Book Review: And Fire Came Down by Emma Viskic
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I started reading And Fire Came Down as soon as I finished the first Caleb Zelic book, Resurrection Bay. Not because I enjoyed Resurrection Bay that much, just because I already had it and thought I might as well. This is the book that Resurrection Bay should have been. And Fire Came Down isn’t perfect but it’s one of those rare cases where the sequel is better than the original.
And Fire Came Down takes place about six months after the events of Resurrection Bay. Haunted by the events of the first book (oldest friend murdered, betrayed by business partner, estranged wife viciously attacked with a knife right in front of him), Caleb Zelic is trying to hold things together. He’s managed to salvage some of his private investigation business but things are slow. One night when he is taking his daily run, a woman approaches him and asks for help. He doesn’t know her but she has his name and address written on the back of a receipt. She signs the word “family” – at least Caleb thinks she does but she’s clearly not fluent in sign language. Before he can get any clarification, a hulking blond man attacks her and tries to drag her away. Caleb intervenes and she flees but she doesn’t get very far. The blond man continues his pursuit and rather than let herself be caught, she steps into traffic and is fatally struck by a vehicle.
Caleb cradles her on the road as she dies; it’s another thing to add to his list of haunting events. And when he checks the receipt with his name and address written on the back, he finds it’s for a train ticket – station of origin: Resurrection Bay. Someone he knows must have sent her to him for help.
He heads back to his home town, which is simmering with more than the usual amount of tension. It’s a stinking hot summer with the threat of bushfires hanging overhead and as well as the ongoing racial divide between the white community and the local Aboriginal people, a rash of vandalism, arson and riots is going on. Caleb starts asking around but everybody denies sending the woman to him.
The police aren’t looking into the woman’s death because they think it’s a clear-cut suicide. Caleb feels like he owes her something. But the more he investigates, the more the people of Resurrection Bay turn against him. It’s almost like everybody knows what’s going on but nobody wants to get involved.
I’m still not convinced that Caleb Zelic, the main character, has a long-haul series in him but I was a lot more impressed by this effort than the last one. The town of Resurrection Bay was beautifully drawn. It’s not the kind of place I imagine anyone wanting to live in if they didn’t have to – rampant racism, a massive drug problem, rising crime levels and disillusioned law enforcement – but it’s the perfect setting for a crime novel. It also feels very Australian and not in the cringeworthy way that a lot of Australian novels do.
Caleb still refuses to admit his deafness makes things more difficult but without his business partner, he struggles even more interviewing people than in the previous book. There’s a hilarious and yet dangerous moment in a pub where he asks a bushily bearded bikie some questions and can’t see his lips through his facial hair to make out even a single word. And whenever he goes for a run, he leaves his hearing aids at home so can’t hear anything. Of course, this always seems to be when he really needs them – women asking for help, bad guys holding him down and demanding answers to questions he can’t hear, and so on.
The plot struggles a little because Caleb makes some huge leaps in logic, not necessarily obvious ones, in order to link all the clues together, meaning the reader can only take his word for it rather than attempt to figure it out for themselves. And the ending is absolutely terrible because it turns out that literally everyone is a bad guy (okay, not quite, but almost everyone).
The thing missing from Emma Viskic’s books is memorable villains. It’s great to have a well-developed hero but without a memorable villain, it feels like the hero isn’t really being challenged all that much. What would Will Graham and Clarice Starling have been without Hannibal Lecter? What would Sherlock Holmes have been without Moriarty?
Who is Caleb Zelic? We still don’t really know. He’s still stumbling around trying to figure it out. So we’re still stumbling around with him. But he’s definitely lacking some of the mental strength that we traditionally associate with heroes and has to be saved by others a lot more than he saves himself.
In a word: better.
3.5 stars
*First published on Goodreads 10 April 2020
