Bankstown is a melting pot of cultural and financial diversity. A place where a future prime minister can emerge, having left school at 15. A suburb infused with Asian, Middle Eastern and European immigrants. Close enough to the teeming city centre to attract renovators, developers, shonky deals and crooked operators. In 1992 the suburb was well into the process of gentrification. Corners were being cut, organised crime had a controlling interest and bureaucratic corruption was rife. With this as a backdrop and the ICAC (Independent Commission Against Corruption) investigation in full swing, the plot unfolds.
Nhu 'Ned' Kelly is a young detective based at the Bankstown Police Station. Thrust into a 'blokey' environment, and with a Vietnamese mother and an Irish father, Ned's sex and background are always going to make it tough for her to succeed. Despite being a born and bred Sydneysider, Ned cops sexist and racist jibes from the 'perps' and her workmates alike on a daily basis. But Ned is part of the new police model, not tainted by past graft and made from stern stuff.
When two bodies are found in the foundations of an old building, Ned is confronted with a cascading series of old rivalries, police corruption, and is drawn into the case on a personal level as links are found between the bodies and Ned's own parents who were murdered in 1976. Suspects are plenty, some of her workmates are rotten to the core and Ned doesn't know she can trust and who she can turn to.
The Old School was shortlisted for the 2011 Ned Kelly Best First Crime Fiction Award, and I can see why. It is an absorbing and intriguing police procedural novel. The fact that it is P.M. Newton's debut novel is even more creditable. The plot is well researched by the former policewoman. She nails the era and the battles that a young policewoman would have faced. No doubt experiencing the same sexism and hurdles herself. The fictitious plot is paralleled by real events that give the setting and time period both authenticity and perspective. Aboriginal Landrights, Paul Keating's Redfern Address, ICAC, multiculturalism, a burgeoning and emerging world city in Sydney and a changing attitude to policing are all interwoven cleverly into the plot. The pace of the story is well modulated with new pieces of evidence building the intrigue and deepening the mystery. The characters are diverse and interesting and the ending is both absorbing and fulfilling.
I hope this is the first book in a series. It is a gutsy and gritty police procedural with fleshy characters and lays a perfect launching pad to spawn a series. I will be keenly on the lookout for future P.M. Newton novels and highly recommend this book to those who like tough and dirty police procedural and crime fiction novels.
MY RATING: 4.5/5
Unfortunately does not seem to be available in the UK, pity as it looks v good.
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