Slaughter Park

May 21, 2018
In the stirring conclusion to Ned Kelly Award–winner Maitland’s Belltree trilogy (after 2016’s Ash Island), former Sydney, Australia, homicide cop Harry Belltree fights to prove that his wife, Jenny, is not the murder suspect Det. Insp. Deb Velasco should be hunting in the death of Terry Palfreyman, one of “those obsessed people who turn up at company shareholder meetings and ask curly questions about executive salaries and unethical work practices.” Harry hasn’t seen his wife since they separated after she blamed him for the shooting that injured her and threatened the baby she was carrying, but Harry is galvanized by this new threat to the missing Jenny. At the heart of all the trouble is powerful Nordlund Resources Ltd., the company that was Terry’s favorite target. Company head Konrad Nordlund has plans to develop Sydney’s Slater Park, dubbed Slaughter Park by a journalist after the discovery of multiple human body parts there. Harry also seeks answers regarding the accident that killed his parents in the trilogy’s opener, Crucifixion Creek. Fans of hard-hitting crime fiction will be sorry to see the last of Harry.