Australian crime and thriller author Candice Fox is an expert in delivering compellingly compromised characters who are informed by childhood trauma. Right from her Ned Kelly Award winning debut Hades, Fox has been writing books centred around frighteningly competent yet damaged protaonists. That trend continues in her latest stand alone thriller Redbelly Crossing, set in a small regional town just north of Sydney and featuring a pair of police officer brothers.
When Redbelly Crossing opens, Evan is helping his wife Delle entertain a group of teenagers at his son’s sixteenth birthday party. A phonecall from his ex-cop father changes that and Evan is convinced to put his hand up to support the investigation of a local murder case as a way of redeeming himself in the eyes of his colleagues. Only what Evan doesn’t know is that the lead detective on the case is coming from Sydney and is Evan’s estranged older brother Russell. Russell has his own personal problems and is trying to reconnect with his eighteen-year-old daughter Bridie when he is assigned to the case so brings her with him.
The brothers are investigating the violent murder of a young woman in the small town of Redbelly Crossing. But Evan soon finds that his son might have been involved, or at least at the scene, so starts to try and manipulate the evidence to point in another direction. Both brothers have to manage the way they relate to other people, much of that informed by the way they were brought up by their violent and combative father.
As mentioned already, the main characters of Even and Russell are extremely competent but damaged. Both are driven by, and respond differently to, the legacy of their upbringing. And both are trying desperately to form different, more open and caring relationships with their own children. This inner conflict forms the centre of a narrative that twists and turns through the investigation and is also central to the way that the brothers’ relationship shifts as the investigation plays out.
Redbelly Crossing is another page-turning thrill ride with heart from Fox. But there is more to it than that. A lengthy Afterword provides some background and the actual events and victims of now cold cases who inspired the novel and its central suite of crimes.
Redbelly Crossing by Candice Fox
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