Scrublands by Chris Hammer

Hello my lovely readers! 

When I tell you I DEVOURED this book....I DEVOURED this book! I bought this book at Potts Point Bookshop in Sydney, Australia five years ago. So let's get into it!

BACKGROUND
It was January 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world. I was with my bestie, Laiza to celebrate her birthday and we went to Australia and New Zealand. I later did a four day solo trip to Fiji.

On our way to the Sydney Opera House, we decide to take the scenic route and passed by this bookshop.

The synopsis intrigued me, so of course I purchased it and got a bookmark. Aside from books that I buy when traveling, I love getting bookmarks from local bookstores.

Laiza and I were only in Australia for a week and in Sydney for three days before we headed to Cairns for the rest of the week to go snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef. I thoroughly enjoyed Australia and would definitely visit again. Here's a few photos from my time there...for your viewing pleasure!

    

The Sydney skyline

Snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef

Bondi Beach

Hanging out with aboriginals at the Tjapukai Aboriginal Cultural Center

SYNOPSIS
In Riversend, an isolated rural community afflicted by an endless drought, a young priest does the unthinkable, killing five parishioners before being taken down himself.

A year later, accompanied by his own demons from war-time reporting, journalist Martin Scarsden arrives in Riversend. His assignment is simple: describe how the townspeople are coping as the anniversary of their tragedy approaches. But as Martin meets the locals and hears their version of events, he begins to realize that the accepted wisdom--that the priest was a pedophile whose imminent exposure was the catalyst for the shooting, a theory established through an award-winning investigation by Martin's own newspaper--may be wrong.

Just as Martin believes he's making headway, a new development rocks the town. The bodies of two German backpackers--missing since the time of the church shootings--are discovered in a dam in the scrublands, deserted backwoods marked by forest fires. As the media flocks to the scene, Martin finds himself thrown into a whole new mystery.

What was the real reason behind the priest's shooting spree? And how does it connect to the backpacker murders, if at all? Martin struggles to uncover the town's dark secrets, putting his job, his mental state, and his life at risk as more and more strange happenings escalate around him.

MY THOUGHTS
Like I said, this book was really intriguing. It was a quick read and definitely kept my interest. 

Out of five stars, I'd give it a 3.5. It got too bogged down toward the end with too many plots. This is a direct quote from the book:

Four different crimes, all taking place in and around the same drought-ravaged town, all separate but interlinked, driven by greed and hate, guild and hope: the drug operation, an instrument of atonement co-opted by bikies, the murder of the Germans, abuses spawning abuse; the shooting at St. James, innocents murdered with the best intentions; and Harley Snouch, attempting to expunge rape with fraud. Four crimes, all seeded by violence from the recent or distant past.

In my opinion, this book had four crimes too many. It really should've stopped with the priest's mass murder and the reason why he did it (related to the women he was seeing). Everything else was excessive and confusing. The biker gang completely threw me, the drug operation was unnecessary as was Harley Snouch's entire storyline of being a conman.

Also, it was HIGHLY unbelievable that Martin was only in town for a week and gained the trust of everyone he met after only a day or two, to where they were telling him their deepest, darkest secrets. I did enjoy the bits on Martin's journalism career though!

I'll still keep this book on my shelf as I did like it, but if I could, I'd definitely trim it.