Book Review: "Opal" by Patricia Wolf

 

A small mining town. A brutal double murder. A killer among them.

DS Lucas Walker is off duty. He's supposed to be showing his little sister Grace the Australian outback, on her visit from Boston, but instead they're headed out bush- where Walker's cousin has been mining for boulder opal. Something seemed off when Walker heard that Blair wanted to get out of Kanpara, so he and Grace are en route to bring him home to Caloodie.

But Kanpara is in Channel Country, and a major flood is on the way.

The atmosphere in the isolated mining town is already tense with rumours of a big opal find, and when Walker, Grace and Blair wake up the next day they find themselves completely cut off. A deluge far north has run off into the rivers that make up this unique ecosystem, and the roads will be impassable for days. As they take in their predicament, Blair receives a shocking phone call.

Two bodies have been found, brutally murdered.

The husband is an immediate suspect, but Walker is not convinced. And when Blair is taken in for questioning, the stakes couldn't be higher. Before the water recedes, he must work with local police to uncover the killer in their midst. Can Walker act fast enough to save his cousin, and keep Grace safe? - from Netgalley.com

This eARC was received through Netgalley.com and I am providing an unbiased review.

This is the third novel in the DS Walker series, and once again has proven that Wolf has a great story-telling presence. This book starts not too long after the end of the second novel, and finds our MC not only trying to still find the biker leader of previous crimes, but now on a vacation with his visiting little sister from the US. From the synopsis, you can see where this goes from there....

I have been lucky enough to read all three novels of this series, and I anxiously await each one, hoping that this series doesn't just end after a "few books". Not knowing anything about Australia, it's policing system, geography, et cetera, Wolf does a wonderful job of describing ther world detail in a way even a non-resident will enjoy the read.