The Missing

Fleur McDonald’s latest rural crime story The Missing invites the reader to tread the dusty streets of Kalgoorlie and its desert surroundings in Western Australia.

During Missing Persons Week, teenager Max disappears after a late-night party. Local detectives Angie Sullivan and Jack Higgins (from McDonald’s previous Kalgoorlie book The Prospect) are assigned the case, but come under pressure from Max’s parents and Lily, a tenacious radio show host who has been digging into the town’s growing list of unsolved missing persons cases.

The book tackles two timelines: the investigation into Max’s whereabouts and Max’s story leading up to his disappearance. The latter plot offers insight into Max and his desire to escape Kalgoorlie and his domineering father. It is interesting as it allows us to see Kalgoorlie from the perspective of the town’s youth, some of whom, like Max, yearn for something beyond the town’s borders.

Unfortunately, the main storyline, which takes up most of the book, is hindered by stock characters who are difficult to distinguish from one another. Angie and Lily have such similar backstories (both came to Kalgoorlie after broken relationships) that they seem identical, with only their job descriptions separating them. Jack also has a similar backstory, and while this points to the town’s transitory nature as a place where people come to escape their problems or forget the past, the sameness doesn’t do the lead characters any favours. McDonald, who pivoted from rural romance to rural crime in recent years, writes with a strong sense of place, particularly of outback Australia and the people who inhabit it, but this applies largely to the peripheral characters rather than the core cast.

McDonald's writing brings to mind Stephen King’s maxim that “the road to hell is paved with adverbs”, which I agree with. Coupled with a denouement that strains plausibility, The Missing missed the mark for me. But McDonald has sold over a million books and has another due out next month, so I am clearly in the minority here.