Reading room

Everyone’s talking about debut author Jane Harper’s Australian thriller. Juliet Rieden finds out why.

THE DRY BY JANE HARPER, PAN MACMILLAN.

It seems every promising psychological thriller is tagged the new Gone Girl and although The Dry is garnering the moniker, to judge it in that arena is misleading. The chatter – and bidding war – around this release is nevertheless extremely well deserved. Debut author and journalist Jane Harper has produced a razor-sharp crime yarn dripping in the sights, sounds and smells of the Australian bush.

The novel is set in the rural Victorian township of Kiewarra, an area devastated by drought and a second year of the crippling effects of El Niño. As blow ies gather in a farmhouse, its front door swinging on its hinges, a vivid scene of horror unfolds, of “glassy eyes” and “wet wounds”, not from starved livestock, but the sticky blood of three dead bodies.

Aaron Falk hails from this part of the world, but ed 20 years before, not intending to return. Yet the tragic death of his childhood friend, Luke, in what appears to be a murder-suicide involving his wife and son beckons Aaron to an emotionally charged funeral. Aaron’s return to the blighted town meets with considerable hostility as dark episodes from the past bubble to the surface. At the heart of the plot is another historic suspicious death which seems somehow linked to this tragedy. Now a federal policeman based in the city, Aaron nds himself using his investigative nous to unpick his friend’s demise and starts to question whether all is what it seems. The storytelling is accomplished, with a bald sparseness to the writing that draws you in and characterisation that rings resoundingly true.

“I wanted to write a novel based in regional Australia because it is such a naturally atmospheric setting and I wanted to write something with a mystery element because those are the kinds of novels I enjoy,” Jane Harper tells The Weekly. That sense of enjoyment is certainly there as the action twists and turns, the pace building to a fantastic nale that will leave you breathless.

Happily, Jane is working on a new crime tale featuring Aaron Falk, so if you’re hooked – and I think you will be – watch out for the sequel.