the wonderful beauty of Tasmania while I was also taken through a cleverly plotted series of crime novels featuring one of the most prickly of protagonists. It has been the source of more than a little bit of selfish disappointment that the series only ran for 4 books: Pig's Head (1994), A Second Hand (1995), X and Y (1995) and The Devil Taker (1997).

The astoundingly good news is that after a break of 13 years Detective Inspector Franz 'Pufferfish' Heineken has returned to the job and has featured in the 5th Pufferfish Mystery - No Weather For A Burial (pub. 40 Degrees South).

Also making the return are the rest of Heineken's TPF colleagues Detective Sergeant Hedda Andover of the Drug Squad, his two subordinates Detective Rafe Tredway and Constable Faye Addison a couple of up and comers ready to jump at Heineken's barked command. Then there's Heineken's superior officer Chief Superintendant Walter D'Hayt a man described by the Pufferfish as "a painful stickler, a goody two shoes - we call him GTS - a supercilious, vainglorious prick."

In short, No Weather For A Burial is an incredibly entertaining mystery that features some of the most incredibly descriptive depictions of Tasmania possible. If you don't feel a burning desire to visit the place to see some of the locations for yourself then you're just not trying.

Take the following observation as Franz flies back in to Hobart:

Sheet rain falls across the Organ Pipes of Mount Wellington and the dark
green silhouette of hills linking it to Mount Dromedary. Sunlight slants through
shifting cloud masses. From the eastern shore, approaching the bridge, Hobart
and her outer suburbs, and the pair of flags rippling energetically at
Government House, have a strange unreality about them, a hyper reality brought
on by a massive rainbow. This place is home to the likes of me.

Back to the plot: with Heineken back at work after a stint of long-service leave it doesn't take long for a call to come in to attend a crime scene. It's the discovery of a body found buried on a remote deserted beach (at Outer North Head past Roaring Beach) and the unknown man has obviously been murdered.

This is the starting point of an investigation that begins with a body and not the first clue as to his identity nor how he came to be buried at a beach. The methodical mind of Heineken gradually pieces the mystery together while pressured and distracted by D'Hayt.

From my observation the Pufferfish personality appears to have mellowed just a fraction but the sharp mind and clever deductive process ensures that the story, along with the investigation, flows smoothly. Pufferfish is as sharp as a tack, he sees all and stows it away for future use and only he knows how he's playing the game.

David Owen is a master storyteller and a true ambassador for the state of Tasmania. The state of Tasmania is featured prominently as a vital part of the story and makes it all the more memorable for the forbidding landscapes that are described along the way.

I wasn’t satisfied with reading No Weather For a Burial once. I did something that I have only very rarely done, when I finished the book I turned back to page 1 and I started reading all over again. Not only that, but it was just as enjoyable for the second sitting.

Looking around at the various bookstores it appears that if you want to buy No Weather For A burial you should do so through the publishers.

Reading Notes : The Zero Option by David Rollins

The sixth thriller by David Rollins and the second without the "A". For those who were looking out for the next Vin Cooper book, this is not it, it's a stand alone novel but don't be alarmed because it's a powerful thriller indeed.

The story switches between 1983 and 2012 as we get a story of action and consequence that plays out after 30 years of lies and deception.

There is a terrible plan born in the Cold War days, hatched by NSA agent Roy Garret in which a commercial jet filled with innocent people would be "accidentally" flown into Soviet air space. The Soviets, if they were true to their threats would shoot the plane out of the sky, thus revealing themselves to the rest of the world as the true evil who must be stopped by the US. The plan is put in place in a bid to improve President Reagan's flagging popularity.

Something this large requires a lot of things to go right for the truth to remain a secret and inevitably there is a leak of information that is allowed to get by all of the work done by the NSA heavies. That leak comes in the form of an old American Air Force pilot Curtis Foxx and a Japanese radar operator Yuudai Suzuki. However it is only after their deaths in 2012 that they set in motion a series of events that threaten to uncover the terrible truth.

It comes down to Ben Harbor and Akiko Sato, two youngsters who don't really understand what they're getting themselves into leading a chase through some of the most inhospitable territory. Their pursuers? Well they will want them dead to keep a 30 year old secret.

The Zero Option by David Rollins is an action packed thriller that is your classic tale of the innocent small guy being chased by a formidible big-guy bully. There should only be one winner. And at this point I'm not sure exactly who that winner will be because I've still got another 100 pages to go and I'm riveted.

Deep Water by Peter Corris

The 34th book in Peter Corris' Cliff Hardy private detective series titled Deep Water was released a couple of weeks ago on 30 March by Allen & Unwin. Here is a series that has stood the test of time developing consistently from the first book (The Dying Trade).

My review, containing some of my thoughts about the book can be found on the Deep Water page at Crime Down Under.

Meanwhile, here is the Media Release that will give you the incentive to go out and get yourself a copy of Deep Water.

In a case of art mirroring life, the latest instalment in Peter Corris' Cliff Hardy series, Deep Water, sees the beloved Hardy undergo a quadruple heart bypass after suffering a life threatening heart attack.

Author, Peter Corris, underwent the same heart operation last year, obviously influencing the direction of the Cliff Hardy series.

However, the similarities stop there as Cliff Hardy gets drawn into a missing person's investigation, after the father of his nurse, Margaret McKinley, goes missing.

The search for renowned geologist, Dr Henry McKinley, takes Hardy behind the scenes at one of Sydney's biggest basin aquifers and ignites the wrath of local big buisness that stand to lose even bigger money if Hardy's discoveries are revealed.

Ignoring the threat to his life from both his health and his enemies, Hardy is determined to uncover the truth no matter how deep the water he finds himself in.

Except from the book.

The following excerpt from Deep Water gives a little bit of an insight into Cliff Hardy and what has made him so popular for so long.

A few days later, installed back in my house and with outstanding correspondence and obligations, mostly financial but also social and medical, dealt with, I called on Hank in his Newtown office to talk over the Henry McKinley matter. I climbed the familiar stairs from King Street bu tnow a fluorescent light made them more negotiable. As I was making my way up a man coming down fast bumped into me and almost knocked me off balance.

'Terribly sorry,' he said. 'Are you all right, sir?'

I was until you called me sir, I thought. I nodded and he went down, turning at the bottom of the stairs to look back. I signalled to him and went on.

If you want to find out more about Deep Water by Peter Corris you can also visit Inside Story where Shane Maloney has written an outstanding article about Deep Water, Cliff Hardy and Peter Corris.

Reading Notes : A Beautiful Place To Die by Malla Nunn

There have been a number of high quality debut Australian book releases in the last couple of months that have come my way. I’m gradually getting to each one and have been impressed by all of them.

A particularly strong novel is A Beautiful Place to Die by Malla Nunn (Pan Macmillan Australia), a murder mystery set in South Africa in the 1950s. The time and setting are significant because of the Racial Segregation laws that were in place at the time. The story explores these laws throughout the book and the attitudes of characters play a major role in the tone of the book and in the story’s outcome.

A Beautiful Place To Die introduces police detective Emmanuel Cooper who is called to a small town to investigate the murder of the town’s police captain. What he has walked into, though is a dangerously poised tinderbox of emotions as the sons of the dead man deal with their rage and grief by looking for someone to blame. Their attention sits squarely on the black community and Cooper is forced to act as the voice of reason, unsure of the authority he might be able to exert in such a remote town.

Moving in to take over are the police Security Branch, the feared enforcers of the racial laws that rule the land. Their intention is to find the kind of suspect that suits their needs, which leaves it up to Cooper to work surreptitiously to find the true murderer, regardless of the colour of his skin.

The story builds quickly in intensity as pressure is placed on Emmanuel - and not from the direction you would expect it to come. This is obviously a heartfelt subject for the author and it is told with great style.