Sins of The Fathers
John Byrnes | Paperback | July 2025
The brothers, the girl next door, a score to settle. In the early years of the twentieth century, Billy and Tommy Smith are growing up on the mean streets of Sydney's Millers Point. It's a hungry, hard-scrabble life, made even worse when their violent father returns home from a long stint in prison. The girl next door, Angeline Dubois, is an ambitious young woman running a small boarding house down at The Point. Circumstances beyond her control threaten to derail her big dreams for the future. In the wealthy eastern suburbs, Charles Davies is living an entirely different life, the beneficiary of his father's business acumen and insatiable, unyielding greed. Charles wants for nothing - except perhaps his father's approval. When an incident on The Point leads to the deaths of both Charles' and the Smith boys' fathers, a hatred is born that will follow the three men through their lives. In an epic saga taking them from Sydney to Gallipoli and the killing fields of France in World War I, to the melting pot of Darwin and the opal fields at Lightning Ridge, the men's paths all lead to one final destination: revenge. But in the end, what price must be paid for the sins of the fathers?
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Author Info
John Byrnes has worked bars and doors in pubs and clubs all over Australia, on fishing trawlers out of Darwin, and served in the Australian Army. Eventually, John put on a tie and studied economics, working for the Sydney Futures Exchange, Deutsche Bank and in financial services until 2023.
John started writing in 2015 and has a fascination with the darker aspects of the human condition; the addicted, the malevolent, the scarred. He cheers for the outsider, the slacker, the contrarian, the non-conformist.
Born in Sydney, John now lives on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales with his wife and three children.
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Customer Reviews
Disclaimer: I’m already a fan. I’ve read the author’s previous work and was impressed at once. From contemporary crime fiction, ‘Headland’; to the WWII and Great Depression saga ‘The Youngest Son’; this latest epic takes place during World War I and the years preceding.
The writing is sophisticated, assured. John has honed his style – and it’s magnificent.
If you’re after gritty realism, then you’ve come to the right place. Brace yourself for graphic battlefield scenes; confronting social crises; and a dash of searing eroticism for good measure. Expect also, moments of raw tenderness and understated poignancy. John’s ability to describe the full gamut of human sensibility, and to explore the dark corners and jagged edges of humanity, is undeniable.
Each character feels like they existed as part of history …of course they didn’t – but fictional characters are a reflection of ourselves in some way or another. The lead female, Angeline Dubois, is spectacular… She’s actually everything I ever wanted to be: Precocious, resilient, self-made – not made by her lot. Oh, and she’s hot as ****.
When you pick up a John Byrnes novel, the immersion is swift and affecting. This one is about as cinematic as it gets – brilliant imagery, universal relevance, and a captivating plot. It paints a picture of an era that was different in many ways…but the more you read, the more you realise that the ways of people; their motivations and struggles – mostly stay the same.
I suspect that SINS OF THE FATHERS will live in the hearts and minds of readers long after they’ve closed the book.
Reviewed by Eve Stephenson
(Brisbane, Queensland)
IG @evielou81
