PM Newton’s Beams Falling features Sydney detective Nhu ‘Ned’ Kelly who, because of her Vietnamese background, is given responsibility for cleaning up clean up Cabramatta, an outer western suburb that’s home to 10,000 refugees from the Vietnam War. Amongst these new Australians various street gangs have formed, and their principal members strut the suburban streets with impunity. They’re so audacious, in fact, that they kill a schoolboy in broad daylight – witnesses are more scared of the gangs than they are of the police.
Ned finds herself facing this toxic wall of silence, with both her police colleagues and the Vietnamese she encounters suspicious of her. Plus, she has a monkey on her back – she’s recovering from being shot during the last case she worked. Her latest task seems anything like the restricted duties the doctor recommended. Brilliant, high-charged and traumatic crime fiction. Read the full review here.
