Bad Neighbours (Joanna Jenkins, Allen & Unwin)

Joanna Jenkins (How to Kill a Client, The Bluff) examines the Australian property market through a feminist lens in her latest domestic thriller, Bad Neighbours.

Ruth, a successful lawyer, has recently moved back to Sydney after working overseas. She buys a unit in The Lumen, an Art Deco building in Potts Point, but soon finds herself at the centre of a property dispute following the death of Ben, an unhoused man residing on the grounds. As she digs into the mystery and recruits a detective, her personal and professional lives begin to unravel.

In this pointed critique of contemporary privilege, Jenkins populates The Lumen with a cast of residents whose lives reveal the inequalities underpinning Sydney’s property market. Four long-term owners have lived in the building since the 1980s, including a former singer whose fame has faded and who now cleans the homes of her wealthier neighbours to afford the owners’ corporation fees. More recent arrivals include a banker, an influencer, a tech entrepreneur and an Airbnb investor.

While the story is anchored by Ruth’s perspective, Jenkins occasionally shifts into the viewpoints of other residents. These characters are well rendered and will keep readers invested throughout the many twists of the whodunnit.

Jenkins writes full-bodied scenes rich in detail and metaphor, using deliberate, sparse language that will leave readers wanting more.

Readers who enjoyed Chris Womersley’s Cairo may find the novel’s portrait of an apartment building shaped by decades of shared history appealing, though this one is distinctly Sydney rather than Melbourne. Anyone interested in housing affordability and class tensions will likely be drawn in.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Tara Lee is a creative technologies support officer at the City of PAE Libraries. When she’s not running a workshop teaching the community how to create using technology, she’s crafting or reading a great book. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

Books+Publishing pre-publication reviews are supported by the Copyright Agency Cultural Fund.

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