I have just finished The Riders, Tim Winton. He would have to be one of my mostest bestest authors!!
This book was dark. It was a search for a missing wife, there was no Hollywood ending, no happy tunes playing in the background, in fact I finished the book quite depressed. Some people in life really don’t have happy endings…any at all. I am greatful for my life, my kids and my wife, Christine. I lovethem deeply. I think my relationship with God is connnected in there to all of those relationships some how. Winton wove a soft spirituality throughout the book. The daughter ‘Billie’, had an influencial Grandmother who had shared about Jesus with her, and this 7 year old was gently pressing her Dad about this.
The wonderful ‘powershift’ in the relationship between daughter and father was great to read. He ‘took’ her searching for the wife/mother. In the end, he was shattered and was ‘taken’ home by this wonderful little girl. This shift of power in the relationship was shown by subtle things like her taking the money from his wallet and deciding to look after it.
Our emotions are powerful, they lead us so often. This guy Scully was so absorbed in the search for his life he forgot almost all else. It was the relationship with his daughter that finally pulled him from his darkness.
Why read depressing books? Because life is like that at times, maybe not for me…right now…but maybe for you, the person sitting next to you on the train, the person in the house next door…
No Guarantees 
another Winton beauty!
I was so mad by the end of the book. I saw Winton at a gig a few weeks later and nearly grabbed him to ask ‘where the hell is Jennifer?!!’
So where do you think she is? Was it her that put the ‘meet you at the water fountain’ note at the bank?
What was with the riders? How good was the ‘longing for that which never came’ kind of imagery!!!