Review: Redemption Point

Redemption Point by Candice Fox
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Candice Fox’s Redemption is the second in her Crimson Lake series about mis-matched Australian PIs, Ted Conkaffey and Amanda Pharrell. I have not read the first but that in no way hindered my understanding or enjoyment of this novel. In fact, it feels like the first in a series.

To get the blurb out of the way first, the publisher compares this book to Jane Harper’s The Dry and, while there are similarities - Australia, murder, suspicion thrown on the protagonist - The Dry uses the environment almost as a main character, the oppressive heat is palpable and integral to the story; Redemption is not that novel. But, it is a very good thriller with interesting characters.

Having been aware of the first in the series, I was under the impression that the suspicion of child abduction and rape hanging over Conkaffey would have been dealt with in Crimson Lake, but the crime and its aftermath still follow him and he finds it hard to escape despite moving away from Sydney in an effort to escape those who deem him guilty despite the collapse of his trial. I have to admit, I didn’t particularly warm to Ted. His, first-person narrated, sections of the novel read almost self-serving; he seems to be trying hard to convince the reader that he didn’t do what he was accused of while, at the same time, telling us that he tries to ignore the support he is getting from podcasters championing his innocence. Not particularly liking him is not the same as not enjoying reading about him; I did and the touches such as the podcast are very well done.

Amanda, I did like. Unconventional, a one-off, a little bit weird, she is a convicted murderess, who did do it - although she got the wrong person. I really preferred the sections of the story that tell Amanda’s tale, and that of the police officer, Phillipa Sweeney, with whom Ted and Amanda become involved when investigating the local murder of two late-night bar staff when the father of one of the victims hires the pair to balance his mistrust of the police.

The stories of the local murder and of the attack of which Ted is accused intertwine and overlap and each is brought to a satisfactory conclusion by the author. Redemption is a very good detective novel and I will go back and read Fox’s first book in the series.

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