The Dry cover art

The Dry

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The Dry

By: Jane Harper
Narrated by: Stephen Shanahan
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About this listen

I just can't understand how someone like him could do something like that. Amid the worst drought to ravage Australia in a century, it hasn't rained in small country town Kiewarra for two years. Tensions in the community become unbearable when three members of the Hadler family are brutally murdered.

Everyone thinks Luke Hadler, who committed suicide after slaughtering his wife and six-year-old son, is guilty. Policeman Aaron Falk returns to the town of his youth for the funeral of his childhood best friend, and is unwillingly drawn into the investigation.

As questions mount and suspicion spreads through the town, Falk is forced to confront the community that rejected him 20 years earlier. Because Falk and Luke Hadler shared a secret, one which Luke's death threatens to unearth. And as Falk probes deeper into the killings, secrets from his past and why he left home bubble to the surface as he questions the truth of his friend's crime.

©2016 Jane Harper (P)2016 Hachette Audio UK Crime Fiction Crime Fiction Suspense Exciting

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Critic reviews

Harper's debut novel is The Dry, a crime thriller making its way up The Sunday Times Bestsellers charts as steadily as the mercury rises each day in the stricken agricultural town of Kiewarra, in which it is set...It feels like an Ur-Australian novel, a whodunit that evokes the punishing landscape and searing aridity so convincingly, you expect a heat haze to shimmer above the page (Patricia Nichol)

An award-winner in its native Australia, in this first book from journalist Harper a local cop investigates the murder of a family in a small town enduring the worst drought in 100 years. This could be the start of an Antipodean wave that will overtake Scandi noir (Nick Curtis)
Praise for this book has been 'resounding', and rightly so: it's truly 'remarkable'. Exploring the tensions of small-town life and 'the limits of human endurance', The Dry is a 'chilling murder mystery', said The Mail on Sunday
All stars
Most relevant
I bought this on the basis of a good newspaper review and was not disappointed. A very well plotted story, well written and performed, it ticked all the boxes for me. The characters were all well drawn and her description of the landscape really conveyed the feeling of menace and isolation and the effect of the drought. I have already bought Jane Harper's next book and am looking forward to it.

Enthralling and suspenseful

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When one comes back to town after twenty years and he finds himself the victim of hate its difficult to prove you were innocent in the first place. Good story well written and well narrated, be ready for some late nights.

Small town memories

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Listened to this whilst running, great book for this as not lots of complex characters and storylines so you don’t get mixed up. Love the way the main character is referred to as first name when going back in time and surname when back to present day so doesn’t confuse what is happening. Several mysteries that slowly reveal themselves set in the dry Australian outback, raw and real. Really loved this book and the characters you really warm to. Nice twist.

Great steady paced who dunnit

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A good story which unravels gradually as it draws you into the characters lives in the heat and dust of an Australian draught.

Excellent listening.

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A well written story with a great reveal that is set up and well planned nicely from the very beginning, an aspect I really appreciated as the story did take quite a while to get to its reveal and had clues scattered throughout! I liked the idea of (nearly) killing two birds with one stone with a mystery from the present and a separate one from the past, although I thought the ending was a little abrupt and possibly too ambiguous for me.

The only "dry" aspects of the book I felt were that the story meanders a little from time to time, and doesn't escalate in tension (until the last few chapters maybe), only really staying at a constant flat-lined level of tension throughout, which isn't exactly a bad thing, I just expected a bit more momentum to be built throughout!

Another gripe was the narrator rarely switching voices for different characters, making it hard to distinguish between two characters during dialogue sometimes, unless one of them was maybe Scottish or an angry drunk man. 🤷‍♂️ Either way the performance itself was great, I just hoped for a bit more variation to differentiate between characters!

Overall a great murder mystery, that when it gets to the ending makes you go "a ha!" as the light bulb flicks on, the pieces fit together and a decent payoff and not a cheap ending! A few gripes with the story but they're only really minor, along with the narration which could have benefited from a few differing character voices, but other than that I'd definitely recommend!

Good story but just a little bit dry...

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