In 2004, the body of a young Perth woman was found on the grounds of a primary school. Her name was Rebecca Ryle. The killing would mystify investigators, lawyers, and psychologists - and profoundly rearrange the life of the victim's family.
It would also involve the author's family, because his brother knew the man charged with the murder. For years, the two had circled each other suspiciously, in a world of violence, drugs, and rotten aspirations.
A Murder Without Motive is a police procedural, a meditation on suffering, and an exploration of how the different parts of the justice system make sense of the senseless. It is also a unique memoir: a mapping of the suburbs that the author grew up in, and a revelation of the dangerous underbelly of adolescent ennui.
'[D]eeply thoughtful ? The main strength of this book is the way it dips between genres - A Murder Without Motive is part-true crime, part police procedural, part-memoir. It's a consideration of adolescent ennui in Australian suburbia and an engrossing investigation into masculinity and violence.'
