The Sun Walks Down

A Novel

By: Fiona McFarlane

Narrated by: Emma Jones

One of The Washington Post's 10 Best Audiobooks of 2023

Long-listed, New Yorker Best Books of the Year, 2023

Long-listed, CPL: Chicago Public Library Best of the Best, 2023

Long-listed, Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year, 2023

Long-listed, Barnes and Noble Best New Books of the Year 2023

"Such a large cast of characters would normally be difficult to keep straight in an audiobook without tedious backtracking, but McFarlane’s skill in evoking their distinct inner lives and Jones’s deftness in capturing them in manner and accent keep them perfectly distinct."—The Washington Post

“The Sun Walks Down is the book I'm always longing to find: brilliant, fresh and compulsively readable. It is marvelous. I loved it start to finish.”—Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch House

"Listeners learn as much about the searchers and their inner lives as they do about the missing child. Each person—including farmers, cameleers, policemen, Indigenous trackers, and more—is examined with precision and telling details."—AudioFile

Fiona McFarlane's blazingly brilliant new novel, The Sun Walks Down, tells the many-voiced, many-sided story of a boy lost in colonial Australia.

In September 1883, a small town in the South Australian outback huddles under strange, vivid sunsets. Six-year-old Denny Wallace has gone missing during a dust storm, and the entire community is caught up in the search for him. As they scour the desert and mountains for the lost child, the residents of Fairly—newlyweds, farmers, mothers, indigenous trackers, cameleers, children, artists, schoolteachers, widows, maids, policemen—confront their relationships, both with one another and with the land­scape they inhabit.

The colonial Australia of The Sun Walks Down is noisy with opinions, arguments, longings, and terrors. It's haunted by many gods—the sun among them, rising and falling on each day in which Denny could be found, or lost forever.

Told in many ways and by many voices, Fiona McFarlane's new novel pulses with love, art, and the unbearable divine. It arrives like a vision: mythic, vivid, and bright with meaning.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

©2023 Fiona McFarlane (P)2023 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“The Sun Walks Down is a revelation. McFarlane places her lens first over the disappearance of a small boy in the Australian Outback and zooms out, weaving the stories of the people involved in the search for him into a tapestry as richly imagined and fully realized as anything I’ve read in recent memory. Her sentences fit together with the beauty of fine carpentry, and with them she’s constructed a novel that calls to my mind no less than Patrick White’s The Tree of Man. I can’t think of another writer working today who I admire more.”—Kevin Powers, author of The Yellow Birds

“This tale of a farming community’s search for a missing child offers intimate human drama, ruminations on the intersections of art and life, and a sweeping, still relevant view of race and class in Australia . . . A masterpiece of riveting storytelling.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“The Sun Walks Down is a brilliant, intimate epic, a book about a family and also about history that is full of heart and heat. Fiona McFarlane's ear for the gurgles and clamor and hidden symphonies of her characters’ souls is flawless; the way their lives intertwine is propulsive, heartbreaking. She is, simply, one of the best writers around.”—Elizabeth McCracken, author of The Souvenir Museum and Bowlaway

descriptions

McFarlane’s descriptions were beyond imagination. Absolutely beautiful. So vivid that you feel you are there at sunset on the Australian Outback. Loved the characters. Thank you for such powerful literature!

Superb

A fabulous, and surprising picture of early Australian life for Europeans, and their encounters with aborigines.

Best (audio) Book ever!

Extraordinary writing and story, and extraordinarily well read. This is truly not to be missed. It’s the kind that, when you get to the end, you want to start all over.

Good

Enjoyed the book Liked learning about Australia. Liked the characters, the suspense, the reader. I recommended.It.

Lyrical Writing Style

Thoroughly enjoyed the narration. The narrator added to the lyrical way the author writes. The story had many character studies. In the end, there wasn’t any character that I identified with or even cared about their outcome.

Beautiful story, beautifully narrated

This story really lifts you out of the ordinary with engaging characters and a compelling plot. Really enjoyed

Don’t miss this book.

This is an exceptionally wonderful book in every way. And, Emma Jones was a perfect narrator!

Fanciful narrative

Mixture of personal relationships, mythical lore, religious fanaticism and mystery amidst an Australian setting. Couldn’t decide if I really enjoyed it, but couldn’t quit listening in order to see what would happen at the end.

Mrs Dalloway in the Outback

This novel is really an impressionistic painting. A moment in time captured with metaphors in a lovely accent. No plot, just portraits. Gently sedating. 

T.M.I. Too much information.

Each line may be beautifully written, but it contains bunny trails after bunny trails, after boring bunny trails. There are far too many unnecessary characters and backstories.