UFO (Unavoidable Family Outings)

Multi-talented Dave Hackett (aka Cartoon Dave)’s first novel is a crazy, hilarious whodunit.
The novel’s narrator is an unnamed would-be writer, whose hapless, Morris-minor-driving father has decided to take the family on a driving holiday to Cape York (the pointy bit at the top of Australia). The family consists of Mum, Dad, older sisters Jessica and Sal, and the narrator (known only by his many nicknames, e.g. ‘Brainiac Boy’).

Jessica is madly in love with her boyfriend, BRAD (he prefers all caps), who she text-messages ad nauseum. Sal and ‘Brainiac Boy’ make constant fun of her, even after Jessica receives an SMS telling her that BRAD’s been kidnapped and they must deliver the ransom money to ‘The Point’ or else.

But which point?

Meanwhile, ‘Brainiac Boy’ is down to the serious business of writing a novel, The Cat from Darktown, but is finding his very cute detective protagonist, a kitten called Twinkie, at odds with the crime-thriller genre he is attempting.

Will Jessica ever see BRAD alive again? Will Brainiac Boy sort out his composition conundrum? Will Dad get the family to Cape York? Will Twinkie ever actually solve a crime?

All this, plus car breakdowns, weird, bearded men, detours to Tamworth, Surfers Paradise and Stonehenge.