Detective Sergeant Lucas Walker is on compassionate leave to take care of his dying grandmother in the small Australian outback town of Caloodie when he's asked to help out on a case involving two missing German backpackers.
Walker can't figure out why he's been asked to work the case because chances are excellent that the two young people decided to opt out of hard farm work to head back to the Queensland coast where they can enjoy the sand and surf.
Walker is soon joined by the older sister of one of the backpackers, who is a detective herself on the Berlin police force. She's flown to Australia and is desperate to find her sister before it's too late.
Having worked in the organized crime unit of the Australian Federal Police, Walker soon becomes convinced that there's more going on than meets the eye in this missing persons case, but the presence of the German police officer can often be a hindrance as she becomes impatient and goes her own way, knowing little of the people or her surroundings.
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Author Patricia Wolf gives readers an excellent sense of the vast distances and the landscape of the Australian outback. She's also created a very interesting main character in Lucas Walker. As a child, he was raised by his grandmother until his mother decided she was ready for parental responsibility which is when he moved to the United States for ten years. He came back to Australia and joined the Federal Police, spending several years as an undercover cop.
His sidekick in Outback is Detective Sergeant Barbara Guerra, a member of the Berlin police force and the daughter of parents who escaped the Pinochet regime in Chile. Her missing sister has always had the tendency to get into trouble, and Barbara has always had the tendency to bail her out of it. Her primary objective, once she arrives in Australia, is to convince the police-- including Walker-- that her sister, Rita, is really missing and in danger. The local law enforcement has seen too many instances of young people changing their travel plans and then not getting in touch with friends and family because the cell phone reception is extremely poor there.
The interplay between Walker and Guerra kept the story moving along, and I enjoyed watching the German trying to cope with the unforgiving climate. There is a lot more going on than merely a missing persons case, too. All in all, Outback is a compelling story, and I'm hoping to see more of Lucas Walker in the future.
Outback by Patricia Wolf
eISBN: 9781471411700
Embla Books © 2022
eBook, 349 pages
Police Procedural, #1 DS Lucas Walker
Rating: A-
Source: Net Galley
