The reading world is a richer place since Bruce Cooke left life as a plumber and turned to teaching and eventually to writing. Though he has two novels in print and a number of short stories published, he also has seen his original adaptation of The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe turned into a $1 million production for the Australian stage. Ironically, though, Cooke's real forte is telling stories in the real world and not those in fantasy.

His first two novels, The Irish Retribution and The Pursuit of Mary McBride (also reviewed on Myshelf), were released simultaneously by Swimming Kangaroo last summer. They are two very different stories that capture readers immediately. When both were offered to me for review, I was intrigued by the vast difference in content and approach that Cooke offered in these stories.

The Irish Retribution, which will be reviewed here, is the story of war correspondent Tully Sanderson, an Australian national, and his estranged daughter Carrie, who never really knew how her Irish mother died. The novel begins with a tense scene between Tully and Carrie where the young woman pulls a gun and announces she is seeking revenge for his part in killing her mother. This act of revenge, known as the Irish Retribution, is set aside as the story of Tully's life and character as a reporter covering the Vietnam War unfolds. This tale, though it occurs after Carrie's mother's death, lays the foundation for the complexities in Tully's life that eventually bring him to that fateful meeting with Carrie. Only then does the reader find out what really happened. Needless to day, Tully Sanderson's life is rife with women, children whose lives he has not become a part of, and intense guilt, even though he has become a world-renown journalist and his daughter looks to be following in his career path.

The convolutions in Tully Sanderson's story are many, but it is the accuracy with which author Bruce Cooke paints the experiences of a war correspondent that take this novel to a higher plane. This backdrop of war and its inherent dangers allow the very human drama to play out in vivid colors. Relationships (and the lack of attention to them) are the hallmark of this novel, although this novel would by no means be considered a romance. It is certainly a portrait of the evils of war and the collateral damage done by it.

Bruce Cooke is an astute modern storyteller. I highly recommend The Irish Retribution.