We discuss chapters 1-8 of Jock Serong’s The Rules of Backyard Cricket. Beginning with our protagonist, Darren Keefe, with a gunshot wound, tied up in the back of the car, it’s immediately apparent that this is going to be a slightly different cricket story to the ones normally lining the average cricket fanatic’s bookshelf. Exploring Darren and his brother Wally’s youth as they go from being the rapscallion children of a single mother to competent professional cricketers, it’s not your standard mystery affair but the questions come gnawing all the stronger for it. With Herds tied up in the boot to solve this one, can he evade the traps of this unconventional puzzle?

Check out Part Two and Part Three here!