Reviewed by Rod McLary
Nemesis is the fourth book in a series featuring DS Lucas Walker from the Australian Federal Police. Although all the books in the series are stand-alone, this one has links back to the first one Outback and the events which took place ten years previously. DS Walker was then on compassionate leave visiting his dying grandmother in north-west Queensland. He was directed by DCI Rutherford – head of the AFP’s organised crime squad – to investigate the disappearance of two German tourists Rita Guerra and Berndt Meyer. In the course of the investigation, Lucas meets Rita’s older sister Barbara who flew from Germany to assist in the search. Barbara is a detective in the German Police and she and DS Walker strike up a friendship which has continued after her return to Germany and through the intervening years.
Now Barbara is investigating the murder of Matthias Ritter in Mildersee – a German lakeside village. Lucas is chasing down Stefan Markovich who has so far evaded the police and is hiding in Berlin. Markovich was a senior leader of a bikie gang the Vandals in Australia and is a very dangerous man. He is wanted for a drive-by shooting which killed two people and seriously injured an eight-year-old boy. Lucas has persuaded DCI Rutherford to allow him to travel to Berlin to bring down Markovich; and so he plays the ‘nemesis’ of the title – the formidable opponent of Markovich. While he is in Berlin, Lucas can also attend an international conference on policing – and catch up with Barbara.
Thus the three strands in this enthralling narrative are established – Barbara’s investigation, Lucas’ pursuit of Markovich and the developing relationship between the two detectives. And together they make a tense and exciting story with many twists and turns. It is a cliché with reviews of the thriller genre that some books are so exciting that they demand to be read in one sitting. But – as with this book – sometimes the reader has to put the book down if only to take a deep breath before the next chapter. It helps too that both Lucas and Barbara are such engaging and personable characters; and three-dimensional due to the references to their personal lives which round out their characters very well.
The reader will enjoy the descriptions of the police procedural work undertaken by Barbara and her colleagues – not all of whom are entirely on her side. Politics plays its part in the German police much as it does everywhere else. Barbara’s out-in-the-open investigation is set alongside Lucas’ undercover and under-darkness work as he relentlessly pursues his quarry through the dives of Berlin. Together the two stories – much as Barbara and Lucas do – fit together quite well.
All in all, Nemesis is a finely crafted thriller with sufficient tension, thrill of the chase [of the murderer of the Mildersee victims and the nemesis of the title – Stefan Markovich] and the possible romantic connection to satisfy even the toughest aficionados of the crime genre. DS Lucas Walker is a detective well worth the following.
Well recommended.
Nemesis
[2025]
by Patricia Wolf
Echo Publishing
ISBN: 978 1786 58574 5
$32.99; 398pp