Last One Out
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3.9 • 32 Ratings
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- $34.99
Publisher Description
THE DAZZLING NEW NOVEL FROM THE MASTER OF CRIME
He had been here, that was clear from the marks in the dust. And he had been alone.
In a dying town, Ro Crowley waits for her son on the evening of his 21st birthday.
But Sam never comes home. His footprints in the dust of three abandoned houses offer the only clue to his final movements. One set in. One set out.
Five long years later, Ro returns to Carralon Ridge for the annual memorial of Sam's disappearance. The skeletal community is now an echo of itself, having fractured under the pressure of the coal mine operating on its outskirts.
But Ro still wants answers. Only a few people remain. If the truth is to be found in that town, does it lie among them?
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Ever since her career-making 2016 debut The Dry, Jane Harper has showcased her talent for crafting sturdy characters and intricate plotting against the evocative backdrop of desolate outback towns. This time, the setting is Carralon Ridge, a declining NSW village that draws the attention of a young man who decides that it deserves an oral history. But he vanishes during the process, and five years later, his family travel to the town to honour his memory. The mournful visit triggers his mother’s renewed interest in the case, and she stubbornly begins overturning rocks that not everyone wants to see exposed to the light of day. Narrated with a firm grasp of the story’s nuanced Australiana by Angeline Armstrong, this standalone audiobook is part downbeat family drama and part meticulous thriller.
Customer Reviews
Meh
Author
British-Australian journalist turned crime novelist and screenwriter, who first rose to prominence with The Dry (2016).
In brief
Middle-aged white female general practitioner returns to the NSW country town she used to live and work in, to mark the fifth anniversary of the disappearance of her only son the evening before his 21st birthday. Her marriage broke down afterwards. Her estranged hubby still lives there. Their daughter, who is now an accountant in Sydney, comes too. The town itself, which was already being progressively subsumed by a nearby coal mine five years earlier, is now in its death throes. Cue reminiscence, questioning, yet another search for clues as to what happened, yada, yada, resolution, new beginnings.
Writing
Polished prose with more lush description and metaphor compared to Ms H’s work. Pace slow with frequent flashbacks. The plot is somewhat derivative of Cutter’s End (2021) by Margaret Hickey, which involved a murder and a suicide in a small outback town near a mine, but stuck to tried and true formula of crime fiction: show don’t tell.
Last One Out does the opposite, which is why I’d classify it as literary rather than genre fiction. That is not necessarily a bad thing, unless you were hoping for another instalment of Aaron Falk, in which case it probably is.
Engaging
I just finished Jane Harper’s The Last One Out — what a beautiful, engaging read. Her writing is so clean and atmospheric, drawing you in from the first page. The characters feel real, the tension builds gently but cleverly, and the sense of place is just stunning. A thoroughly enjoyable book — loved every moment