Review: THE POOL

THE POOL by Hannah Tunnicliffe (Ultimo Press, 2024)

Reviewed by Karen Chisholm

Prince of spin and life of the party, Baz King, is missing. Nine years ago, at an innocent summer barbecue in Melbourne, everything imploded. For the Kings and the four other young families there that fateful day marriages fractured, friendships crumbled and lives were upended.

Nothing would ever be the same.

Now in their forties and their children teenagers, Baz King cannot be found. Has his charm finally run out? With a history of dodgy dealings and no shortage of motives, anyone could be a suspect – his ex-wife, Birdie; his colleague, Alex Turner; his lover, Jess and her husband, Richard; his friend’s nanny and new wife, Madison – who wants him out of the picture?.

The promotional material pushes the connection, and it's hard not to get a vibe of THE SLAP from the blurb of this one  - young families, a tragedy at a BBQ that implodes relationships, crumbles friendships and all, but fear not if you're feeling like this is another commentary on parenting, because I will confess that's kind of the worry I had going in as well, and not the feeling I had coming out the other side of Hannah Tunnicliffe's THE POOL.

The catalyst of this story is events at a BBQ, nine years ago in Melbourne, after which prince of spin, life of the party, father, Baz King vanished. It's easy to imagine that he's simply done a runner, what with a history of dodgy dealings and a plethora of reasons for him to disappear himself, but there's a lot of suspects on that day including ex-wife Birdie, new wife Madison, colleagues, friends and a complicated interweaving of children, staff, lovers, and married partners who also have lovers. And a eye-watering and skin-crawling tendency towards flaunted privilege, tacky interpersonal relationships, misogyny, and, it has to be said, some truly bloody awful parenting.

So a lot going on, and a big cast of characters which means readers may find themselves floundering a bit in the early stages - particularly as there's a type here - big noting, big talking, basically not a lot there blokes, and pretty, vapid, put upon women. There's leering, there's suggestive talk, there's men at the BBQ, women in the kitchen, and the constant bickering over who is watching what kids, and there's alcohol. All of which leads to a tragedy, which leads to fracturing, which leads to the idea that it's nine years later, things are finally setting down, and all those people, with all those motives have finished with their own dramas and look to what really happened back then. 

There's also a lot of points of view, and what is, ultimately a cast of pretty unlikeable people, which may not necessarily appeal to many readers, but it had a feeling of real life about it, perhaps because of that. It also made the drama that bit more heightened, the number of potentially unreliable narrator's high, and the mystery and lying all the more believable.

The more I think about it, the more I suspect THE POOL is the sort of novel that will appeal directly to lovers of books of the sorts of suburban noir that writers like Liane Moriarty, Sally Hepworth, Caroline Overington and Louise Candlish are known for. There will be others that I should have included on that list. Blame too many books, too few brain cells left for any unforgivable omissions.

Karen Chisholm is one of Australia's leading crime reviewers. She created Aust Crime Fiction in 2006, a terrific resource - please check it out. Karen also reviews for Newtown Review of Books, and has been a regular judge of the Ned Kelly Awards and Ngaio Marsh Awards. This review was first published on Karen's website; she kindly shares some of her reviews of crime and thriller novels written by New Zealanders adn Australians on Crime Watch as well as on Aust Crime Fiction.