A powerfully told, gripping novel of family, guilt, empire, and race set in the dusty, deserted outback of Queensland in the 1880s. Tommy McBride and his brother Billy return to the isolated family home to find their parents have been brutally murdered. Haunted and alone, their desperate search for the killers leads them to the charismatic and deadly Inspector Noone and his Queensland Native Police – an infamous arm of colonial power whose sole purpose is the ‘dispersal’ of Indigenous Australians in protection of settler rights. The retribution that follows will not only devastate Tommy and his relationship with his brother, but leave a terrible and lasting mark on the colony and the country it later becomes. This is a stunning debut from a major new talent.