Fatal Development

by Inga Simpson

When a body turns up in the courtyard of Dirk and Stacey's apartment, they turn to their friend and neighbor, Kersten Heller, for support. The police assume the death was accidental, but when it comes to light that the victim, a resident of the apartment building, was about to take legal action against the building's developers, Kersten decides there must be a connection. Kersten draws on old skills to investigate, hiding her activities, as well as details of her past, from her partner, Toni. She soon discovers what she's suspected all along. The victim was not alone on the roof when he fell, and evidence he'd collected for his case against the developer has gone missing. Threats and mysterious stalking put pressure on Kersten, and Toni grows impatient with her secrecy. With Dirk's help, Kersten sets a trap to prove her theories, but this case might unearth far more than she bargains for.

244 pages, Paperback

First published June 23, 2010

About the author

Inga is the award-winning author of THE THINNING, WILLOWMAN, THE LAST WOMAN IN THE WORLD, THE BOOK OF AUSTRALIAN TREES, UNDERSTORY: a life with trees, WHERE THE TREES WERE, NEST and MR WIGG.

A novelist and nature writer, her work explores our relationship with the natural world.

Inga grew up in central west NSW, and has lived in Canberra, Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. She is now based on the far south coast of NSW.

WILLOWMAN was shortlisted for the Bookpeople adult fiction Book of the Year 2023.

UNDERSTORY: a life with trees (2017), Inga's first book-length work of nature writing, was shortlisted for the Adelaide Writers Week prize for nonfiction.

WHERE THE TREES WERE (2016) was shortlisted for an Indie Award, and longlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award, ABIA book awards and Green Carnation Prize.

NEST (2014) was shortlisted for the ALS Gold Medal, and longlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award and the Stella Prize.

Her debut novel, MR WIGG, was selected for the 2011 QWC/Hachette manuscript developemnt program and, as a result, published by Hachette in 2013. MR WIGG was shortlisted for an Indie Award and longlisted for the Dobbie Award.

In 2012, Inga was the winner of the final Eric Rolls nature essay prize.

She has a PhDs in creative writing and English literature, and her short work has been published in Griffith Review, Wonderground, the Review of Australian Fiction, Clues, WQ, and the Dictionary of Literary Biography.

Reviews

[Candace · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is an unusual book in that it is paced like a "cozy," but has the plot of a "thriller." Characters are almost entirely undescribed, although the author gives a decent sense of the Brisbane, Australia, suburbs. The book starts out slow and builds very slowly. I hoped to be rewarded with a "thrilling climax," but got a completely anticlimactic resolution. It was never clear to me how the developers' harrassment of our heroine was supposed to make any discernible difference to the outcome of the story. It seemed over-the-top and not terribly believable. This wasn't Silkwood -- the things being covered up involved leaky ceilings and kickbacks. The resolution of the murder that is supposedly the center of the story was obvious to me from the first few chapters. In terms of writing, copy-editing, proofreading, the book is fine, but the characters didn't make an impression on me. It seemed like a novel written at arms' length. I wished that the author had taken the plunge or taken a few more chances or _something_. It was not a satisfying read.