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Cold Justice, Katherine Howell30/01/2010 - 3:03pmIt's nearly impossible for a reader to understand what it must be like to write a series of books, based around the same characters. All we can do is be extremely grateful that writers like Katherine Howell can do it, book after book, maintaining the same high standard, giving us new stories, and new situations for the characters to appear in, keeping the series fresh and interesting all the time. Following on from FRANTIC and THE DARKEST HOUR, the third book COLD JUSTICE again simply does not miss a beat. Part of the reason that these books are so good is the shifting ... Read Review |
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All The Dead Voices, Declan Hughes12/01/2010 - 3:44pmGrant me a moment here, but Ed Loy is well and truly back and I'm more than a little bit happy about that! ALL THE DEAD VOICES is a really tense, investigative novel with a just a touch of the thriller about it. The action is swift, the tension carefully ramped up and the plot nicely complicated. The details are carefully laid out, allowing the reader to keep up, sort it out, decide for themselves, pick up the clues along the way. Provided you're concentrating. In 1980 two IRA men are hiding beside a roadway, ready to detonate the bomb destined to kill a hated judge ... Read Review |
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Cold Justice, Katherine Howell (review by sunniefromoz)12/01/2010 - 3:04pm“Write what you know” aspiring writers are often told. Katherine Howell has done that to good effect. She worked as a paramedic for many years and her detailed knowledge of both the job and the physical and emotional toll it takes are vividly portrayed. COLD JUSTICE is Katherine’s third book (the previous two are Frantic and The Darkest Hour) and her writing seems to get better and better . COLD JUSTICE not only has the fast pace of a thriller, it also has multiple threads which are gradually pulled together. Katherine is also a dab hand at knowing exactly when to change threads in ... Read Review |
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Dark Mirror, Barry Maitland (review by Sunnie Gill)10/01/2010 - 11:54amDARK MIRROR is a first rate police procedural. The author plays fair with the reader. The clues are all there, it's up to you to sort out which are red herrings and which are genuine. He also strikes a nice balanace between the private lives of the characters and their work. A good police procedural is one of my favourite types of books. If it's done properly it keeps you reading compulsively to find out if your theory is correct. I did manage to figure it out in the end, but not before I ran trough a number of suspects and changed my mind several times. If ... Read Review |
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Innocent Blood, Elizabeth Corley06/01/2010 - 12:49pmThere are some authors who just seem to be able to consistently turn out good books, ones that engage your attention, sometimes create some discomfort in the reader, but invariably make you think. Elizabeth Corley is one of those authors for me, I remember her books long after I've finished reading them. INNOCENT BLOOD continues the standard. DCI Fenwick's case - the Choir Boy investigations into a paedophile ring, was triggered by information from the USA, indicating that there is a paedophile ring operating in his area. This ring looks like it has been in existence ... Read Review |
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A Question of Power, Michelle Schwarz05/01/2010 - 1:11pmIn 2001, when a series of newspaper reports revealed that four women had accused Geoff Clark of rape I distinctly remember trying to follow the complicated legal and reporting machinations that were going on. I also distinctly remember feeling like I'd failed in that endeavour badly, but was never exactly sure why. Reading A QUESTION OF POWER gives you a distinct understanding of why this case was so complicated, so intense, so emotional. This book really is a fantastic example of investigative journalism, and ultimately, of the very best sort of true crime ... Read Review |
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Torn Apart, Peter Corris05/01/2010 - 1:06pmIt couldn't ever be said that the loss of his Private Investigator's licence has slowed Cliff Hardy down. In TORN APART, the death of his look-alike cousin in Cliff's house, an arrest for importing illegal drugs, a trip to Ireland, a gathering of Irish Traveller descendants, a brush with the spooks and a new woman don't even slow him down. But they do coincide to give him a moment or two's thought. Meeting Patrick - a second cousin he never knew about, a second cousin who is the absolute spitting image of him certainly does give Cliff something to think about. Not the ... Read Review |
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Dark Country, Bronwyn Parry02/01/2010 - 1:21pm
You'd be hard put to think of another mystery series, with a female protagonist that is set in the Australian outback so on this alone, perhaps author Brownyn Parry has chosen her setting and thus her market very well. We have somewhat of an old fashioned girl leading the action in this novel, and it A huge and not to be undersold appeal of Parry's novels is the picture they paint of small town Australia. Dungirri could be any one of hundreds ... Read Review |
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Flashforward, Robert J. Sawyer01/01/2010 - 1:53pmThe ABC tv series has prompted the re-release of the paperback but has little resemblance to the events of 2009 that Sawyer created. The best science fiction novels will always have you firmly believing in the writer's vision of our future world. It is a given that there will be some hellishly dire warning as to where humanity will head if it trips merrily along its current path of debauchery and selfishness. Science fiction offers up all the cool stuff like great technology and at best, grounds this reality from whatever stage of advancement the world is at as the ... Read Review |
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Forbidden Fruit, Kerry Greenwood16/12/2009 - 1:43pmFORBIDDEN FRUIT is the 5th book in the Corinna Chapman series by Australian author Kerry Greenwood (probably best known for her Phryne Fisher series). These books are set in modern day, inner Melbourne, are also on the cosier end of the scale. There are enough elements that coincide in both series to make fans of one feel somewhat comfortable in the other. Having never read any of the earlier books in this series, though, I can't comment on whether FORBIDDEN FRUIT is particularly representative, so I comment on it in isolation. Corrina is a woman who has turned to ... Read Review |
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My Life, Roberta Williams02/12/2009 - 1:51pmThe thing with reading a book like MY LIFE by Roberta Williams seems to be, to me at least, to remember that this isn't "yet another book about the Gangland Wars in Melbourne". It's a book about a specific person's life. In that I'm not reviewing her life, I'm reviewing a book she wrote. So I came to this book with a number of requirements in mind - did it feel like an honest portrayal of her life? Was this an attempt to put a positive spin on her involvement with some of the most well-known criminals in recent Melbourne history? How much did she know about what was ... Read Review |
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Lennox, Craig Russell24/11/2009 - 1:54pmCraig Russell is best known for his series of novels featuring Hamburg based detective Jan Fabel, but LENNOX is (it is reported) the first in a series of neo-noir styled novels, this one set in Glasgow, post World War II. Lennox is a Canadian ex-soldier who bears the psychological and physical scars of a brutal war, left with a skill set that makes him an ideal player in post-war, corrupt, grimy, dirty, mucky, violent Glasgow. Organised crime is establishing itself and at the centre of machinations are identical twins, Tam and Frankie McGahern. When Tam is murdered Lennox is "hired ... Read Review |
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Gangsters' Women, John Kerr20/11/2009 - 1:36pmGANGSTERS' WOMEN is one release in a series of "commuter true crime" books. Available via newsagencies and similar outlets, they are designed as quick little books - perfect for the train or tram journey home. Not bad for a Sunday night read as well! This book tells the story of a number of women who, for whatever reasons - and they vary woman to woman - choose to get involved / stay involved with Gangsters. A varied selection, including some well known Gangsters' Women - Roberta Williams, and the women of Terry Clark's drug organisation - now probably more generally ... Read Review |
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Ice Cold, Andrea Maria Schenkel (review by Sunnie Gill)08/11/2009 - 1:03pmSomehow the format that worked so well in "The Murder Farm" doesn't seem to have quite the same impact in ICE COLD. Whether it's because of the story of that the novelty of the unusual format isn't as fresh, I'm not sure. Perhaps it was the blurb on the book jacket which asked the question, "but is he really guilty?" It is a question that maybe leads to false expections about the ending. I found myself none the wiser at the end of the book than I did when I first opened it. It could be more the fault of the publicists and powers that be who decide what goes on the blurbs ... Read Review |
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Dead-End Road, Richard Kunzmann22/10/2009 - 2:15pmDEAD-END ROAD is third novel Detective Harry Mason novel from South African author Richard Kunzmann - the earlier books are BLOODY HARVESTS and SALAMANDER COTTON. It was the first of this series that I've read, and I'm not sure that was necessarily a wise move. It's been a couple of years since Harry's last outing and since then he has joined the elite Serious and Violent Crimes unit. They have been assigned to the investigation of the slaying of a minor politician and his family in a township west of Johannesburg. Unsolvable, until a tip sends the unit in pursuit of a ... Read Review |
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Born or Bred?, Robert Wainwright & Paola Totaro (review by Sunnie Gill)11/10/2009 - 12:38pmBORN OR BRED? began life as a book to tell Bryant's mother's story. However, unhappy at what the authors wanted to do, Carleen Bryant quickly pulled out of the project. By that time Wainwright and Totaro had become fascinated into trying to find if there was something in Bryant's past that would explain in inexplicable. They spoke to neighbours, friends, family, teachers; anyone who knew Bryant and his family willing to talk, trying to shed light on the man. All are interesting; some are revelatory. Probably the people who come closest to giving us an ... Read Review |
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Fifty Grand, Adrian McKinty23/09/2009 - 11:59amAdrian McKinty has an awful lot to answer for. Sitting down to read FIFTY GRAND, I thought this would be another good book from an author whose books I've increasing come to like. What I didn't expect was a nearly straight reading sitting, leaving the entire household making do with scratch meals, and the dogs threatening to pack their bags and leave home if meals and playtime didn't get back to normal pretty darn quick. FIFTY GRAND features a new character from McKinty, Cuban cop Mercado. There are some vague similarities to earlier books in plot location though - set ... Read Review |
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Death and the Running Patterer, Robin Adair17/09/2009 - 1:55pmDEATH AND THE RUNNING PATTERER is the book that won Penguin's last Most Wanted Crime Writing competition, and there's a comment in the acknowledgements that explain a little about the development of the book: "I owe a debt to Robert Sessions, Penguin Australia's Publishing Director, who overcame his initial shock at being confronted with a manuscript knocked out on an old manual typewriter...." The reason for highlighting this is that whilst reading DEATH AND THE RUNNING PATTERER was a very enjoyable overall experience, the book is made up of a series of ... Read Review |
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Bruno Chief of Police, Martin Walker19/08/2009 - 12:04pmIf you're not a fan of cosy style mysteries, you could be forgiven for missing BRUNO CHIEF OF POLICE. Don't be fooled by the cover photos, or the blurb which uses a comparison with a rather well known cosy writer though. BRUNO CHIEF OF POLICE is much more of a police procedural. Well it's a rural French procedural, so whilst there's a violent murder to be solved, there's also a very engaging central police character, a great sense of place, and meals to die for. Perhaps a comparison with Montalbano might have been more successful? Although it's still not quite accurate as Bruno ... Read Review |
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Burial, Neil Cross18/08/2009 - 1:10pmNeil Cross really knows how to put together a story. More importantly, in BURIAL, his second crime fiction novel, he's absolutely not afraid to write a very morally ambiguous central character. When Nathan meets up with journalist Bob again at a drug fuelled party at his bosses house, he did something incredibly stupid. He was young and restless but just maybe he wasn't the one that killed a young girl that night. Maybe she wasn't actually killed but just died in very wrong circumstances. He certainly had a part in covering up her death. Somehow that isn't the ... Read Review |