Where the Truth Lies

3.75 stars. Where the Truth Lies is a great debut novel by author Karina Kilmore. I love the protagonist who is essentially a misfit with something to hide. She’s struggling with her past as well as her present, and in many ways doesn’t trust herself, yet she’s determined to prove herself professionally in spite of the obstacles in front of her. I love how this was set in Melbourne and the author captured the atmosphere and many things iconically Melbourne. I also loved the mystery and suspense of the story, there were twists and turns and I wasn’t even sure there’d be a resolution under the very end. Chrissie O’Brian is a journalist at The Argus in Melbourne. After conducting a profile interview on Australia’s first female crane operator Masina (Mas) Weber, Mas is the victim of a workplace accident. The more Chrissie looks into this, the more things don’t add up. On the docks where Mas had been working there is growing hostilities between the company and the union, accidents are happening and people are looking the other way. Chrissie is determined to get to the truth yet she’s not sure who she can trust with her investigation and her own anxiety is getting worse. She’s close to the truth but when she finally gets to where the truth lies, there are still more challenges to overcome to report it.

Where The Truth Lies by Karina Kilmore is a marvellous debut novel as it is full of intrigue and mystery that held my attention right throughout the story. Chrissie’s personal story is interwoven into the overall story which revolves around her working as a journalist at The Argus newspaper in Melbourne, Australia. She gets involved in researching and writing a story of deaths and corruption on the wharf front of Melbourne. Corruption at all levels emerges and someone is leaking what she is coming up with - who can she trust?

Beside Chrissie there are a lot of well developed characters who add a lot to the depth of the story. In particular I loved Mike, the nerdy computer guy, who is her neighbour and friend with Mr Skinny their shared cat. Also there is Harry, the grumpy boss at The Argus who adds colour to the story as he is never happy with Chrissie as her employment was made without his consultation. The detectives Bannister and the sinister Dorn provide interesting but contrasting characters.

A refreshing story of a woman searching for personal release from her past while also trying to re-establish herself as a professional journalist which she had to leave behind in New Zealand.

Highly recommended read.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher Simon & Schuster Australia for a copy to read and review.

Love a crime book set in Australia! Where The truth Lies is a twisty and gritty story that kept me hooked. The main character is a messed up journalist who is trying to escape her past but struggling to move on. I look forward to reading more of this character

Chrissie O'Brien has moved to Melbourne from NZ after world is torn apart. She is a troubled women who is constantly battling her demons, unable to put her past behind her. Her boss resents her and she wants a story that packs a punch to impress him and prove her place on the team. She is sent to interview the first Australian women to operate a crane on the wharfs. The next day the women is dead, in apparent work[place accident. But Chrissie is not having any of that. Something wicked in happening on the wharf in Melbourne and she is determined to find out what.

Thanks to Simon and Schuster Australia and Netgalley for my advanced copy of this book to read. All opinions are my own and are in no way biased.

Dedicated journalist Chrissie O’Brian thinks she’s onto a big story investigating a number of mysterious workplace accidents at the Melbourne Docklands. But her stories keep getting slashed and instead she’s assigned to a profile piece on solo female crane driver, Masina. Things take a sinister turn when Masina tells Chrissie she’s in danger, and then is found dead the next day – another ‘accident’. As Chrissie digs deeper, yet another worker is killed and a bloodied parcel turns up at her desk. She realises she’s onto something – and she has to get to the truth before it gets to her.

Karina Kilmore’s debut novel Where the Truth Lies is crime fiction at its finest with an intriguing mystery at its core – are these really workplace accidents or are they murders? The plot is complicated by an ongoing dispute between the unions and the wharves, missing cargo, dodgy crane records and financial trouble. Could the unions be staging accidents? Or are the wharves involved in large scale fraud?

Main characters in crime fiction typically have a dark past (that’s what makes them so interesting) and Chrissie is no different. She lives alone, self-medicating with alcohol and painkillers, trying to dull the pain from a past trauma, throwing herself into her work and taking comfort in neighbourhood stray cat, Skinny. The successful career she forged in New Zealand hasn’t translated to Australia; her senior position at The Argus newspaper was given to her as a favour and her news director resents her. But Chrissie’s backstory, involving the tragic loss of her husband and her downward spiral into self-blame and depression, is so heart-breaking that the reader cannot help but feel empathy for her and root for her to succeed.

Like Chrissie, Karina Kilmore is a New Zealand native who lives in Melbourne. An experienced journalist, Kilmore uses her knowledge to great advantage with vivid depictions of the newsroom, crammed with desks and people, and buzzing with noise from televisions, radios and phones. She brings the wharves to life with descriptions of the patchwork of coloured corrugated containers and picketers spinning their clicker rattles high in the air, chanting about safety.

The plot ticks along at a fast pace, the suspense increasing as the story speeds towards a revealing conclusion. Chrissie is hit with several gut-wrenching setbacks – just when she seems to be making headway, she’s forced backwards again. But like all compelling protagonists, she ploughs on, undeterred. Karina Kilmore’s confident writing style and talent for telling a great story, teamed with her flawed but extremely likeable main character, makes it easy to see why this novel was shortlisted for the Unpublished Manuscript Award at the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards in 2017. Like Chrissie, you’ll be racing to the end to find out who, if anyone, is telling the truth.

Where The Truth Lies is the first novel by Australian journalist and author, Karina Kilmore. After a year at The Argus, journalist Chrissie O’Brian is still being relegated to minor stories and puff pieces by her resentful news director. But one such piece, interviewing a female dockworker, leads into a potentially explosive story.

Masina Weber, a veteran of some years’ experience with Grange Industries, falls to her death in her workplace mere hours after leaving Chrissie a concerning voicemail alleging that something was dangerously wrong at the wharf.

Chrissie is determined to find out just what Mas meant, and whether her death, unwitnessed and unrecorded on CCTV, was really accidental. But interviews with Grange, with the Maritime Union boss, and with the Transport Union rep result in conflicting allegations and information, and it’s soon clear that the opposing sides have agendas they aren’t revealing. Chrissie is left wondering if she can trust anything they say.

Before she can do the necessary research, however, she is taken off the news desk and sent to work for the op ed doing obits. Could the rumour about The Argus avoiding certain stories have some validity? And if the coming redundancies don’t threaten her job, could there be someone at The Argus leaking?

Another death, and then a grisly message delivered to her desk have Chrissie and her colleagues concerned for her safety. It also becomes clear that Chrissie's judgement and performance are affected by the high consumption of alcohol and pills to which she resorts to cope with the grief and guilt she carries from her recent traumatic events in New Zealand.

Kilmore’s secondary characters, if a little thin, are appealing, particularly Mike and Maria; Chrissie, as a main character, is well developed, but using the flawed protagonist device can be a fine line to tread: laying it on too thick risks losing the empathy of the reader, leading instead to frustration with the character's behaviour. The hint of romance is unnecessary and not entirely convincing.

Kilmore’s experience as a journalist is apparent on every page, and she manages to incorporate many topical issues into her plot: the automation of industry and the inherent safety concerns; the (perhaps unsafe) conditions under which non-union and foreign labour might agree to work; and the spread of information and “news” via social media, with its lack of fact checking. The plot has numerous twists, red herrings and sub-plots, making the resolution feel a little messy. Nonetheless, an impressive debut.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Australia.