All the Reviews

Look Closer, Rachel Amphlett

A Thriller, LOOK CLOSER, is set in London against the backdrop of British Politics, but the scenario could be played out in any similar democracy.

When Will Fletcher's journalist girlfriend Amy is badly wounded in an assassination attempt on the likely next PM, nobody even imagines that the candidate wasn't the target. Especially Fletcher who suddenly finds himself in the position of target himself, with no real understanding of why or how his life took this turn. Or what, exactly Amy was doing at the time that she was shot.

In the tradition of all great ... Read Review

Every Move, Ellie Marney

The final book in the James Mycroft and Rachel Watts series starts and draws much to a close on the family farm Five Mile. Deep in the Mallee / Wimmera area of Victoria, first up, Rachel uses a short visit back to try to repair the mental damage that events in the middle book (EVERY WORD) inflicted. Then again the area is the setting for a very different purpose as the series concludes. It's also a chance for her brother Mike to bring his best mate Harris Derwent back to the city with them. 

Designated as Young Adult fiction, the "Every" series has always handled the ... Read Review

Gun Control, Peter Corris

The 40th book in the Cliff Hardy series, GUN CONTROL takes on a very current issue in the style that we've all come to expect from Peter Corris. It's worth taking a moment to consider that 40 book history. When Cliff Hardy first made an appearance on the Australian landscape (THE DYING TRADE, 1982), Crime Fiction had been working prolifically in the pulp fiction days (Carter Brown etc) for a very long time. Hardy, as a hard-boiled, quietly spoken, high action, take no crap from anybody type PI might have felt like a rather American "type". But Hardy was then, and has always been very ... Read Review

Left Luggage, Andrew Christie

LEFT LUGGAGE is the debut novel of Sydney based author Andrew Christie. Set mostly in and around Newtown and inner Sydney it combines an unlikely cast of central characters: John - an ex-Army house renovator; Betty - his Australian-born, French resident, famous war photographer mother; Billy – an abused and neglected young boy and Large – a gangster.

Categorised as a thriller, Left Luggage is a slow burner. The initial setup involves John bringing Betty (the names do look unfortunate when you put them like that) back from her beloved Paris to live in Sydney, in a ... Read Review

Follow the Leader, Mel Sherratt

The second book in the DS Allie Shenton series, FOLLOW THE LEADER is not impeded in any way by not having read the earlier novel.

Whilst many fans of crime fiction will take one look at the blurb and groan "not another serial killer", this one deserves a second look. This serial killer kind of makes sense - in a decidedly uncomfortable manner.

In another possibly groan inducing moment, readers will also find themselves spending time in the head of this killer. A viewpoint that's used here to illuminate the killings, their circumstances, and more importantly, ... Read Review

Riding in Cars with Girls, Evangeline Jennings

It's a such a simple idea when you think of it, take a standard noir setting, with added muscle cars, old cars, fast cars and gorgeous cars, and replace the male characters with female ones. It makes enormous sense to me, especially as I grew up in a country town where girls driving hotted up cars, and hanging around hotted up cars was pretty common. Granted there was a bit of dating of boys driving hotted up cars as well - but really we could have just had all those cars to ourselves.

Evangeline Jennings does a good job of building up her dark and dangerous settings and ... Read Review

The Agatha Christie Book Club, C.A. Larmer

Written for fans of cosy styled, more light-hearted mystery stories, THE AGATHA CHRISTIE BOOK CLUB will ring many bells in any readers who are also dedicated Agatha Christie readers. Set in Sydney, the ACBC is formed by Alicia Finlay when she finally has to throw in the towel on a more formal (aka stuffy) literature based book club (personal note - if you TRIED to hold off the wine and cheese at our book club meetings you'd be laughed out the door!).

Those dedicated fans of Agatha Christie will recognise many of the scenarios, clues and hints dotted throughout this ... Read Review

Land of Shadows, Rachel Howzell Hall

Having been a bit of a fan of one of her earlier books - NO ONE KNOWS YOU'RE HERE - the chance to read LAND OF SHADOWS was gratefully accepted (courtesy of NetGalley). Set in Los Angeles, with another strong, flawed, believable and extremely likeable central female protagonist this writer has a fabulous way of making that world come alive. There's a strong sense of place, particularly in this book, set as it is in that sort of fringe world between deprived communities and incoming gentrification, stalled because of economic downturn and malaise. Add to that a couple of very different ... Read Review

The Mister Rainbow series

This gloriously retro private eye series is purely for fun. 

Crime fiction tends, in the main, to take itself very seriously. Murder after all, isn’t a laughing matter, and the exploration of who did what to whom sometimes demands the playing of a very straight bat. That’s not to say that there aren’t excellent examples of comic crime fiction, many of which, for some reason, include a rather hefty hat-tip to the classic, early PI-style novels. The use of that scenario does mean that the author can move away from the sort of gallows humour that characters ... Read Review