CHRIS HAMMER IN CONVERSATION – ANU 8 December 2021

Chris Hammer’s Treasure & Dirt is one of the stand out Australian crime novels of 2021.

Set in the small opal mining town of Finnigan’s Gap in outback New South Wales it is a richly plotted novel. The story revolves Sydney homicide detective Ivan Lucic who is sent to Finnigan’s Gap to investigate the death of an opal miner, who is found crucified and left to rot down his mine.  With his usual senior partner, Detective Inspector Morris Montifore, being held back in Sydney, Lucic is accompanied by a young inexperienced investigator with local knowledge of the opal town, Nell Buchanan. Once there they find a strange concoction of desperate miners, jet-setting billionaires trying to do a deal and a strange religious cult. Hampered by uncooperative local police and influential mining interests, they find themselves being investigated by internal affairs as they close in on the killer.

It is one of the ‘must read’ Australian crime novels of 2021.

Those in Canberra will be able to see Chris Hammer in conversation with fellow crime writer Michael Brissenden, whose Dead Letters was also an impressive read this year, on Wednesday 8 December at 6 pm at the ANU. For more detail follow this link: 

https://www.anu.edu.au/events/in-conversation-with-chris-hammer-0

The conversation with Michael Brissenden was a fun event earlier this year and this conversation with Chris Hammer is sure to be just as entertaining.

Here is my review of Treasure & Dirt from earlier this year: https://murdermayhemandlongdogs.com/treasure-dirt-by-chris-hammer-allen-unwin/