Fast Lanes & Fatal games How Fords, Holdens, and Hiluxes Drive the Drama in Aussie Crime Fiction- Mortice: Double Tap

Declassified
Written By AJ Wilton

If you want to understand Australia, forget Vegemite, koalas, and Crocodile Dundee. Look at the cars.
From the Ford Falcon to the Toyota Hilux, our roads tell stories — of battlers, bogans, tradies, and cops on the tail of blokes who should’ve quit while they were ahead. And in crime fiction, these cars aren’t just background noise. They’re moving characters, engines of escape and identity, roaring across novels just like they do across Bathurst’s Mount Panorama.

A.J. Wilton’s Double Tap, the latest Mortice novel, gets this dead right. When Mort describes a Toyota Hilux parked “half on the kerb, half on the lawn like it owned the street” (p. 112), you know exactly the type of bloke who drives it. Cars in Double Tap aren’t window dressing — they’re cultural signposts. And in Australia, every make and model comes with baggage heavier than a boot full of XXXX Gold.

Why Cars Matter in Australian Crime Fiction

In the US, you think “muscle car” and picture a Mustang growling down Route 66. In Australia, we’ve got our own automotive mythology — equal parts gritty, practical, and ridiculous. Cars here are shorthand for class, culture, and intent.

That’s why crime fiction leans on them. Mort knows when a Holden Commodore creeps past at 2 a.m., it’s not a mum driving home from footy training. When a Nissan Patrol shows up in the bush, you know someone’s going off-road — maybe for pigs, maybe for bodies.

As Mort quips: “People lie, but their cars rarely do.”

Why Cars Matter in Australian Crime Fiction

Ford Falcon: From Bathurst Hero to Getaway Villain

The Ford Falcon is as Aussie as meat pies and arguments about who makes the best meat pies. It ruled the Bathurst 1000 for decades, became the default police cruiser, and the hoon’s choice of getaway car.

In Double Tap, Mort spots one idling outside a servo, “paint flaking, exhaust rattling like it had a death rattle” (p. 87). To the untrained eye, it’s just a beater. To Mort, it’s a clue: blokes who run in Falcons usually don’t have Plan B.

Culturally, the Falcon carries split reputations:

  • Working-class hero — the car that got tradies to job sites and families to the coast.

  • Bathurst royalty — a fan-warrior in the Ford vs Holden rivalry that divided households tighter than religion.

  • Cop and crim crossover — when the same car is used by Highway Patrol and getaway drivers, you know it’s embedded in the culture.

As auto journalist Toby Hagon put it, “The Falcon wasn’t just a car. It was a badge of identity” .

Holden Commodore: The Family Car with a Not-So-Family Reputation

If the Falcon was Ford’s blue-collar hammer, the Commodore was Holden’s crowbar. Officially, it was the family sedan. Unofficially, it was the hoon’s chariot — a car with P-plates hanging off the back window and burnout marks in its wake.

In Double Tap, Mort clocks one outside a dodgy pub: “Headlights fogged over, backseat full of takeaway boxes — I didn’t need to see the driver to know the story” (p. 204).

The Commodore defined Aussie streets for decades. It was cheap, easy to fix, and had enough grunt to do a burnout in Coles’ carpark. But it also became the official police car, making it the perfect double agent: family-friendly by day, felony-friendly by night.

Cultural flashpoints:

  • Bathurst battles — Holden vs Ford, with Commodore fans treating the mountain like holy ground.

  • Cop car credibility — when the Commodore wore lights on the roof, you knew you were cooked.

  • Suburban icon — more likely to have a baby seat in the back and a slab in the boot.

Mort’s take? “If you want to know who someone is, check if their Commodore’s hubcaps match. Odds are they don’t.”

Toyota Hilux: The Tough Guy of the Outback and the Underworld

The Hilux is Australia’s most indestructible car. Clarkson and the Top Gear lads famously tried to kill one — set it on fire, drowned it, dropped it from a tower — and it still started. Aussies didn’t need proof. We already knew.

In Double Tap, the Hilux shows up like an extra character: “It wasn’t parked, it was planted — half the street gave way just to let it rest its tyres” (p. 113). That one sentence tells you: this isn’t a hatchback. This is a declaration of dominance.

The Hilux is the tradie’s warhorse, the farmer’s companion, the outlaw’s battering ram. If you see one with roo bars and a snorkel, don’t ask questions — just assume whatever’s in the tray isn’t going on Gumtree.

Culturally:

  • Workhorse legend — in 2023, it was still the top-selling car in Australia .

  • Symbol of toughness — tied to bush survival, mining towns, and blokes who think “weekend away” means pig-hunting.

  • Dark side — globally, Hiluxes have shown up in conflict zones, cementing their reputation as vehicles of choice when you don’t plan on breaking down .

Mort sums it up: “You don’t own a Hilux. It owns you.”

Nissan Patrol & the Bush-Bashers: When 4WDs Mean Survival

The Nissan Patrol is the Hilux’s less-famous cousin — a beast built for bush-bashing. In Double Tap, one rumbles onto the page: “It came at me slow, headlights off, engine growling low — like a crocodile pretending it wasn’t interested” (p. 231).

Cultural weight:

  • Bush hero — Patrols and LandCruisers dominate remote Australia. If you don’t have one, you don’t make it back.

  • Club wars — Patrol vs Cruiser debates rage on forums with more venom than Ford vs Holden.

  • Crim’s cover — in crime fiction, a Patrol in the bush means no one’s around to hear the shovel hit dirt.

Mort’s dry aside: “No one buys a Patrol for the city. Unless their postcode is ‘paranoia.’”

Cultural Car Moments That Shaped Australia’s Perceptions

Cultural Car Moments That Shaped Australia’s Perceptions

Why do these reputations stick? Because cars are more than metal. They’re cultural shorthand.

  • The Ford vs Holden wars: Decades of Bathurst rivalry split families, suburbs, and even towns. “Ford people” and “Holden people” weren’t just fans — they were tribes .

  • Police chases on the news: Commodores and Falcons became the stars of nightly TV when hoons used them to outrun cops — usually badly.

  • Hilux ads: Toyota’s “Unbreakable” campaign locked the Hilux into the Aussie psyche as the tradie’s Excalibur.

  • Patrol vs Cruiser in the bush: Online forums still rage with threads about which one will survive a trek from Darwin to Alice. Spoiler: both will. The Camry won’t.

These cultural touchstones bleed into fiction because they bleed into real life.

How Double Tap Uses Cars as Characters

Wilton knows his audience. Every time Mort mentions a car, it’s not filler. It’s forensic.

  • The Falcon outside the servo signals desperation.

  • The Commodore by the pub signals trouble.

  • The Hilux signals dominance.

  • The Patrol signals someone’s going bush, and it isn’t for sightseeing.

Cars in Double Tap are clues, misdirections, and metaphors. They’re as much a part of the crime landscape as guns, alleys, and body bags.

Mort himself puts it best: “Engines tell better lies than people. At least you can hear them coming.”

Final Thoughts: Engines of Culture, Crime, and Character

Australian crime fiction doesn’t need Maseratis or Lambos. It’s got Falcons, Commodores, Hiluxes, and Patrols — cars that tell you exactly who’s behind the wheel before they even step out.

Double Tap nails this cultural truth: in Australia, cars aren’t just transport. They’re identity. They’re class. They’re menace and myth, all rolled into steel and petrol fumes.

So next time you crack open a Mortice novel, pay attention to the cars. They’re telling you the story before the suspects do.

DOWNLOAD THE FIRST CHAPTER OF MORTICE: YOU KILLED MY WIFE TODAY

References

AJ Wilton
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