BOOK REVIEW: Exiles (Aaron Falk, #3) by Jane Harper

Exiles is the third (and final?) book in the police procedural series set in rural Australia featuring federal tax investigator Aaron Falk written by Jane Harper. The other books in the Falk series are The Dry (2016) and Force of Nature (2017). Harper is well-known for her suspenseful, lyrical mystery novels and Exiles (2023) is another example of this.

This time the main mystery is the disappearance of a 39-year-old new mother from a food and wine festival being held in a small rural (fictional) town named Marralee in the Australian wine country in Victoria. The missing woman is Kim Gillespie, the ex-wife of Charlie Raco, who is the brother of Aaron’s friend Greg Raco, another Australian cop who we were introduced to in Force of Nature. Aaron had been named godfather to Greg and Rita’s newborn kid Henry and was in town for the christening the very day Kim disappeared. He was at the Raco home when Kim called Zara, the 17-year-old daughter she had with Charlie to discuss how they would meet up at the Maralee festival.

All this information is provided in the prologue. When the story begins it's one year later and Aaron is driving to Marralee again to finally participate in the long-delayed christening of his godson, Henry Raco. We learn how the family members have been affected by Kim’s disappearance, and we get introduced to Kim’s husband, Rohan and his and Kim’s daughter. We also learn that Kim’s disappearance is not the only violent crime that the small town of Marralee has known. About five years ago there was a hit-and-run very near the site of the Festival, again during opening weekend (which is when Kim disappeared) that resulted in the death of Dean Tozer, the husband of Gemma Tozer and father of Joel. Joel and Kara are now teenage friends, bonded together through the loss of their parents.

One key aspect of Harper’s mysteries that makes them so compelling is that she uses her books to comment on and depict contemporary Australian life and the social problems that are lying below the surface. For example, in Exiles drinking alcohol by teenagers and the dangerous behaviors this can facilitate animates multiple important plot points. Ultimately, I would say that Exiles is about solitude, and the consequences of cutting oneself off (or being cut off by the actions of others) from the people around you that know you the best. (The book makes clear that in some cases this could be your family or your chosen family and doesn’t communicate any value judgments on the difference between them.)

Another key aspect of Harper’s mysteries, at least the ones that I have read that feature Aaron Falk, have been the internal dialogue of the protagonist. I wasn’t really that impressed with, or frankly very interested in, Falk’s inner life or personality in the first two books, The Dry and Forces of Nature, but in Exiles I really enjoyed getting to know him better. I’m not exactly sure why that is, but it could be that in addition to the career wanderlust that is a recurring theme in all three books, in Exiles he is also pursuing a romantic relationship. As a gay man reading about a straight male character (written by a presumably straight woman) falling in love, I was surprised at how much I was invested in the resolution of this storyline.

Overall, Exiles is (by far!) the best of the Aaron Falk books written by Jane Harper. It is billed as the last in a trilogy of books but I hope that is not the case, I would love to spend more time in rural Australia with Falk as he solves crimes. But even if Harper doesn’t write more books featuring Falk I am confident she will write more compelling mysteries set in rural Australia in the future.

Title: Exiles (Aaron Falk, #3).
Author: Jane Harper.
Format: Kindle.
Length: 353 pages.
Publisher: Orbit Books.
Date Published: May 26, 2022.
Date Read: May 22, 2023.

GOODREADS RATING: ★★★★½☆  (4.5/5.0).

OVERALL GRADE: A/A- (3.83/4.0).

PLOT: A.
IMAGERY: A-.
IMPACT: A-.
WRITING: A.

BOOK REVIEW: Force of Nature (Aaron Falk, #2) by Jane Harper

Force of Nature is an interesting psychological thriller based around familial and work relationships and the feelings, slights and resentments that can result. The basic facts are that five women (2 of whom are sisters, 2 of whom went to school together and all of whom work together at a private financial services firm) go on a 3-day hike in a remote national park and one of them (the pretty, obnoxious, “most successful” one) doesn’t make it out (alive). Overall rating: 3.5 Stars.

Force of Nature is the second book by Australian author Jane Harper featuring Aaron Falk, an officer of the Australian Federal Police (I guess the Aussie version of the United States’ FBI) specializing in financial crimes. Harper's first book, The Dry, was a sensation, and ended up winning the prestigious Gold Dagger award from the Crime Writers of America. It tells the story of what happens when Aaron goes back to his hometown after his childhood best friend’s entire family is gunned down in a deserted town in the middle of nowhere.

In my opinion, Force of Nature is a more interesting book than The Dry, but that’s not because of Aaron Falk, it’s due to the power of the mystery and suspense of the central question of “what happened between these women in the park?” It turns out that Alice Russell, the woman who does not make it out of the park with her co-workers, was acting as a confidential informer to Aaron and the AFP as they tried to build a substantial money laundering case against the employer of the women on the hike. Aaron and his partner go up to the park when news reaches them that Alice is missing to try and see if they can discover if her disappearance is linked to their investigation of her bosses. It turns out that the reason for her death is something much closer to home.

To me, there’s a fundamental flaw in Harper’s choice of protagonist for her mystery series. Falk is simply not that interesting a character. He’s almost nondescript. It’s really a testament to Harper’s writing and plotting that both books she has written so far, especially the second one, are captivating thrillers. Part of this is the exotic nature of their setting (Down Under) where in both books Harper takes full advantage of the lay of the land to enthrall the reader. I hope that the author takes a page out of Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad books and considers having other main characters in subsequent books. Or she could keep on using Falk as the ostensible protagonist of the books but then also depict the other characters in a more compelling and complex way as she does in Force of Nature.

Title: Force of Nature (Aaron Falk, #2).
Author: Jane Harper.
Paperback: 272 pages.
Publisher: Flatiron Books.
Date Published: February 26, 2018.
Date Read: June 29, 2018.

GOODREADS RATING: ★★★★☆  (4.0/5.0).

OVERALL GRADE: A- (3.67/4.0).

PLOT: A-.
IMAGERY: A-.
IMPACT: B+.
WRITING: A.

BOOK REVIEW: The Dry by Jane Harper

The Dry is the celebrated debut mystery novel by Jane Harper which won the Gold Dagger Award for best mystery novel of 2016 recently. This puts Harper in territory with other impressive writers in this genre whose work I have enjoyed (Val McDermid, Henning Mankell and Patricia Cornwell). Sadly, other favorites like Tana French, Stuart MacBride, Ian Rankin and Adrian McKinty have not done so (yet!)

I think The Dry is quite good, and somewhat reminiscent of another widely celebrated debut mystery, In The Woods (2010) by Tana French. The writing is similarly sumptuous and the story is bolstered by the strength of the characters and the description of the deep emotional ties that link them and strengthen the impact of the book on the reader.

In The Dry, there are two mysteries at the heart of the plot. Who brutally shot and killed Aaron Falk's former childhood best friend Luke Hadler along with Hadler's wife and son with a shotgun at close range? Does it have to do with the fact that 20-something years ago Luke lied to give his best friend an alibi for the mysterious death of their common friend Ellie Deacon who was at the apex of a complicated teen love triangle involving the two friends? Again this plot is reminiscent of French's debut where the main character is trying to solve a disappearance/murder of a child decades after he survived the murder/abduction of himself and his best friends. In Aaron's case, despite Luke's alibi the suspicion about his involvement in Ellie's death has hung over his head for years, especially since soon afterwards he and his dad were essentially run out of their small town by Ellie's dad, the town's most prominent citizen.

Despite winning the Gold Dagger I disagree that Harper's The Dry, is as devastatingly good a work of fiction as French's In The Woods. This doesn't mean Harper shouldn't have won the Gold Dagger, it is really a complaint that French has not won yet, and that she should have won for her debut as well. 

Anyway one reason I think Harper's debut is inferior to French's is that there are definitely flaws in The Dry. For example, there are several aspects of the story which are easy to figure out, and the revelation of the killer of Luke and his family is presented in an almost matter-of-fact fashion after spending a few hundred pages misdirecting the reader with other clues and red herrings. 

Despite its flaws, the book has very strong features as well. First among these is the sense of place in The Dry. It is set in Kiewarra, a very small town in the middle of nowhere in Australia which has been greatly impacted by a long-running drought. Secondly, the main character of Aaron Falk is interesting, and the back story of his life in Kiewarra and the connections he has to almost all the suspects and residents of the town add a frisson to the work.

Overall, I would agree that The Dry is an impressive debut but I would hesitate to declare this the best mystery I have read this year. However, I will definitely look forward to spending time with Aaron Falk, wherever his next (mis)adventure takes him. The second book, Force of Nature, should be out early in 2018.

Title: The Dry.
Author: Jane Harper.
Paperback: 336 pages.
Publisher: Flatiron Books.
Date Published: January 10, 2017.
Date Read: October 28, 2017.

GOODREADS RATING: ★★★★ (4.0/5.0).

OVERALL GRADE: A- (3.67/4.0).

PLOT: B.
IMAGERY: A-.
IMPACT: A.
WRITING: A.