THE STONING
A small town in outback Australia wakes to
a crime of medieval savagery.
A local schoolteacher is found taped to a tree and stoned to death. Suspicion
instantly falls on the refugees at the new detention centre on Cobb's northern
outskirts. Tensions are high, between whites and the local indigenous
community, between immigrants and the townies.
Still mourning the recent death of his father, Detective Sergeant George
Manolis returns to his childhood hometown to investigate. Within minutes of his
arrival, it's clear that Cobb is not the same place he left. Once it thrived,
but now it's a poor and derelict dusthole, with the local police chief it
deserves. And as Manolis negotiates his new colleagues' antagonism, and the
simmering anger of a community destroyed by alcohol and drugs, the ghosts of
his past begin to flicker to life.
Vivid, pacy and almost dangerously atmospheric, The Stoning is the first in a
new series of outback noir featuring DS Manolis, himself an outsider, and a
good man in a world gone to hell.
The STONING by Peter Papathanasiou is book one in the DS George Manolis series. Manolis is sent to Cobb, a fictitious rural town in outback Australia, to investigate the stoning death of a respected teacher.
Manolis spent his early childhood Cobb, but the few memories he has of the place are far removed from what it is today: a declining town verging on lawlessness, where drug and alcohol abuse is rampant. A town with a nearby refugee detention centre that incenses residents, promoted as a boost to the community, it only seems to have brought a transient workforce and the refugees, who, in the eyes of the residents are better treated than they are.
Reading some interviews and publicity material about the book, it’s clear that the author is well versed in the issues he writes in the book. As a reader, I felt this was both an advantage and disadvantage. The story premise is compelling – the first chapter definitely draws you in - and I was interested enough to continue reading. On the other side, I found the ever increasing agenda-pushing and at times fanciful language (‘wild refugee blood’ . . . ???) became a drawback.
My favourite character was Constable Andrew ‘Sparrow’ Smith. He’s young, Aboriginal, gay, and a police officer. In an insular town like Cobb where racism is widespread, homosexuality is condemned, and the police are despised, Sparrow has definitely got the deck stacked against him. And yet, he still picks himself up, time and again. I would have loved to learn more about him – he deserves his own book.
This book firmly sits in the ‘outback noir’ genre, and I think fans of this genre will appreciate that the book brings something a little different with an unusual crime and the atypical setting of an insular town sitting alongside a refugee detention centre.
Book borrowed from my library. I love libraries!
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