Reviewed by Rod McLary
Sex trafficking – or human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation – is a scourge across the world. Estimates of the number of persons subjected to forced sexual exploitation suggest around five million victims may be involved. It is within this dark and abusive world that Shadow City is set.
The book’s title is very apt suggesting as it does a city which lies beyond or beneath the one in which most of us live. It is a city where life is lived in darkness and exploitation and cruelty.
Set across two continents – Australia and South Africa – the story takes the reader into a dangerous world where human dignity, and indeed human life, counts for very little. The narrative begins with the body of a young woman being found in Chinatown Sydney. She has been beaten and tortured – and branded with an image of the sun. Sergeant Jackie Rose is called to the scene but, almost before she can begin her investigation, she is ordered to hand the case over to the Australian Federal Police.
On the other side of the world, Detective Schalk Lourens from the Cape Town South Africa police – suspended from duty because of matters relating to the days of Apartheid – is planning to travel to Sydney to visit his daughter. Learning about a young woman who was offered a chance to study in Australia but is now uncontactable by her parents, he decides to search for her at the same time as his visit.
Thus begins an intriguing and twisting tale of corruption and human exploitation ranging primarily across two continents but with tentacles which stretch around the world. Perhaps inevitably, the two investigations intersect; and, to add a frisson of sexual interest to the narrative, so do Sergeant Rose and Detective Lourens. But there is a complication which heightens the tension when the Australian Federal Police become involved and the AFP officer in charge of the case – James Bush – alleges that there is a mole within the AFP. Chasing down the mole is a distraction but a necessary one. Throw in an organisation called Sunshine Scholarships, Roxana Flint who wants to employ Detective Lourens in a vague and uncertain role, a nefarious and dangerous character named rather incongruously Mrs Sunshine, and you have the ingredients for a very intriguing and thrilling crime story. And Shadow City never disappoints.
The author has crafted a taut and tense novel which engages the reader from the beginning and doesn’t ease up until the dénouement. The characterisation of all the players, particularly of the two key protagonists Jackie and Schalk, is both authentic and engaging. This – and the quality of the writing – adds to the enjoyment of the narrative and the chase.
Shadow City is a fine contribution to the crime genre and well worth reading.
Natalie Conyer has also written Present Tense which won the Ned Kelly Award for the best debut crime novel of 2020 and was shortlisted for the Davitt Awards.
Shadow City
[2024]
by Natalie Conyer
Echo Publishing
ISBN 978 176068 885 1
$32.99; 355pp