We discuss chapters 1-2 of Janice Hallett‘s bizarre media-meta-fiction ‘Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels’. Journalist and true crime author Amanda Bailey is on the hunt for a new story. Her editors put her onto the case of the Alperton Angels, a perplexing cult-suicide from the early 2000s involving ritual sacrifice and a missing baby. As Amanda begins to work through her wishlist of interviewees for the novel, her old arch rival Oliver Menzies shows up investigating the same case, and the two are forced to work together on the tapestry of conspiracy behind the case. We see the case through the text logs and transcripts of conversations as the narrative is sculpted out in the atmosphere between the hard journalistic fact.

In the spirit of strange structures, we’re joined by author Ben Hobson to talk about his etched-in-stone Aussie-Outback-western ‘The Death of John Lacey’, and the motivating factors behind both his narrative choices, and how threatening the reader with a thoughtfully off-kilter structure can impact the feel of a book.

Check out Part Two and Part Three here!

Thank you to ABC Radio National and Allen & Unwin for providing copies of ‘The Death of John Lacey‘. You can catch Herds on ‘The Bookshelf’ on ABC Radio National discussing the book here.