Two dominant, controlling, headstrong men, one a violent bully, the other an arrogant bombast, living cheek by jowl, were bound to come to loggerheads.
Ian Jamieson, an immovable object, met Peter Lockhart, an unstoppable force. It was always going to end badly.
Just how lethal that head to head confrontation would become is the centre of WEDDERBURN, a searing true crime spectacular from Maryrose Cuskelly.
WEDDERBURN, a tale of blood and dust, opens with dark fairy tale analogy – the slaying of a tyrant, his wife and warrior son, and the hint of a stepdaughter imprisoned against her will, but it plays out more like a Greek tragedy – great passion fuelled by pettiness and resentment; pride, hubris, paranoia and malice writ upon dry and dusty paddocks and in modest rural dwellings; one time friends turned mortal enemies; a chorus of neighbours warning of impending disaster. Everything laid waste as the protagonists advanced obdurately towards their own destruction.
It was a Wednesday in Wedderburn, October 22, 2014. 65 year old Ian Jamieson stabbed his 48 year old neighbour Greg Holmes, then proceeded to shoot Holmes, mother Mary and 78 year old stepfather, Peter.
Cuskelly calibrates the growth of the blood lust amongst the dust, as tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, builds into a succession of hostility, creeps in this petty pace from day to day, and all the yesterdays of slights and slings and slanging have lighted fools the way to dusty death.
It is a tale told adroitly, full of sound and fury, signifying much in human foible and fallibility.
WEDDERBURN is the result of the author’s countless return to the town talking to one person, then another, walking its wide streets, and then attending the court proceedings.
WEDDERBURN is not a story about one thing but about many things; violence, masculinity, families, the judicial process, small communities, and base and lofty human emotions.
A character study of a cross section of the wider Wedderburn community – and what characters – ex bikies, hippies, nudists, WEDDERBURN is also a courtroom drama with flamboyant lawyers, and a no nonsense judge.
In compelling prose, Cuskelly, weaves a thrilling yarn of provocation, personality and perception. Can there ever be a mitigating motivation for murder or justification for slaughter?
When does interest in one’s neighbour tip into prurience, interested speculation into malicious innuendo. Chinese whispers can turn raised voices into raised fists and over protectiveness into pedophilia.
WEDDERBURN by Maryrose Cuskelly is published by Allen & Unwin