Jarad Henry

The Rubens McCauley series is one of those little gems of Australian crime fiction, of which PINK TIDE is the third book. We now find McCauley in a seachange respite from the rigours of inner city St Kilda, stationed in the small coastal town of Jutt Rock, admiring the scenery, chilling out, even thinking about taking up surfing.

Until the bashing of his nephew and the death of a local hero. About then everything starts to go badly pear-shaped. McCauley's stress related ailment management, his marriage, the family, the town and the community.

Scratch the surface of most worlds and you'll find a lot of simmering problems - and Jutt Rock's no different. Especially as the investigation proceeds and the tensions boil: between local surfers and footballers, locals and incomers, straight and gay communities.

Henry sets himself a lot of scope in PINK TIDE. He has a plot to unwind which is built around the death and bashing of two local young men. The dead man is a local boy, made good. A surfing hero, somebody that the town is proud to call their own. Somebody with a secret that, for reasons which continue to baffle me completely, is cause for over-reaction in some. The reaction is touched upon, the idiocy of it beautifully highlighted by some simple and touching passages.

Whilst the investigation proceeds, overtaken by the "Big Boys" from Melbourne, McCauley mostly goes it alone. Distracted and distressed by the discovery of his wife's affair, he was a damaged man to start out with and thrown badly off-kilter by the conglomeration of all events, he presses on for the truth, playing your classic lone hand. Taking risks, stomping over the rules, opening up each and every dark box he can find.

There's considerably more damage in PINK TIDE than I remember from the earlier books in the series. There's also, I can't help feeling, a bit more of an edge, more risks. It's raw in places, and it's dark and uncomfortable sometimes. It's also fast-paced and chaotic. Which is probably the best way to describe McCauley as well.

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/review-pink-tide-jarad-henry… (altro)

It’s summer in Melbourne, Australia and with the city choking on the smoke from bushfires the body of a young runaway, Dallas Boyd, is discovered. At first Detective Rubens McCauley, newly back to work after recovering from a gunshot wound, registers the death as having no suspicious circumstances. However as he thinks about it more he becomes convinced the boy was murdered though it’s difficult for him to convince his superiors of this. He works alone on the case while suspended from duty but when a second teenager’s body is found his boss reluctantly allows him to return to work.

Ostensibly about the case of a murdered boy, Blood Sunset really seemed to me to be more about inner-city Melbourne. McCauley meets a series of people as he investigates the case and each one is used to show some aspect of life in the city. Sometimes these vignettes have little to do with the case, such as the scene which had me in tears where McCauley’s elderly neighbour describes the fear and helplessness he feels over one of his friends who was assaulted while withdrawing money from an ATM. At other times they’re more directly involved with the investigation such as when McCauley meets the social worker who has been assigned to the case of Dallas Boyd’s six-year-old sister who lives with the same step father who abused Boyd. Even McCauley’s personal life presents opportunities to display different sides of city life including his niece’s use of recreational drugs and his own search for the perfect pub gig. All of these threads are pulled deftly together to present a portrait of the gritty side of life in a modern city.

There is a very sound police procedural too, with McCauley doggedly tracking down leads and involving anyone he can find to help him uncover what happened to Dallas Boyd. At the very end of the book Henry did introduce one over-used crime fiction cliché, particularly unnecessary when the book is wonderfully suspense-filled without it, but overall it didn’t detract too much from the otherwise excellent story.

McCauley is a nicely complex character: sharing some of the foibles of other lone detectives in crime fiction but never becoming unbelievably dysfunctional. His struggle with some personal issues throughout the book is woven into the story well, providing interesting insight into his character without allowing the story to become angst-ridden. None of the other characters had much opportunity to be terribly well-developed and that, for me, was the only other slightly disappointing element to the book. Still, we did get some fascinating glimpses of both the city and McCauley’s personal history through meeting his estranged wife, his brother and some of his police colleagues.

I bought this book purely because it was buy an Australian author and hadn’t read a single thing about it before embarking on it. I sometimes wish I could approach all books with such a lack of expectations because it offers the potential for a reading surprise which, at least on this occasion, was an entirely pleasant one.… (altro)