Drylands is set in a small, dying town in central Queensland, Australia. The town is called Drylands, and it is a place where very little seems to grow or improve. The land is dry, the businesses are failing, and many people are either leaving or wishing they could leave. The story does not move like a single adventure plot. Instead, it follows several people connected to Drylands, showing what happens in their lives and how the town affects them.
The novel begins with Janet Deakin, a widow who runs the local newsagency. She lives in a flat above the shop after the death of her husband, Ted. Janet sells newspapers, magazines, and books, but almost nobody in the town is interested in buying books. People are more interested in television, drinking, gossip, and daily survival. Janet spends a lot of time watching the town from her shop and thinking about the people who pass through it. She decides to write a book for “the world’s last reader,” because she feels that reading itself is disappearing.
From Janet’s point of view, the reader begins to understand Drylands as a tired and unhappy place. The town is full of people who feel stuck. Some are angry, some are lonely, and some are simply worn down. Janet’s story works like a frame for the rest of the novel. After her introduction, the book moves into the lives of different characters in and around Drylands. These stories are connected by the same town and by the same feeling that life there is becoming harder to continue.
One of the people connected to the town is Franzi Massig. His story shows a man trying to deal with official systems and frustrating bureaucracy. He is caught in a world where paperwork, rules, and authority make ordinary life difficult. His experience adds to the picture of Drylands as a place where people have little control over what happens to them. Franzi’s life does not lead to a clean solution. Like many characters in the novel, he is left feeling defeated by systems larger than himself.
The novel then moves to Evie, a writing teacher. Evie is connected to the idea of writing and storytelling. Her story is important because she is one of the characters who still thinks about words, books, and imagination. At the same time, her presence makes the novel more complicated, because it becomes unclear at points who is writing whose story. Janet may be writing about people like Evie, but Evie also seems capable of imagining someone like Janet. This gives the story a layered feeling, but in plot terms, Evie is another person connected to Drylands who is trying to make sense of a place where stories and reading no longer seem valued.
Another major story follows Jim Randler, a farmer who has spent much of his life trying to survive on dry, difficult land. Jim has inherited land that gives him very little reward. Farming has become a burden rather than a dream. He is tired of the drought, the failure, and the feeling that his life has been wasted. His neighbour’s teenage son, Toff, is also part of this section. Through Jim and Toff, the novel shows both an older man worn down by the land and a younger person growing up in a place that offers very little future. Jim dreams of leaving the dry inland and going to the coast, where he imagines water, boats, and a different life.
The story of Benny Shoforth introduces another painful part of Drylands. Benny is an Aboriginal man who carries a buried family secret. He becomes involved in a conflict over land when a corrupt councilman wants to push him out of his home. Benny’s story is not just about personal hardship; it also shows how power works in the town. People with influence can take advantage of those who are more vulnerable. Benny’s situation becomes another example of how Drylands traps people and forces them into loss.
The novel also follows Lannie Cunneen, a housewife who has spent years serving her husband and sons. Lannie’s life is exhausting and repetitive. She cooks, cleans, and works for her family, but she receives little affection or respect in return. Over time, she becomes overwhelmed by the emptiness of her daily routine. Her story builds toward a decision to leave. Lannie’s departure becomes one of the moments in the novel where a character actively tries to escape the life Drylands has forced on her.
Another important character is Joss, a frightened barmaid connected to the pub life of the town. The pub is one of the main gathering places in Drylands, but it is not a comforting place. It is linked with drinking, rough behaviour, and male aggression. Joss’s story shows the fear and danger that women experience in this environment. Her life in Drylands is shaped by threat, watchfulness, and the need to survive around men who may turn violent.
As these different stories unfold, Janet remains the figure who connects the larger picture. She continues to observe the town and think about what it has become. Her newsagency stands in the middle of a place where books are unwanted and people are losing interest in imagination. The stories of Franzi, Evie, Jim, Toff, Benny, Lannie, and Joss show different kinds of defeat, but they all belong to the same dry world.
By the later part of the novel, many characters either leave Drylands or are forced toward leaving. The town cannot give them safety, hope, money, or a future. Jim dreams of the coast. Lannie leaves domestic servitude behind. Benny is pushed out. Others also drift away from the town because life there becomes impossible to sustain. Drylands does not collapse in one dramatic event; instead, it slowly empties out through disappointment, failure, and escape.
The ending returns to the feeling that Janet began with: Drylands is a town where something human has almost disappeared. Janet’s attempt to write for the last reader does not save the town. It does not turn the people into readers or rebuild the community. But it does record their lives. The novel ends with Drylands still dry, damaged, and declining. The people’s stories remain as fragments of a town that is losing its future.
Drylands is the story of a dying Australian town and the people trying to survive inside it. Janet Deakin begins the novel by writing from her newsagency. The rest of the book follows different residents whose lives are shaped by drought, poverty, violence, loneliness, and the desire to escape. By the end, the town has not changed for the better. Instead, most characters realise they must leave, or they remain trapped in a place that has almost nothing left to offer.
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