Investigative journalist John Bailey is doing his best to turn his life around after losing the woman he loved. He has a new job. He’s given up the drink. He even has a dog.
But then Federal Police raid his home with a warrant granting them unprecedented powers to take anything they want, including all his electronic devices and passwords. When Bailey protests, they threaten to put him in a prison cell.
Someone wants to stop Bailey doing what he does best – exposing the truth. He has been investigating the rise of a global white supremacist group and suspects that a notorious neo-Nazi in the United States has been directing deadly racist attacks on Sydney’s streets.
When the body of one of his key sources washes up on a nearby beach, it’s clear Bailey and anyone helping him have become targets. Bailey reaches out to a ruthless old friend – CIA veteran Ronnie Johnson – to lure the enemy from the shadows.
An enemy who thought they were untouchable. Until now…
Tim Ayliffe is a Managing Editor for ABC News who uses more than twenty years’ worth of experience as a journalist to write global crime thrillers that ‘explore some of the harder truths about our world.’ Stan Grant has said of him: ‘As a correspondent, I lived this world. Tim Ayliffe has written it.’ Ayliffe’s previous two novels, The Greater Good and State of Fear, were both big hits with BR readers. Now he’s back with the third instalment in his gripping John Bailey series, The Enemy Within. But don’t be dismayed if you haven’t read the first two books in the series as The Enemy Within can easily be read as a standalone.
Taking place after the events of State of Fear, The Enemy Within follows former war correspondent turned investigative journalist John Bailey as he journeys into the murky world of white extremism and far-right nationalism. Unlike the previous two instalments, which featured an international locale, The Enemy Within is set in Sydney during the 2020 bushfire season. The gritty streets of the Inner City and Inner West give the story a familiar feel, while the devastating bushfires form a symbolic backdrop for the terrible, racially motivated attacks that are also plaguing the city.
As always, Bailey makes for an engaging, rough-around-the-edges protagonist who doggedly pursues the truth at all costs. Ayliffe’s experience as a journalist shines through here as he gives the reader a look into the exciting and at times dangerous world of an investigative journalist. A number of the incidents that take place in the novel are actually based on real-life events, such as the rise in far-right fanaticism and the Australian Federal Police’s raid on the ABC headquarters in 2019.
In The Enemy Within, Ayliffe has blended a brilliantly crafted political thriller with a timely look into the weighty topics of far-right extremism and freedom of the press. This is yet another cracking read from Ayliffe.
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