Another Look at Moonlight Downs by Adrian Hyland

The following review was first posted in May 2009.

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First Line: I parked my little white ute on the outskirts of the camp and sat there, looking out at the scatter of corrugated iron hovels.

When I finished this book, I was speechless. I was smiling. I was in awe. And I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to do what I'd just read justice in a review. I'm going to give it a shot anyway.

After years of traveling the world, Emily Tempest, half-Aborigine, half-white, has returned to Moonlight, the community in the desert of Northern Australia where she grew up. Within hours of her arrival, respected community leader Lincoln Flinders' body is found, and all signs point to an Aboriginal sorcerer as his murderer. With the help of the police, Emily is determined to find Lincoln's killer, for the dead man held a very special place in her heart:

And how had Lincoln drawn me into this world? By stories. Stories and songs. With Lincoln a journey of any description was a rolling dialogue with the country. A track by a waterhole or an unusual rock, a tree shaped like a woman or a circle of stones, the subtlest change in the landscape, any of these things was enough to get him going: he'd tell you the tale of the ancestral beings that had made it, the songs they'd sung, the paths they'd carved in the Dreaming. For a wide-eyed five-year-old he'd made the country come alive.

Although the mystery is intriguing, and the bad guy slips deliciously into the picture at the end, the strength of this book lies in its characters and its depiction of the landscape and its people. Hyland's language is earthy, sometimes profane, and often very funny. Fortunately for many of us, there are glossaries in the front of the book which decipher the slang. (I made regular use of them at the beginning.) Hyland portrays the life of these people as it really is. He doesn't use politically correct euphemisms; he doesn't try to sugarcoat anything, and the book is all the more powerful for it.

Emily is such an in-your-face creature. Her ambivalence about the aboriginal and white worlds that she's a part of is a strong theme in this novel. She makes me laugh. She certainly doesn't mince her words, and she doesn't know the meaning of the word "quit". She's just the type of character I want to read more about.

After reading Moonlight Downs, not only did I feel supremely entertained, but I felt as though I knew a bit more about a totally different culture thousands of miles away from my comfortable home in metropolitan Phoenix. This book is sitting pretty on my Best Reads of 2009 list.

Moonlight Downs by Adrian Hyland
ISBN: 9781569475263

Soho Press © 2008

Paperback, 352 pages

Amateur Sleuth, #1 Emily Tempest mystery
Rating: A+

Source: Purchased from Amazon.

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Give me a couple of days to recuperate from vacation, and Kittling: Books will be back to normal! 

Gunshot Road by Adrian Hyland

Title: Gunshot Road, An Emily Tempest Investigation
Author: Adrian Hyland
ISBN: 9781569476369, Soho Crime, 2010
Genre: Amateur Sleuth, #2 Emily Tempest mystery
Rating: A
Source: Purchased at The Poisoned Pen.

First Line: I closed my eyes, felt the ragged harmonies flowing through my head.

Working as an Aboriginal Community police officer, the half-Aboriginal, half-white Emily Tempest is working the harsh land of northern Australia. It doesn't take long for her to encounter her first dead body-- an old prospector she knew as a child. Trouble is, her boss has already figured out who the murderer is and wants Emily to mind her own business and work the night shift in town like a good little Abo girl. Emily believes the old prospector-- and the man they have thrown in prison--deserve much better than that, and she goes her own way, conducting her own investigation. Emily has never been afraid of getting into a fight, but during the course of her travels along Gunshot Road, she finds the hard knocks to be much worse than she'd anticipated.

This is an excellent follow-up to Hyland's first book, Moonlight Downs (published elsewhere as Diamond Dove). Emily is most definitely an amateur detective; she leads with her heart instead of her head, and she has a tendency to make mistakes. If she's lucky, the mistakes aren't painful, but she's not always lucky. In fact, if you have a strong aversion to violence against women, there is one scene in this book that you will want to avoid. For that matter, Emily's world is dirty and rough. People don't always bathe as often as they should, they use whatever language they feel like using, and violence is often a way of life. Expect grit and realism as you read about Emily.

Having a foot in two worlds, Emily has reaped some of the benefits of the white world: she has furthered her education, and she is a world traveler. However, she cannot and will not ignore injustice, especially to the Aboriginal people among whom she spent her childhood.

Each character in this book seems to fit perfectly into the hot and dusty land, and as much as I enjoy Hyland's plot, pacing and characters, one of the main reasons why I love his books is because of the landscape. It reminds me of my own chosen one:

I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention to the road, I admit-- a nasty habit I've acquired since coming back out bush. Sometimes I even read while I'm driving. Nothing heavy, mind you-- crime, perhaps, maybe a magazine. I'm not the only culprit, I'm sure. Meeting another vehicle out here is an event of such magnitude you tend to get out and talk about it.

Like the Australian Outback, there are places here in the Arizona desert where you can drive all day long and never meet another living soul outside of a snake and a lizard or two. If you do meet someone out in this vast emptiness, you acknowledge each other. You are no longer in the city, and anonymity can get you killed. Although Hyland's territory is an exotic one, it does feel familiar to me even if I don't always understand the lingo.

Story, pacing, characters, setting... these are four very important things to any book, but Hyland adds yet another element that makes his writing stand out: the Aboriginal culture. As much as I enjoyed this book, one sentence engraved itself on my mind because it voices something I've felt for a long time without ever putting it into words: "He bin say you not from here. You move too fast: more better you slow down, take time for the country to know you."

Take time for the country to know you. In Gunshot Road, that is important advice from a people who have learned to live in rhythm with a very special land. Outside of Gunshot Road it is excellent advice for us all to follow.

If you haven't tasted a book written by Adrian Hyland, you've been missing a banquet.

Moonlight Downs by Adrian Hyland

Title: Moonlight Downs
Author: Adrian Hyland
ISBN: 9781569475263/ Soho Press, 2008
Genre: Amateur Sleuth, #1 Emily Tempest mystery
Rating: A+

First Line: I parked my little white ute on the outskirts of the camp and sat there, looking out at the scatter of corrugated iron hovels.

When I finished this book, I was speechless. I was smiling. I was in awe. And I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to do what I'd just read justice in a review. I'm going to give it a shot anyway.

After years of traveling the world, Emily Tempest, half-Aborigine, half-white, has returned to Moonlight, the community in the desert of Northern Australia where she grew up. Within hours of her arrival, respected community leader Lincoln Flinders' body is found, and all signs point to an Aboriginal sorcerer as his murderer. With the help of the police, Emily is determined to find Lincoln's killer, for the dead man held a very special place in her heart:

And how had Lincoln drawn me into this world? By stories. Stories and songs. With Lincoln a journey of any description was a rolling dialogue with the country. A track by a waterhole or an unusual rock, a tree shaped like a woman or a circle of stones, the subtlest change in the landscape, any of these things was enough to get him going: he'd tell you the tale of the ancestral beings that had made it, the songs they'd sung, the paths they'd carved in the Dreaming. For a wide-eyed five-year-old he'd made the country come alive.

Although the mystery is intriguing, and the bad guy slips deliciously into the picture at the end, the strength of this book lies in its characters and its depiction of the landscape and its people. Hyland's language is earthy, sometimes profane, and often very funny. Fortunately for many of us there are glossaries in the front of the book which decipher the slang. (I made regular use of them at the beginning.) Hyland portrays the life of these people as it really is. He doesn't use politically correct euphemisms; he doesn't try to sugarcoat anything, and the book is all the more powerful for it.

Emily is such an in-your-face creature. Her ambivalence about the aboriginal and white worlds that she's a part of is a strong theme in this novel. She makes me laugh. She certainly doesn't mince her words. She doesn't know the meaning of the word "quit". She's just the type of character I want to read more about.

After reading Moonlight Downs, not only did I feel supremely entertained, but I felt as though I knew a bit more about a totally different culture thousands of miles away from my comfortable home in metropolitan Phoenix. Without doubt, Adrian Hyland's book will be one of my top reads this year.