This is a passionate, driven novel whose main character, the flinty but vulnerable Snip Freeman, has stayed with me long after I finished the book. Gemmell's voice is vivid and poetic, unlike any other I have read. I couldn't put the novel down. It was facinating to read about a place so foreign as the Australian desert, and the central sequence where the protagonists are stranded and running out of time is wonderfully handled. I can imagine this book having a huge fan base, particularly among the sort of readers who loved "The Beach." Powerful stuff.