The Name of the Sister

by Gail Jones

A young woman stumbles onto an outback road at night and is lit up in the headlights of an approaching car. Who is she? Nobody knows, and she has lost the ability to speak.

This is how the story of the Unknown Woman begins. Angie, a freelance journalist, joins her childhood friend Bev, the police officer in charge of the case, to try to solve the mystery.

Dozens of people claim to know the speech-less woman. The stories multiply. In an urgent, unexpected finale, more questions arise.

Set in Sydney and the Mars-red landscapes around Broken Hill, Gail Jones’s The Name of the Sister is an elegant and thrilling novel that explores the unreliable terrain between the truth and the stories we tell each other.

Gail Jones is one of Australia’s most celebrated writers. She is the author of two short-story collections and eleven novels, and her work has been translated into several languages and has received numerous literary awards. Originally from Western Australia, she now lives in Sydney.

‘Intricate, absorbing, beguiling…A suspenseful, sombre tale, spun with an unwavering grace.’ Age

‘Jones writes beautifully…Pieces coalesce into a rich and suggestive novel about the very meaning of plots and plotting, the ideas and feelings we project onto unknowns, and the connections we draw to give events shape and significance.’ Conversation

‘One of the finest writers that Australia has ever produced.’ Caroline Overington

‘One of the most important and prolific literary authors working in Australia today.’ Sydney Review of Books

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Mystery, Crime, Australia, Audiobook, Murder Mystery

177 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 3, 2025

About the author

Gail Jones is the author of two short-story collections, a critical monograph, and the novels BLACK MIRROR, SIXTY LIGHTS, DREAMS OF SPEAKING, SORRY and FIVE BELLS.

Three times shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award, her prizes include the WA Premier's Award for Fiction, the Nita B. Kibble Award, the Steele Rudd Award, the Age Book of the Year Award, the Adelaide Festival Award for Fiction and the ASAL Gold Medal. She has also been shortlisted for international awards, including the IMPAC and the Prix Femina.

Her fiction has been translated into nine languages. Gail has recently taken up a Professorship at UWS.

Reviews

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘No one knew who she was. No one knew where she had come from. She had simply arrived. Her life was a puzzle waiting to be solved.’

The Name of the Sister by Gail Jones is a hypnotic, slow burn literary thriller that completely consumed me. From the eerie opening, a naked, silent woman stumbling into the outback darkness, to its emotionally resonant conclusion, this novel is both cerebral and intensely human.

Jones masterfully weaves together themes of identity, silence, and the stories we use to survive. The “Unknown Woman” becomes a cipher not only for the people around her but also for a nation obsessed with knowing, labeling, and explaining. As journalist Angie and Detective Inspector Beverly Calder peel back layers of falsehoods and half truths, what emerges is not just a mystery but a meditation on memory, trauma, and sisterhood, in all its forms.

The prose is luminous and intelligent. Every sentence carries weight; every description feels precise and aching. And yet the pacing never falters, the investigative narrative pulses with urgency, made even more poignant by the emotional undertow that drags you deeper.

This isn’t just a novel you read, it’s one you absorb. The Name of the Sister is storytelling at its peak. I’ll be thinking about this one for a long time.

My Highest Recommendation.

Thank you Text Publishing for my early readers copy.

[Suz · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book wasn’t a great choice for me. I usually enjoy literary fiction, but sometimes there's a gap that doesn’t fully draw me in—and this was one of those times. It’s very well written, but the word-building felt heavy and cumbersome. I’d suggest having a dictionary nearby - not that there's anything wrong with that!

The story works backward from a disturbing discovery: an unnamed woman, emaciated and starved, appears in the middle of the road, nearly run over. What I really enjoyed was the relationship between childhood friends—Angie, a journalist interviewing desperate loved ones hoping this mystery woman is theirs to claim, and Detective Inspector Beverley, who probably shouldn't be discussing the case but chats freely with her friend.

The novel has layers—following Angie’s failed marriage and Beverley’s fractured past—and it's rich with descriptive prose that, in the right reader's hands, will be appreciated.

With the expected tone of misogyny and the desperate search for the truth, this was an unexpected read.

[Marianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Name Of The Sister is the eleventh novel by Australian author, Gail Jones. An emaciated, naked woman is found wandering at night on the road to Broken Hill, apparently unable to speak, and an appeal is launched on TV to identify this Unknown Woman. Freelance journalist Angie is not the only one whose interest is captured: the Crimestoppers phone lines are flooded with calls claiming the young woman.

While they have been close friends since childhood, the officer in charge of the case, DI Beverly Calder really can’t tell Angie anything. But of course, they do talk about it. As Bev sifts through the stories of sisters, fiancées, daughters, and friends, ruling them out, those who want to, talk to Angie. She gets many different perspectives on missing persons and the heartache of those left behind.

In the background is Angie’s marriage to Sam, a high school teacher who criticises her decision to go freelance, trivialises her work. Once, love that conferred a particular joy was reciprocated; now, they seem to have deteriorated to careless but hurtful resentment, tepid reproach: what does the future of their relationship look like?

Eventually, with “Jane” still unable to tell them about the bruises around her neck, the recent pregnancy, the historic fractures, the stagnation of the case send Bev to Broken Hill to investigate further: where was she kept, and by whom?

A tragic incident with a student sees Sam taking a break in New Zealand, so Angie joins Bev. Her ever-intuitive imagination, and what she sees on a visit to a local museum, present a possible lead, but is Bev too busy wrangling chauvinistic local cops to take it seriously?

Jones treats the reader to some wonderfully evocative prose: “Canopies shadowed the suburb with their leafy profusion, the road was glossed by streetlights, soft gleam issued in rectangles from quiet homes” is an example.

Also “She had expected to feel a measure of radical detachment, but instead experienced a powerful drive to attach, to make sense of the crooked fences, and the long, pocked road, turning at the edges to crimson dust, and the scraggly pepper trees and redgums shaking slightly in a faint breeze, and the squat houses, of wood and stone and corrugated iron, with low prospects and rusty water tanks, and poor excuses for a garden.”

An Australian rural crime thriller wrapped in intelligent, sensuous prose. Once again, Jones excels.
This unbiased review is from a copy provided by Text Publishing.

[Text Publishing]

The following book reviews have been shared by Text Publishing, publisher of The Name of the Sister:

‘Dripping with suspense and intrigue. Driven by complex female characters, this novel is an intellectual page-turner.’
Guardian

‘Jones’s writing truly shines.’
Saturday Paper

‘It was an absolute pleasure to read this novel.’
ABC RN The Bookshelf

‘5 stars. Inscribed, elegant writing and storytelling.’
ArtsHub

‘Sharp and intriguing…A lyrical and introspective story that explores loss, identity, femicide and the Australian public's attitude towards women.’
Books+Publishing

‘[Gail Jones is] ever lyrical and prolific.’
Upcoming fiction for 2025, ArtsHub

‘One of the finest writers that Australia has ever produced.’
Caroline Overington

‘Smart lyrical, and inventive.’
Ramona Magazine

‘Gail Jones is a great writer and this thrilling, intriguing book will delight her admirers but also garner the attention of those yet to discover her.’
Mark Rubbo, Readings

‘Intricate, absorbing, beguiling…A suspenseful, sombre tale, spun with an unwavering grace.’
Age

‘Jones writes beautifully…Pieces coalesce into a rich and suggestive novel about the very meaning of plots and plotting, the ideas and feelings we project onto unknowns, and the connections we draw to give events shape and significance.’
Conversation

‘A thinking person’s crime thriller, The Name of the Sister shows just how well Gail Jones exacts her craft...An absolute pleasure to read.’
Sydney Arts Guide

‘Jane Harper for the intellectual reader…Displays the characteristic Jones brand of critical intelligence and preoccupation with how truth is an individual perception.’
Good Reading

‘A story of the missing…Jones takes us into this story with her usual eye for surprising detail and exquisitely realised description.’
ABC News

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. An interesting, engaging novel narrated by Angie, a freelance journalist. She becomes interested in a particular ‘news’ item. An injured, malnourished young woman is found on a road near Broken Hill, NSW, a mining town, by Terry, a local. The woman is mute. It takes some time before she is identified. Angie is married to Sam, a high school English teacher who is directing his students in the play, Hamlet by Shakespeare. Angie becomes consumed by the case and by coincidence, her best friend Angie, is the detective in charge. Bev gives Angie insider information on the case. Angie interviews people who claim the unidentified woman is their relation.

Angie and Bev travel from Sydney to Broken Hill to further investigate what may have happened to the young woman. Terry is interviewed and a search of small outback properties is made to discover where the young woman had been held captive.

A very rewarding, satisfying read. Highly recommended. This is the tenth Gail Jones novel I have read and it is my favorite! My other two favorites are ‘Sorry’ and ‘One Another’.
I have found all of her novels interesting, though not always totally satisfying! She always adds an interesting factual detail. In this one, it is about the bird, the Ibis.

This book was first published in 2025.

[Sue Gerhardt Griffiths · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 ⭐️s

Not overly fond of literary fiction so this was just an ok read for me.

The setting in Broken Hill was a highlight of the story.

I think I would have benefitted more from reading the book.


Audiobook via BorrowBox
Published by: Bolinda audio
Read by Eleanor Stankiewicz
Duration: 5 hrs 59 min. 1.25x Speed

[Debbie Robson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jones is such an interesting writer and for me this novel took me to so many different places, exterior and interior that my head is still spinning. When an Unknown Woman is found stumbling on a dirt road out of Broken Hill, the media, of course goes into a frenzy. But for freelance journalist Angie, it is the people who try to lay claim to the Unknown Woman who fascinate her.
Jones deftly sketches the state of Angie’s marriage to Sam and the life they share in Glebe. These are some of my favourite parts of the novel. For instance:
“In their small terrace in Glebe, one bedroom, a living room and a courtyard with a square of tiles, they shared their lives. Moonlight in milky haze fell into their yard. Sitting together, outside, Angie listened to the traffic streaming densely in the parallel street, thought of the harbour and all those buildings they walked past to go down to the quay, the art deco cinema, now offices, the wool stores, now apartments, the warehouse and factory conversions in which had once been the working-class fringe of industrial life.”
Angie’s childhood friend is a cop and they meet regularly. Bev wrangles a list of those who have tried to ‘claim’ the Unknown Woman. “These poor souls, wanting a connection, had been conclusively ruled out: no harm could come from allowing Angie to meet them.” It is in the depictions of “these callers” that I believe Jones really excels. There is Herb, Vesna, Marie, Jake, Lisa, Alex and Tezza who rescued the stricken, still speechless woman. Not only does Jones manage to make them all very different people but she skilfully depicts them in their own worlds, cafes or pubs they have chosen as meetup points. And in each conversation, we get a strong sense of the connection between the survivor and the missing person.
When a tragedy strikes Sam, he takes time off work from his teaching job and goes to New Zealand. Angie decides to visit Bev who is now stationed in Broken Hill and this is where I got a bit lost. The clash of cultures, which I’m sure Jones was trying to highlight (city versus outback) but I found Angie’s increasing verbose interior thoughts at odds with the bleakness of the desert surrounding Broken Hill and Silverton. That might be the point of course, but it was disorientating as a reader.
There are some marvellous passages such as the dreamtime story of Marnpi and the following:
“And this, she thought too, was a kind of education: learning what falls away and what remains, contemplating why she was attracted to these images and what they held for her, and whether something in her wish to make an artifact of her feelings might be, after all, her own futile search, unwisely elaborated, for something long gone.”
But other passages I found were full of associations and wordplay that I was ignorant of and as a result, distanced me from the main characters. That is until the astonishing climax, which is still reverberating in my head. A challenging and intelligent read.

[Tundra · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story felt familiar in its outback noir setting but Jones delves much more into the people and events that surround the crime. It felt more like an exploration of the experience of those that are left behind after the crime than about the victims themselves. The tragedy of having a missing family member is central to this story and it must be a life changing experience.
Angie, the central character, is experiencing a sense of breaking of her relationship and a loss of sense of life purpose and direction. This opens her mind to the possibility of exploring ‘the missing woman’ story in a tangential way. Often crime fiction happens in a short space of time but this novel seems more realistic in the slow and unproductive attempts to solve crimes like these.

As always, with Jones, the writing at a sentence level is exceptionally evocative and slows the reader in what is normally a propulsive genre. I’m not sure I was fully onboard with the events leading to the climax of this story, it felt a little rushed or easy. Overall I really liked this but it will probably need to find a niche of readers that are not expecting it to be a traditional crime thriller.

[Mandy Partridge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gail Jones has written an outback Aussie crime thriller set between Broken Hill and Sydney, with a female journalist sleuth.
Protagonist Angie has a policewoman best friend, Bev, who informs her about the strange case of a found woman, "Jane", who is muted by her psychological trauma. Dozens of grieving relatives of the Missing contact the police, so officer Bev passes Angie's contact details to them, once they've been ruled out of the investigation by DNA analysis.
Angie listens to the mothers, fathers and sisters of the missing, and uncovers their enduring love, while her own love life is fading away. Her English teacher partner is more connected to his students, and their production of "Hamlet".
When Bev requests transfer to Broken Hill to find the woman's kidnapper, Angie decides to visit and help with the investigation.
Their worst nightmares are realised in the abandoned mines of New South Wales, but with the help of Aboriginal officers, they locate the kidnapper's lair. The most frightening aspect of this book is that with the hundreds of people who go missing in Australia every year, this whole scenario is very likely and probably common, it's a big country, with plenty of disturbed, violent men.
A thrilling read with lots of literary tangents.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have tried to like Gail Jones’ books, but I have to admit, I just don’t.

Gail Jones expresses things beautifully. I think where she is lacking is telling a coherent story.

The starting premise for this story was ingenious and I thought it was going to go in a really interesting direction; the long term effect of trauma and how it seeps into all your life. All those people who thought Jane/Hannah was their missing loved one were still experiencing the trauma of loss, trauma and being a victim of crime.

I was really interested to see where it would go and how she would reveal the schism trauma and crime drives into a person’s life and how you are robbed of a future that you were moving freely towards. It sets you on a different path without your consent.

Then the story changed focus and sent it down a very unsatisfactory path. This, coupled with the infuriating obscurity in Jones’ writing, left me feeling underwhelmed. And the cherry on top was the implausibility of a number of aspects of the plot. This is really emblematic of my issues with Jones; she pays far too little attention to plot. I don’t mind doing some work while I’m reading, I just don’t like having to do all the work in lieu of the author.

The most frustrating thing is Jones is a good wordsmith so she should be able to tell a good story, for me, she just doesn’t. I have given her a go; I won’t be reading a book of hers again.

[Anne Fenn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been puzzling over the title of this book. It’s relevant to a segment that’s equally puzzling for its inclusion, a brief aspect of an appalling historical event. The author is very high on my list of fabulous writers, I do know she brings originality and great creativity to each of her books. I’ll work it out some time.
This one has something new, outback gothic elements. It starts in buzzing Sydney with deep reflective writing about the decline of relationships, then moves to remote isolated Broken Hill surrounds where the narrative builds and builds, action, mystery, investigations, negativity and threats pending up to an astounding climax. Angie and Bev are great main characters, plus a number of impactful minor players make this another really good read from this author.

[Jaclyn]

This starts with a woman being found in the outback rather than lost. Which sets our protagonist Angie on a path to meeting families of missing women. It has elements of a police procedural, especially in the second half which was unexpected and really brought to mind the books of Chris Hammer. Jones is a beautiful writer and while this lacked her usual European sensibility it contained so much complexity and dexterity.

[Kaz]

Grandiloquent pedantry

[Gayle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Something in the writing of this made me think of Solvej Balle’s ‘On the Calculation of Volume’, but maybe that was just the feeling of a woman alone, a woman trapped, with people around her, yet living her life alone in what seemed to me to be a repetitive cycle.
It irritated me often. The musing, the off topics, the wordiness; it felt like a short story padded out at times. Overall however, I did like it, and I’m surprised she hasn’t crossed my radar before as it is firmly Australian literary fiction.

The book follows Angie, a freelance journalist interested in a story of a woman who turns up on the side of the road, so traumatised that she is unable to speak. It’s more than that though and the blurb doesn’t really reflect the overall story within, and I felt it was really just a backdrop to a woman lost within her own life.

A strange book, so calm leading toward the crescendo. I didn’t think it excellent, but it kept drawing me in, kept me coming back. There’s something in that, hence the 4 stars.

I got this from a street library and I will return it, hopefully someone else can discover this overlooked author there.

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

An unknown woman appears in Broken Hill. Angie is a journalist writing about missing persons. But there are so many missing people and only one found. A great novel, beautiful writing.

[Fran Whiteman · Rating 2 out of 5]

A good storyline with lots of really really big words & I’m glad it was an audio book version for that reason.

[Robert Watson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dissapointing. Promised a lot with its opening scenes, but the writing felt forced and mismatched the crime-thriller plot.

[Caitlyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this writing is objectively beautiful but there is something about its rhythm that I can’t sync my brain up with, it feels impossible to sink into.

[Violet Bell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked up this book knowing little about it other than the idea of an unknown woman found injured and mute in the outback. This was a quick read - I finished it in around two hours. The descriptions of place - the smells, sounds, sights, Sydney glossy after rains - were beautiful, but I wish the author had taken a bit more space to let us get to know the characters.

Because we really don't. The protagonist, Angie, escapes the tedium of a silently disintegrating marriage to explore the mystery of thd unknown woman. Why does it feel like every 40 or 50 something female protagonist of a novel is in an unfulfiling marriage before embarking on the central drama of the book, which her husband doesn't understand. Why can't women just be single?

At any rate, Angie's quest for answers takes her to Broken Hill, where ... Well I don't mean to spoil anything, but with so little space for it to develop, the narrative felt rather rushed, and I found late events in the book rather incredulous


I'll give Ms Jones another try at some stage. I do enjoy the rich language, and hope more room might allow for a deeper and more satisfying story.

[Colette Godfrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

3 1/2 stars - I was really engaged for the first half of the book but the second half failed to keep my interest, the different storylines just didn't seem to resolve for me.

[Erin Shillabeer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Everything was happening but nothing at the same time. Loved her writing and finished it in a day, just wish there was a better rhythm to the book.

[Belinda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this book up a few times during trips to my local indie bookshop and decided that it must be calling out to me for a reason, and didn't realise that I knew Gail Jones until after I began reading. I had the niggling feeling that I knew her name from somewhere, but it took a bit to remember why! She was working in WSU's Writing and Society faculty back when I was a postgrad student there. That doesn't affect my rating, as I always do my best to give completely honest reviews.

This is a short novella, but it packs a punch. I didn't expect the ending of this at all. The first half is quite slow, with lots of examination of the inner self, relationships and the physical space of Sydney. I've lived in different parts of Sydney my whole life, and I think this novel captures it better than any other book I've read. I was enjoying it a lot, even though it was a whole lot of thought and conversation without action. It kind of gave me Claire Keegan vibes at that point, particularly Small Things Like These. When the story moves on to Broken Hill, the plot veers off the road and goes crashing straight into a mine shaft, in the very best way possible. The sheer scale of brutality and the ramifications of it was a shock, but ultimately thrilling. After the quiet introspection of beginning, you really don't expect what is to come.

I had to go back and re-read the last few chapters, because I needed to wrap my head around what had happened. I needed two or three reads to really soak it all in. It was violent, cruel and unflinching, much like the landscape it's set in.
I really loved Jones's description of both Sydney and rural Australia, even to the point of being able to feel and almost smell the beautiful (in my opinion!) familiarity of the XPT train ploughing through the middle of the country. That scene alone took me back to being a kid. I remember so many trips on the XPT to Melbourne and Cootamundra, or out west to Dubbo, Parkes and Forbes. I'd sit glued to the train window and huddled down in my seat, inhaling diesel fumes and reading a book, knowing there was a nondescript country motel waiting for me at the end of the line. I LOVED those trips. I still have a deep love of the XPT and prefer it to any other long distance transport, partly due to nostalgia, partly practicality. I really loved having a little literary adventure out that way while reading this book. But I digress.

The writing is lyrical and deep throughout. I loved everything about it. I wish we had more resolution to the story, both of Angie's future and the police investigation, but I understand why it's left open ended. I think the reader gets the most of the important parts, and the rest can be left up to interpretation. The way Jones captures the essence of everything is gorgeous, gorgeous prose. The main characters have richly nuanced internal lives, despite the story only being told from Angie's perspective. Lots of mistakes were made on all sides, but you can't help but hope for the best for most of them.

The subject matter is grim, especially towards the end, and I would encourage people to check trigger warnings before picking this book up. It's grisly, violent and graphic, and the imprisonment and subsequent discovery of Jane is horrifying in its cruelty. I can't really say much more without major spoilers. I think the shock of it made this book more stark than other crime novels I've read. I wouldn't have really classified it as a crime novel before the shift to Broken Hill.

I didn't think I'd be able to top Kate Morton's Homecoming this month, but here we are! Funny how they're both Australian authors, writing very Australian books! I'd recommend this to anyone who likes well written crime novels, people who enjoy literary fiction that isn't unnecessarily wordy and overwrought, fans of Australian fiction, and to anyone who liked Wake in Fright. I'm sure I'll be re-reading this book at some point in the future, and I'm looking forward to reading more of Jones' work.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

When speaking of one of our foremost writers of literary fiction, it seems reductive to suggest that Gail Jones' new novel The Name of  the Sister is a literary thriller, but it's true to say that I devoured it in less than a day, mulling the early pages slowly as one does with any novel by Jones, but then racing through to the heart-stopping finale to see who might survive...
The Name of the Sister evokes all those alarming tropes about outback predators.  People, that is, not animals.  Dreadful, horrifying disappearances of hapless travellers on remote outback roads, far from any kind of help.  Sometimes, deaths can be caused by risky behaviour in Australia's extreme heat, but those are not the deaths that prey on our fears. No, we think of Peter Falconio and his girlfriend Joanne Lees; or the victims of serial killer Ivan Milat, and the lost-and-never-found who we hear about during Missing Persons Week.  If you've ever been the prey of aggressive motorists on an outback road (and I have, in outback Queensland), these fears are magnified, even if no harm was done.

The Unknown Woman given the placeholder name of 'Jane Doe', is found in the Outback, not lost.  Hers is an appearance, not a disappearance.  But she is a mystery because she cannot speak.  She can't be identified, and authorities don't know what trauma lies behind her emergence onto the road, where Terry Williams (known as Tezza to his mates), almost ran her down.  Angie, the freelance journalist, is interested in approaching the story from a different angle.  She wants to explore the stories of people who ring Crime Stoppers, people who are convinced that 'Jane' is a long-lost loved one.  Dismayed and yet absorbed by the media frenzy, Angie seeks a more high-minded purpose.  Though she can't yet articulate to herself or her unsatisfactory husband how she might proceed, she rejects the populist approach:

Angie felt uncomfortable entering the genre of 'true crime': styrofoam cups rolling in the wind; wannabe solvers of dodgy whodunnits, seekers of gory details; raincoated perves.  Not really her thing.  There was enough of it anyway, enough willed malfeasance out there to satisfy the grossest demand.  And fiction: grimly Norwegian, darkly Finnish, wittily Scots.  At some level she was appalled by the public appetite for stories of hurt, and by the addictive excellence of crime dramas on television. (p15).

As she watches the news reports...

Now by some dark magic, Angie more fully imagined her.  She was wavering in the headlights, a figure in a ragged dress, her feet bloody, perhaps, and her frame slowly staggering.  This driver charging at the darkness saw a shape ahead and thought first of an animal.  Knowing how to drive in the country, he slowed rather than swerved.  And then the woman drifted towards him, a set of human angles and skinny as a new lamb, and he stamped his brake in panic, coming to a skidding halt—too close, too close (how his heart hammered).  (p.4)

This scene has a significance easy to miss on a first reading.  Jones does not give us a narration of what happened.  She shows that Angie, a journalist experienced in fact-finding, has assembled it from media reports and let her imagination recreate a scene at which she was never present.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/05/29/t...

[Denise Newton · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://denisenewtonwrites.com/?p=7632

This very Australian novel is best described as ‘literary crime’. Crime, in that there is a crime that is central to the story line: why things in the novel play out the way they do. Literary, in the sense of its beautiful prose and the strong focus on character and theme.

The plot concerns Angie, a disillusioned journalist who is trying to make a career from freelance work. Her husband Sam is a teacher, also somewhat jaded in his chosen career. The third main character is Angie’s childhood friend Beverley, now a senior detective in the NSW Police. The three individuals and their interactions form the core of the story, around their own concerns and preoccupations and the novel’s crime.

So, to the crime. A young woman is found on a deserted road one night, near the mining town of Broken Hill in outback NSW. She can’t speak, has no ID and no one knows who she is. She becomes Unknown Woman, then given the moniker Jane.

As you might expect, the media and online social platforms are full of rumours, speculation and theories about who ‘Jane’ really is and what happened to her.

Angie is herself drawn to the story and thanks to her connection with Bev, ends up fielding calls from among the many people who contact the Police information line, certain that ‘Jane’ is their missing daughter, friend, or sister. Despite her misgivings, Angie becomes a sounding board, a witness to the loss and grief that these people have carried for months or years. It starts to become a heavy burden but she feels unable to stop.

She bears her own burdens, including her inability to have a child, and the grief of her slow realisation that her marriage was failing, her previously uncomplicated relationship with Sam becoming distant and unsatisfying. She knows that Marriages of a decade were destroyed by less: this gloom of worn expectations, this failure wholly to connect. (p21) Worse still, she doesn’t know what to do about it.

Then a family arrive from Germany to identify the Unknown Woman as their daughter who’d gone missing a couple of years earlier on a holiday in Australia. ‘Jane’ is Hannah Bloch; the mystery of her identity solved but not what had happened to her.

As Bev goes to Broken Hill to work on the case, Angie decides to join her there in the hope of…what? Distraction from her own problems? That she might have something to contribute to the police investigation? She’s not really sure.

It’s in Broken Hill that the novel’s climax takes place, a resolution of the mystery at the heart of the novel, and a revelation of the (very clever) meaning of the title.

Jones’s writing is beautiful, deftly capturing the various landscapes of inner-suburban Sydney and outback Broken Hill, along with relationships in all their wonderful supportiveness and messiness:

When Bev and Angie next met it was at Bev’s apartment, for a pizza.
Girls’ night, Bev called it; both needed to talk. They were alike in wanting the other to confirm what Angie called constitutional seriousness, how they had seen in each other – perhaps from the beginning, and certainly before they had words for it – the ability to not look away, to search for deeper meanings, to take themselves seriously.
The Name of the Sister p50-51

The Name of the Sister was published in 2025 by Text Publishing.

[Rachel Axton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interesting book, it follows the story of Angie, who is kind of at a crossroads in her life. She has left traditional journalism to be freelance, but she is struggling to find connection to both her career and her husband. The other key character is Bev, a childhood friend (as close as a sister) who is in the Police force.

As the book opens, we are faced with the premise of the crime, a lady, terribly thin and frail is spotted struggling along the roadside in Broken Hill. He calls the Police. The woman doesn’t talk, but when examined shows signs she has been abused. They don’t know who she is and she doesn’t match with missing persons, so Bev runs the twin cases, of finding out who ‘she ‘Jane’ is and second trying to solve the crime.

The case whips up media interest and Angie decides to make it the focus of a story.

But for me, Angie’s personal story is what I consider as the focus of the book, it is her journey and her hopes and drive to move forward while holding on to the past. The ‘who done it’ drives the narrative and sets the scene for Angie’s, dragging her like a passenger through the stalemate of her career and relationship. It provides her an outlet, to avoid (as much as she can) the slow fracture of her life.

I read it quickly and enjoyed it, but I am finding a few days later that what is sitting with me is this woman who has an overactive imagination, and not always useful or good things, some of them are, but half of it is rubbish that you just ponder on. I see my family reflected in it, the over thinking, the want to wander the streets at night and the joining of ideas and thoughts, not always coherent. And the inability to really close them out.

I felt the story is really well balanced and there are lots of connecting ties, between the love of sisters, and friends (who are like sisters), the way childhood impacts adulthood, and expressions of displacement and connection. It is subtle, but there is so much to like in this book. Most of all the humanity and the hope…

I feel this is quite different from other Gail Jones books but I have only read a few.. so perhaps I do not have the knowledge to comment, but I think this book can be read two ways, the story of Jane and the crimes, or the story of Angie… I thought it was great.

Check out my other reviews here: https://yarrabookclub.wordpress.com/

[lyny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gail Jones has published a number of novels and is well regarded as a writer, but her kind of writing does not work well for me (I noticed when I had finished this that I had had similar reactions to the two previous books of hers I had read). She is interested in character and dwelling on people, but she also doesn’t seem to have enough confidence to go full on into a story that is simply about characters, but ties her books to mysteries or crimes of some sort that need a solution. For me the problem is that there is so much of the books that is not moving the crime story along at all, then often a rather perfunctory or unsatisfying closing off of the mystery. This begins arrestingly – an unknown woman has been found in outback WA on a road and seemingly traumatized, unable to speak or write. A lot of people from different parts of the world contact the police in charge of the investigation, convinced that she is the person they know – the spouse or sister who disappeared, etc – often even when the age would be totally wrong to make that viable. For much of the first part of the story, the central character/investigator Angie (who is a stuck freelance journalist, not getting on well with her teacher husband) contacts people who had contacted the police but whose connections have now been ruled out (her friend Bev is involved in the investigation). I kept expecting this part of the story to develop thematically – ie to say more about what was interesting about these people and their yearnings. Instead, half-way through, the actual investigation takes off in a fairly familiar way, and Angie helps to solve it. The two parts of the book didn’t go together very well from my point of view.

[Liisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Name of the Sister opens with a genuinely compelling premise: an emaciated, unidentified woman appears in the middle of an outback road, triggering a wave of hope and heartbreak among families searching for missing loved ones.

What worked best for me was the relationship between journalist Angie and Detective Inspector Beverley, childhood friends whose conversations provide an intriguing window into the investigation. Gail Jones also explores an aspect of crime fiction that is often overlooked - the people left behind. The grief, uncertainty, and enduring trauma experienced by families of missing persons sits at the heart of this novel, and those sections felt thoughtful and affecting.

The novel is rich with descriptive prose, and I can appreciate the beauty and craftsmanship of Jones’s writing. Unfortunately, I struggled to connect with its rhythm. Despite finishing it in a day, I never quite felt immersed in the story. The lyrical style often felt at odds with the crime-thriller premise, and I found myself admiring the writing more than enjoying the reading experience.

I was particularly drawn to the novel’s exploration of how trauma reshapes lives and futures without consent. The opening suggested a fascinating examination of the long-term impact of crime on victims and their families, but for me, it never fully delivered on that promise.

There is much to admire here, especially for readers who enjoy literary crime fiction and character-driven narratives. While the story didn’t entirely work for me, I appreciated its ambition and its compassionate focus on those living with loss.

[Mother Mercer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story centres around the shocking discovery of an emaciated, naked woman, found wandering at night on an outback road, between Broken Hill and Silverton. She is catatonic, and an appeal is launched on TV to identify this Unknown Woman. ‘No one knew who she was. No one knew where she had come from. She had simply arrived. Her life was a puzzle waiting to be solved.’

Thrillers and crime fiction are not usually a genres I gravitate to. What peaked my interst was the outback setting, not far from where I grew up. It was very much giving Wolf Creek vibes. I enjoyed a lot of things about this book. It's a slow burn, elegently written thriller.

The characters and environment are beautifully constructed, with much care in the details. I particularly enjoyed the weaving in of the story of Marnpi, the creator bird of Wilyakali lore. The importance of First Nations story telling and caring for Country was seamlessly integrated into the stroy. It was a real pleasure to read.

I felt Jones captred the nature of her characters vividly. People from the country can be hard natured, sceptical and disparaging of outsiders. This was understood and conveyed in the unfolding narrative without being naive or idealistic.

This novel is a real pleasure to read. I read in a single day.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Angie is home in Sydney watching the television news bulletin, when a different type of story pops up - a picture of an amenic woman comes on the screen with a banner saying informantion wanted for unknown woman found walking a stretch of lonely road near Broken Hill. Angie is a journalist, now working freelance. Her relationship seems to be on the rocks and herself is out of sorts in relation to her work as well. While she didn’t think much of that evening, in the morning the story had exploded on social media. Thus Angie is drawn to this mysterious women who cannot or will not speak and also in desperately bad shape. Angie calls a friend she’s known since childhood working for the police department, Bev, to ask what she knows. Bev tells her to ‘piss off’ its her case not your story. But after meeting up as friends, Angie is able to latch onto the story in a way to protect Bev as a source. And so the adventure begins. This is a story of missing persons, but also of misogyny in society as a whole and the police departments. It is also a story of violence against women, especially vulnerable women. And a story of troubled marriages and even suicide as a side story. Ms Jones packs a lot in this novella of just under 200 pages in a compact yet very interesting way, without feeling rushed.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Angie is a free lance journalist who becomes interested in the case of a woman who is found on an outback road. The woman, who is given the name Jane by the police who are investigating her case, cannot speak and the mystery surrounding her makes headline news.

Many people are fascinated by the unknown woman. Who is she? How did she come to be in the outback near Broken Hill? What happened to her?

As people come to know that Angie is investigating the case, she is contacted by many who have lost relatives over the years. Each tells her a story of loss, loneliness and heartbreak.

Eventually, Jane is matched by DNA to a missing German woman and she is returned to her family. As Angie wonders what to do with her research into missing people, she decides to visit her best friend, Bev, who is a detective given the job of investigating Jane's discovery.

And while there, the mystery of Jane is finally solved, with more deaths and violence but also a resolution of sorts for Angie, for Bev, and for one of those who contacted Angie with their story of loss.

A tender, haunting novel, beautifully written.