Exiles

by Jane Harper

Critics like to categorize novels as either plot-driven or character-driven — but it’s hard to categorize Exiles as one or the other: it’s both. It has a strong plot, with a real mystery, numerous twists and a surprise ending. But its characters are what give it life; I challenge anyone not to fall in love with the individuals who people this story.

This is the third book in Jane Harper’s trilogy featuring Aaron Falk, an officer in the Australian Federal Police. He first appeared in her debut novel, The Dry, and had a second outing in Force of Nature.

In this book, Aaron is visiting Marralee, a town in South Australia’s wine country, to attend a christening. He’s to be godfather for the child of his friends Greg and Rita Raco. Aaron was in Marralee a year ago too, when the christening was originally scheduled—but it was postponed because of a tragedy that happened that weekend. A young mother, Kim, disappeared, leaving her then-one-year-old daughter Zoe in a stroller on the grounds of the annual county festival. It seemed unbelievable that Kim would just abandon Zoe, but no sign of Kim has turned up since.

Aaron was one of the last people to see Kim last year on the night she disappeared, as she waved from the top of the Ferris wheel.

Kim was formerly married to Greg’s brother Charlie, who runs a large vineyard and winery. Kim and Charlie shared a daughter, Zara who’s now seventeen. The family plan to appeal at this year’s festival for anyone to come forward with memories that could help locate Kim.

While trying to help support the family’s efforts, Aaron finds himself wondering if he’s really committed to his career in Melbourne, where apart from work he’s been lonely and unattached. He’s drawn to Gemma, the manager of the Marallee festival, with whom he finds a powerful connection. She’s drawn to him too, but neither of them thinks they could sustain a long-distance relationship.

The past and the present interweave powerfully in this nove: a network of personal connections and motivations unfolds as Aaron and the others search for answers. And as in all of Jane Harper’s books, the settings are lushly described: the winery, the family meals, the festival, the river pathway. This is a thrilling and suspenseful novel, very hard to put down once you’re drawn into it. The ending took me by surprise, but Harper played fair — the foundation was clearly laid earlier.

Jane Harper was born in 1980 in Manchester, England. She moved to Australia with her family at age eight, then returned to the UK with her family as a teenager. She studied English and History at the University of Kent in Canterbury.

On graduating, she worked as a newspaper journalist in the UK for a number of years, continuing her journalism career in Australia after moving back in 2008. In 2014, she enrolled in a 12-week online fiction writing course, which gave her the motivation to write the first draft of a novel. That novel then won a regional unpublished novel prize, which led to acquiring an agent and ultimately winning publishing contracts in Australia, the UK, and the US. The Dry, which was finally published in 2016, has won numerous international awards and has sold over a million copies worldwide. Each of Harper’s subsequent books — Force of Nature (2017), The Lost Man (2018) and The Survivors (2020). — has also become a bestseller. Exile (2022) is her fifth novel. 

She is now a full-time novelist, living in Melbourne with her husband and their two young children. She is working on her sixth novel.

 [Click here to sign up to my book club, to get periodic updates on my writing journey, along with notices of new book reviews when I post them.]