Mischance Creek by GARRY DISHER is the latest book in the bestselling ‘Hirsch’ series which sees the return of a beloved local copper. AKINA HANSEN writes.
Garry Disher grew up on a wheat and wool farm just an hour’s drive from Burra, in the mid-north of South Australia. Like many farming communities, it’s a place where knowledge and stories are passed down person to person.
And for Garry, it’s where he gained his love of storytelling.
‘I grew up in a very oral culture. The people around me were great yarners, particularly my father, and his bedtime storytelling. His books – many of which I didn’t understand and some of which were gently removed from my hot little hands – and his respect for education had a great influence on me,’ he tells me.
While he eventually left small-town life for university, those early years proved to be incredibly influential. Even as a child, Garry knew he wanted to become a writer and shares that three aspects of his upbringing contributed to this.
‘First, I was a great reader; there were plenty of books in the house. No-one can hope to be a writer without being a reader. Second, it was a solitary time – which I didn’t mind, and which has stood me in good stead for life as a writer. I was a daydreamer, which is a form of storytelling. Third, my father didn’t read to us at bedtime, he made up stories, so from an early age I witnessed someone inventing characters, settings and storylines. He also said, “Farming’s a mug’s game, son, get an education.”
‘Admittedly, my parents had grown up during the Great Depression and World War II, and thought that medicine, law or engineering made more sense than writing.’
So, while Garry held onto his writing dreams, he also knew he needed another job to supplement those pursuits. He went on to train and work part-time as a teacher while writing in his spare time.
Remarkably since publishing his debut novel in 1987, Garry has since gone on to write over 60 books. He is a three-time winner of the Ned Kelly Award for Best Novel and was nominated for a Booker Prize for his novel The Sunken Road.
‘I get twitchy when I’m not writing. I start a new book almost as soon as the previous one is finished, and will never retire – I’m relying on friends to tap me on the shoulder and tell me I’m losing my marbles. I find ideas all around me, all the time: newspaper items, overheard conversations, people’s behaviour, speculations, places, etc. I think writers learn to be alert, to ask: Why did she do that? What if she’d done X instead? What might happen next? and so on.’
Surprisingly, it wasn’t until later in his life that Garry finally gained widespread recognition and popularity. With the publication of his 2019 novel, Peace, he became a bestselling novelist.
‘It’s taken me a lifetime to finally make a living from writing, so I’d have liked good sales early in my career, when I had a family to help raise and needed a decent dwelling and a reliable car, but I don’t regret anything. I’ve found a readership at last. I’ve won many awards. My books are taking off overseas. On the other hand, I have also written “literary” novels, but these have been pretty much overlooked, I’m sad to say.’
I ask Garry what he’s learnt about himself from this journey after a career spanning over 40 years and an impressive literary output to show for it.
‘The importance of persistence. The importance of pushing at my boundaries rather than trotting out the same book each time. The realisation that there’s no such thing as writer’s block: I simply haven’t thought enough, yet, about the story that’s blocking me.’
Today, Garry has made a name for himself within the genre of crime and rural noir. With almost half of his 60-odd books being crime titles, including his three main books series: ‘Wyatt’, ‘Peninsula Crimes’ and ‘Hirsch’.
The latter catapulted Garry’s career with his aforementioned second book, Peace. The series follows South Australian rural police constable Paul Hirschhausen. Garry first found inspiration for the characters and world of the series when he came across a news story.
‘I had read an Age newspaper article about the daily life of a policeman in rural Victoria and saw that his job was as much welfare counselling as crime fighting. I formed an image of a small community, of an outsider policing it – in most crime fiction the protagonist is an insider – Bosch in Los Angeles, for example – and of the limitations of rank. Hirsch is a lowly constable: in most crime fiction the protagonist is much more senior than that, with a team of officers to help him or her. It was easy then to transplant all this to the area where I grew up. Then I thought about Hirsch’s personality: amiable, perceptive, fair, pretty bright but overlooked by his bosses. He’s just an ordinary bloke: no dark secrets or habits.’
His latest novel, Mischance Creek, is the fifth book in the ‘Hirsch’ series and sees the return of Constable Paul Hirschhausen or ‘Hirsch’ as he investigates a cold case.
‘Hirsch is an appealing character to write about and read about, I’m told. I pull him on as if he were a familiar woollen jumper. And even though I left the mid-north of South Australia to go to university when I was 20, the place still draws me in, I still see, hear and smell it. And I have to be practical about it: the ‘Hirsch’ novels have been bestsellers, I need to make a living. But I couldn’t write one every year. I tend to alternate a ‘Hirsch’ with a standalone.’
While Garry may not return to the world of Hirsch as frequently as some readers might like, it’s still like coming home for him.
‘I’m writing about a world and a way of life that I know. I grew up on a wheat and wool farm halfway between Adelaide and the Flinders Ranges and still have family involved in that life, in that place. I still dream about it.’ •
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Garry Disher has published 60 titles across multiple genres.
With a growing international reputation for his best-selling crime novels, he has won four German and three Australian awards for best crime novel of the year, and been longlisted twice for a British CWA Dagger award.
In 2018 he received the Ned Kelly Lifetime Achievement Award.
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