Kala, by Colin Walsh.

 

            Colin Walsh has already made his reputation as a prize-winning short-story writer:  this is his first novel and he may cover all the bases of a competent thriller, but it takes an extraordinary talent to elevate efficiency to brilliance, and Colin Walsh has it in spades.

            The reader is spared no mercy as we are subjected to every good, bad and ugly emotion throughout this story of solid teenage friendship that has disintegrated into reluctant acquaintance fifteen years after the disappearance of Kala Lanann, the heart and soul of the little group.  Her boyfriend Joe is now a famous rock star;  her best friend Helen has returned to Ireland from Canada to attend her father’s forthcoming wedding to Pauline Lyons, mother of Aidan, Joe’s mate and drummer in their little rock band, and Mush – Mush is Aidan’s cousin, horribly scarred and doomed to be his Mam’s assistant in their Cafe in the tourist town of Kinlough till death do them part.  Kala’s staunch-to-the-death friends haven’t survived well without her, and no-one – NO-ONE, wants to revisit the last time they saw her:  each of them know that they could have behaved differently.  Kala was in trouble;  she needed them, and they let her down.

            But her body has never been found, so that should surely mean something, especially to her poor, wheelchair-bound  grandmother with whom she lived – until her bones are discovered on a local building site in a gym bag.  Her badly broken skull is on top of the bag, with a photo of two young girls positioned beneath.  Are they the next targets?  And why was Kala, a vital, fearless, talented 15 year-old murdered?  What did she know or discover to cause her horrible death, and could her friends have prevented it?

            The nature of friendship casual or deep is relentlessly explored in this searing exposé of the corrupt underbelly of a seemingly prosperous and scenic Irish seaside town:  the police control law and order – but who controls the police?  To their consternation, the broken, wounded adult versions of Kala’s much-loved friends discover that everything has its price and for some, it is too high to pay.

            With this outstanding debut novel, Colin Walsh proves that he can carry on admirably the great literary tradition of Irish storytelling:  it’s all wonderful craic and I can’t wait for the next example of his brilliance. Will he make me laugh and cry again, and recoil in horror at the cruelty his characters visit upon each other?  I shall be waiting because I must, but I hope he doesn’t go on his holidays!  SIX STARS.

 

    

             

 

Killing Jericho, by William Hussey.

 

            How many Crime novels have you read where the protagonist is a burnt-out investigator, near the end of his tether but with still-enviable skills at detecting and smelling rats of all kinds?  William Hussey’s main man Scott Jericho is all of these things, but he’s also of a different stripe:  he’s a Traveller – a Pikey, a Gypo, part of the travelling fairs of Gypsies who still visit different locations in Britain – and he’s gay.

            He also won a scholarship to Oxford, experienced contempt from every class of student because he was a traveller, and found love with a fellow student, Harry Wainhouse, who was the one ray of sunshine in his bleak, unlovely life.  Naturally, with his luck, everything eventually becomes unstuck, especially his precious relationship, and after a time of booze, pills and doubtful employment in ‘security’ he eventually finds salvation of a sort:  as a policeman, causing great consternation to his travelling family, who don’t take kindly to coppers, who have never taken their side, even when they should!

            His mentor is a Detective Inspector Garris who sees great promise in Scott’s cleverly deductive reasoning of various crims and crimes, and for a time Scott Jericho is almost happy in his work, until a particularly hideous crime involving the burning to death of three small children causes him to snap and try to beat the perpetrator to death.  His punishment is severe, with a degrading jail term and damages awarded to the perp:  when he is released he is ready to die;  his life means nothing any more – until his old mentor Garris needs his thoughts on a case which appears to mirror an awful historic event concerning his own travelling family:  three people have already died in dreadful copy-cat killings of a tragic event that occurred one hundred and fifty years before.  Nothing accidental or suspicious – all bloodthirsty murders, every one.  Scott cannot resist his good friend’s plea.  He will help if he can and all he can:  it’s time to come back to the world again.

            Except that the more he delves into the crimes, the worse they become, and will he solve the myriad puzzles they present with every turn, or will he become another victim?

            William Hussey comes from a travelling background and knows whereof he speaks;  he has created a very plausible, flawed hero (who does get the guy at the end!), and there will be more Jericho novels to come.  I wouldn’t bet the farm on it, but I’m pretty sure you won’t figure out Whodunnit until that fact is revealed, and you’ll have to keep reading the series (as I will) to find out if the monster is finally bought to justice.  FOUR STARS.

 

The Sparrow, by Tessa Duder.                Young Adults

 

            Auckland writer Tessa Duder dedicates this book ‘to the memory of the women and girls cruelly and unjustly convicted, transported and imprisoned 12,000 miles from their homeland, to those who died and those who, against all odds, survived.’

            And one such survivor in 1840 is Harriet, convicted at the age of 10 of stealing an apple at a market in her Sussex home town:  she didn’t steal the apple;  her jealous older brother connived with his friend to get her arrested by the local constable for theft – that would teach her to think she was better, and better-loved by their parents who, regardless of their desperate attempts to save their little girl from her fate, were powerless to stop her being transported to Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania).

            As if the sea voyage weren’t horrific enough, the destination is even worse, and an attempt by Harriet to escape brings even more punishment raining on her cruelly shaved head.  She will die soon:  she knows it - except for the human kindness we all should have, shown to her by one of the jailors.  She engineers a successful escape for a little girl whom she feels is not destined to die in such a hellhole and Harriet, eventually disguised as Harry stows away on the very same ship that transported her to Hobart:  she’s desperate to return home to her parents, but a side trip first to New Zealand is a compulsory exercise – she can hardly go to the captain as a stowaway and demand to be taken back to England.  But once more she meets kindness in the shape of an Irish seaman who discovers her hiding place and provides her with food and advice – lots of it, to the effect that when she arrives in Auckland, her boy’s disguise complete, she has no problem becoming a messenger boy and earning coins from all the Big-Wigs who have arrived to establish Auckland as the new capital of New Zealand.

            Along with material for a 16-room mansion for the new Governor, the class system has been imported, too – there are clear guidelines as to where everyone should settle:  manual workers at Mechanics Bay, Officials at Official Bay, and business people at Commercial Bay.  And everyone in their little tent villages is supplied with food and vegetables by ‘the natives’.  Who are not to be trusted.  Just because.  They are brown, have tattoos, are half-naked, and don’t speak English.  Never mind that they provide most of the food the settlers eat – that’s immaterial.  They are not to be trusted.

            Ms Duder’s account of our early years as a nation is ruthlessly honest and uncompromising, and she has created in Harriet the same qualities, along with courage and resourcefulness.  This story was a pleasure to read.  SIX STARS.