OUT IN NOWHERE

by Fleur McDonald

Publisher: Allen & Unwin, 2024

Review 

by Deb Bodinnar

I have read all of Fleur McDonald’s novels starting with Red Dust (2009), where Dave Burrows first appeared. As with them all, I feel like I know Dave, and when I open the latest book I am sitting down with an old mate having a good chin wag. 

 Set in outback South Australia we find Detective Dave Burrows, now at the twilight of his policing years, working with Mia Worth, a young female constable, who is still having trouble getting the country blokes to take her seriously. One of these men is Rod Donaldson, his family has owned property at Barker for ages and it’s a man’s world as far as he’s concerned. His son, Alex, went to Agricultural College and now works on the farm with him, living there with his wife Hallie and 2-year-old daughter, Ruby. 

When Alex is found dead at one of the property’s windmills, Rod makes it clear to Mia that he’ll only talk to the male detective, not to her. 

I found Rod’s character quite indicative of some old-fashioned farmers who have generational farming properties, and hang on to their rusted-on beliefs that women are there to support the men and keep house. Thank goodness these attitudes have changed with a high number of women now working in Agricultural enterprises.

The pace of the story is good and has some amusing moments where Mia puts her foot in her mouth at a school talk and when a silly Galah sticks his head in front of a camera.

With the secrets of the” blood brothers” from Ag College coming into play, the plot opens up and I did not figure out the culprit. After being a huge Dave Burrows fan for years, it was nice to see his work and home life moving towards a better place.

There’s a lot of rural crime out there in the wild, most of it written by city people. Fleur’s Dave Burrows books have an authenticity that can’t be creatively thought up. She offers a genuine insight into what it is like out there in the middle of nowhere with no close neighbours to depend on. I can relate, having grown up in the bush. I have actually had a live snake visit inside my house, so I can cross that one off my list! 

I highly recommend you read Fleur McDonald’s books and enjoy a true Voice of the Outback.

Publisher’s blurb

A powerful and poignant tale of rural suspense told by the acclaimed Fleur McDonald, bestselling author of Voices in the Dark and Shock Waves.

Left alone on the vast cattle station with her baby while her husband, Alex, works the farm, Hallie Donaldson is having trouble adjusting to the flies, dust, snakes and isolation in the Flinders Ranges. 

At least today, Hallie knows that she and their daughter Ruby can watch Alex on the security camera erected at the windmill where he’ll be working. But something goes horribly wrong and he suddenly disappears from view. 

Alex is found later, dead at the bottom of the windmill. 

After Alex’s death, Hallie discovers an alarming series of phone messages sent to a still-shared link on Alex’s phone. A short time later, one of Alex’s close friends from agricultural college, Danny Betts, loses his life in another tragic rural accident. 

When Hallie reveals the horrifying information she’s been keeping secret to Detective Dave Burrows and his partner, Constable Mia Worth, they quickly realise that all is not what it seems.