Exiles

Product Information

This is very much a character driven mystery, my very favourite kind, and I relished the seemingly slow pace, the introduction of another, older, unsolved crime, and a welcome diversion in Falk's private life.

So - I loved the previous two Falk books, while Exiles' ratings give me the sense I read an entirely different book from everyone else.Exiles is a slow burner at times as Harper takes us through the magnificient Australian countryside. A very disappointing final outing for Aaron Falk - I solved the main mystery as soon as one character described their movements on the night of the disappearance. Now that the first book, The Dry, has been made into a movie (which I may have watched three times already 😊), I completely pictured Eric Bana, Keir O’Donnell, and Miranda Tapsell as their respective characters while reading this one. From the small town in a drought in ‘the dry’, to the remote bushland of ‘Force of nature’, the parched cattle ranches of outback Queensland in ‘The lost man’, and most recently, the small Tasmanian beach town of ’ The survivors’.

A year later, Kim Gillespie’s absence still casts a long shadow as her friends and loved ones gather to welcome a new addition to the family. Opening night of the Food and Wine Festival has rolled around again, and it is hoped that a planned appeal and tribute will refresh the memories of those who attended the previous year, and unearth fresh clues regarding what really happened to Kim Gillespie? Last year, Aaron Falk was in South Australia to be godfather to Henry, Greg and Rita Raco’s new baby.Overall, while I did like Jane Harper’s Exiles, I wasn’t completely bowled over by it as other readers have been. She was swaddled carefully in a clean wrap purchased from the state's leading baby-wares retailer, and tucked in with an artisan wool blanket, thick enough to have the effect of flattening out the bundle of her shape if placed in the right way. I finally got around to seeing ’The dry’ with Eric Bana recently, which I enjoyed - definitely kept to the spirit of the book. Falk seems to be a workaholic as a financial federal investigator, but now he's back for a happy occasion, Henry's christening.

L’indagine – e quindi la risoluzione del caso - avanza con lentezza – nonostante le sue storie si svolgano in archi temporali stretti, di solito pochi giorni, qualche settimana – e avanza attenta a dettagli e particolari. Aaron Falk is a fully realized character (especially after two earlier books), who ends up playing the role of wise, observant outsider.

He must raise little Zoe alone and watch over Kim's teenage daughter, Zara, from a previous relationship. Thank you to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Definitely still worth reading though, and I’m very excited for the movie of it that is currently being filmed and even more excited for Exiles (which hasn’t been confirmed yet, but I’m sure they’ll commit to turning all three into movies).

Exiles is the third book in the Aaron Falk series and this new addition works really well in this series and for our main character. She disappeared a year ago leaving her baby sleeping in her pram at a wine festival, and no sign of her has been found since. Had I picked up this book only to enjoy the story of a community with family drama and a surprise romance, I could have rated it higher.The characters also have a relationship to the setting - in this case, they’ve spent time at the site as teenagers, worked at the festival, etc so you can imagine them moving around these places. With the investigation into her disappearance still open, Raco and Falk find themselves taking another look at the investigation and unravelling the secrets and lies of a small town and its people. Between Falk’s closest friend, a missing mother, and a woman he’s drawn to, dark questions linger as long-ago truths begin to emerge.