THE LOST MAN

Jane Harper (Little, Brown)
Australia’s new queen of crime is back with her third slice of life and death in the outback under burning skies. Nathan Bright and his brothers, Cameron and Bub, live with their families on three farms adjacent to each other, miles from civilisation. It’s Christmas and the temperature is 120 degrees in the shade, except there isn’t much of it: only that thrown by the headstone on the grave of an old stockman who died a century before. And that’s where the body of Cameron is found after he goes off the radar, burnt to a crisp by the sun. How and why did he get there all alone? So much for tidings of comfort and joy. This is a terrific book. Part crime novel, and part family saga (and what a family). There are more skeletons in the closets of this little lot than you could cheerfully shake a stick at. Couldn’t put it down.

words Mark Timlin

Price: £12.99. Info: www.littlebrown.co.uk