Share this review
The Sun Walks Down
By Fiona McFarlane
Published by Allen and Unwin
ISBN 9781761066207
Set over a period of one week in September 1883 in Colonial Australia in and around the town of Fairly in the Finders Ranges.
This creatively written novel which includes some actual place names and regions in South Australia has a cast of multiple characters excluding the core family and those who live in the surrounding town and stations.
The main plot is about a little 6 year old boy, Denny Wallace who one day goes for a walk and does not return later that day. At first his family think he has just gone for a walk on the property and will be home soon, or at the least, the following morning.
When he fails to return a large party of family members, trackers and neighbours set off to find him hoping that he will use the emergency signals that his father has taught him to use should he ever get lost. His mother who has hearing problems and younger children to care for waits anxiously at home for hews.
The just married police constable, Robert Manning - married the day before Denny is missing, leaves his 18 year old bride Minna or Minnow as he affectionately calls her, to join the search. The sergeant from Port Augusta arrives to lead the search. The story weaves in his bride's wheelchair bound stern and sometimes cold German mother and her expectations. The way in which Minna's parent's occupation was described as fabric merchants and traders as unwarranted, even antisemitic which has lingered with me as I continued reading.
The relationships between the family and siblings, the teachers, widows, maids, indigenous trackers, a Swedish artist Karl and his artist wife Bess, the vicar, the cameleers and the mothers go into deeper details, arguments and their fears.The construction of the arguments put forward by Bess when she later appears before a magistrate are nothing short of remarkably well done and utterly convincing.
At one stage I wondered if Denny would ever be found alive or dead as I was lost in the various side stories, hoping to get back to his story.There are multiple tangents spinning from one scenario and onto another, getting further away from the main plot and interest of finding the lost 6 year old Denny in the Flinders Ranges.
The natural landscape with it's flora and fauna, many gods which include the sun rising and setting plays an important part of this story. Through the descriptions one can imagine the trials and tribulations that settlers would have held at the time with only telegraphic communications and the slow mail, especially in situations like these when Denny's mother sends a telegram to her father in far away Goolwa to let him know what has happened and hoping he would travel to them at Fairly.
Worthwhile reading for people who are interested in early Australian outback life, their relationships between families and the different ethnicities that have formed part of the Australia we know today.
The author
Fiona McFarlane was born in Sydney and teaches creative writing at the University of California, Berkeley. Fiona is the author of the novel The Night Guest, which was shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award, and a collection of short stories, The High Places, which won the International Dylan Thomas Prize.
This is independent review, I am not paid by the publishers, so.If you
Liked this review, Buy me a coffee
