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Outback
Johnson est un homme traqué. En tuant un policier, il est devenu l'ennemi public numéro un, pourchassé par la police australienne sous le regard avide des journalistes. Davidson, reporter à la télévision, couvre avec intérêt cette course-poursuite. Tout les sépare, mais leurs destins vont se jouer dans les plaines sauvages de l'outback.Dans ce roman noir d'une chasse à l'homme, le grand Kenneth Cook mêle avec justesse les trajectoires d'un idéaliste et d'un hors-la-loi dans un monde sans pitié.
320 pages, Pocket Book
Published June 3, 2020
6 people want to read
About the author
Kenneth Cook
51 books34 followersBorn 1929, died 1987. Kenneth Cook was a prolific Australian journalist, film director, screenwriter, TV personality and novelist. He is best known for his novel Wake in Fright, which became a modern classic and is still in print, and for his Killer Koala trilogy.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 10, 2021
The style
Negative: A blunt and rude vocabulary - it was really adjusting to how journalists talk to each other in this book (in Australia, commercial TV?).
Also, the author seemed underestimate the reader. In a lot of places, something is written, then this is repeated by another character, so that it would get through to the reader. These are needless repetitions that take the rhythm out of the book.
There are some vulgar, negative comments about someone who might be gay, while nothing positive about gays is written. Okay, people were stille more anti-homosexual in 1962, but it was already an issue, the author is conservative.
Positive: the book reads easily and has a clear dynamic. It is written according to the rules of the old-fashioned thriller, but this book is from 1962 and the techniques used to create suspense still work.
The characters
They all seem to be equally unhinged and stupid. They are clearly caricatures, but the book is not written in a way that makes us laugh. As a result, the characters are completely out of place, and become implausible.
The strange emotions of the criminal are hard to understand, as is the behaviour of the journalist at the end of the story. As a result, even the only character worthwhile, the journalist, collapses and the book ends in a great content failure.
The setting
The setting doesn't have much to it, except that you learn the word 'outback', and are reminded of the bush.
What I did like, however, was that the book dates from 1962. This means that journalists are working with typewriters, there are dactylos on the editorial staff, films are developed in dark rooms, TV comes into living rooms via aerials. The world of journalism is not accurate, also caricatured, but being confronted with those old techniques was fun.
Themes
- The criticism of commercial channels - too caricatured, but still.
- The description and therefore, for those who want it, the questioning of journalists who will do anything for a nice report
- The fact that the death penalty awaits criminals is often mentioned (the death penalty apparently still applied at the time in the area where the criminal was to be tried), and although no clear stance is taken, the author does raise some questions around it.
- But also: homosexuality, as mentionned above. Very often, the journalists speak to each other about a colleague. They can't stand him. One because the man has a moustache, the other because the man is a homosexual. His colleague asks, 'Why do you think that?' and he replies, 'I just know it. And he stinks.' Stinking as a proof of homosexuality. If that is meant to be funny, I don't go along with it. I think it is vulgar and discriminatory.
Conversations like this about this man allegedly being gay occur regularly. Talk about bad taste!
Conclusion
The book reads well, there is suspense, although the whole environment is very blunt and the author often repeats events. There is criticism on commercial TV, and perhaps a bit on death penalty, but discrimination against gay people. But the content of the story is rendered in such exceptionally poor way, the characters are so caricatured without being funny, that I do not recommend anyone to buy this book, not even to borrow it from the library.
Negative: A blunt and rude vocabulary - it was really adjusting to how journalists talk to each other in this book (in Australia, commercial TV?).
Also, the author seemed underestimate the reader. In a lot of places, something is written, then this is repeated by another character, so that it would get through to the reader. These are needless repetitions that take the rhythm out of the book.
There are some vulgar, negative comments about someone who might be gay, while nothing positive about gays is written. Okay, people were stille more anti-homosexual in 1962, but it was already an issue, the author is conservative.
Positive: the book reads easily and has a clear dynamic. It is written according to the rules of the old-fashioned thriller, but this book is from 1962 and the techniques used to create suspense still work.
The characters
They all seem to be equally unhinged and stupid. They are clearly caricatures, but the book is not written in a way that makes us laugh. As a result, the characters are completely out of place, and become implausible.
The strange emotions of the criminal are hard to understand, as is the behaviour of the journalist at the end of the story. As a result, even the only character worthwhile, the journalist, collapses and the book ends in a great content failure.
The setting
The setting doesn't have much to it, except that you learn the word 'outback', and are reminded of the bush.
What I did like, however, was that the book dates from 1962. This means that journalists are working with typewriters, there are dactylos on the editorial staff, films are developed in dark rooms, TV comes into living rooms via aerials. The world of journalism is not accurate, also caricatured, but being confronted with those old techniques was fun.
Themes
- The criticism of commercial channels - too caricatured, but still.
- The description and therefore, for those who want it, the questioning of journalists who will do anything for a nice report
- The fact that the death penalty awaits criminals is often mentioned (the death penalty apparently still applied at the time in the area where the criminal was to be tried), and although no clear stance is taken, the author does raise some questions around it.
- But also: homosexuality, as mentionned above. Very often, the journalists speak to each other about a colleague. They can't stand him. One because the man has a moustache, the other because the man is a homosexual. His colleague asks, 'Why do you think that?' and he replies, 'I just know it. And he stinks.' Stinking as a proof of homosexuality. If that is meant to be funny, I don't go along with it. I think it is vulgar and discriminatory.
Conversations like this about this man allegedly being gay occur regularly. Talk about bad taste!
Conclusion
The book reads well, there is suspense, although the whole environment is very blunt and the author often repeats events. There is criticism on commercial TV, and perhaps a bit on death penalty, but discrimination against gay people. But the content of the story is rendered in such exceptionally poor way, the characters are so caricatured without being funny, that I do not recommend anyone to buy this book, not even to borrow it from the library.
May 10, 2024
Johnson est recherché par la police suite au braquage d'une bijouterie qui a mal tourné. Davidson cherche le reportage qui va faire décoller sa carrière de journaliste à la télévision. La vie des deux hommes va finalement se croiser, pour le meilleur et pour le pire.
Beaucoup de violence et d'injustice dans ce livre. Même si j'ai apprécié la construction du livre qui met en parallèle une tranche de vie des deux principaux personnages de l'histoire, je ne suis pas complètement convaincue.
En bref : intéressant mais pas un coup de cœur.
Beaucoup de violence et d'injustice dans ce livre. Même si j'ai apprécié la construction du livre qui met en parallèle une tranche de vie des deux principaux personnages de l'histoire, je ne suis pas complètement convaincue.
En bref : intéressant mais pas un coup de cœur.
July 5, 2023
Lu après Cinq matins de trop. Thriller sympa entre un assassin qui s’enfuie et des journalistes qui chassent le scoop
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews