![]() Denny’s father, Mathew, conducts his own search, pursued by his tough-minded daughter, Cissy. Minna waits at home, not always chastely, while her husband sets out with a sergeant who has arrived from Adelaide with two Aboriginal trackers to scour the mountains for the lost boy. Has he strayed into the bush or been snatched by someone? Word of Denny’s disappearance spreads from house to house and, as it does so, McFarlane carries us off on a whirlwind tour of this fictional colonial outpost.įairly has just celebrated the wedding of pretty, restless Minna Baumann to the local constable. ![]() Once the storm has passed, six-year-old Denny Wallace is missing from his parents’ smallholding. They are a violent, “apocalyptic red” and coincide with a dust storm that sweeps through the small town of Fairly and its neighbouring farms. ![]() There are seven sunsets in the story, which unfolds during a September week in 1883 in the South Australian outback surrounding the Flinders Ranges. ![]() ![]() Her second equally distinctive novel also deals with our precarious place in the world, taking its title from the Swedish expression for the setting of the sun. It was shortlisted for the Guardian first book award and won several prizes in the author’s native Australia. F iona McFarlane’s intimate and unnerving debut, 2014’s The Night Guest, described a woman’s mental disorientation as she reaches the end of her life. ![]()
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