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In Her Blood, Annie Hauxwell09/05/2012 - 1:18pmWhilst it's not particularly unusual to have a flawed central protagonist, unapologetic ones are less common. Add being female, and that makes IN HER BLOOD's Catherine Berlin a rather rare beast, and a very welcome one. Set in London after the Global Financial meltdown, Berlin is a government investigator who receives a tip-off about a local loan shark, then finds her informant floating in the Limehouse Basin, brutally killed. The first complication is that her female informant has been anonymous, and even the police seem to have trouble identifying her. The second ... Read Review |
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Silent Valley, Malla Nunn01/05/2012 - 4:50pmThe Emmanuel Cooper books by Malla Nunn, set in 1950's South Africa, are another excellent series in what is luckily now becoming a bigger range of crime fiction set in various parts of Africa. SILENT VALLEY (aka BLESSED ARE THE DEAD) is the third book now, centred around Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper, a policeman with plenty of demons from his past. Knowing that his past is closely intertwined with a society based on Apartheid will help the reader understand some of the difficulties that Cooper faces, just as understanding the intrinsic brutality of that system will give his ... Read Review |
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Poet's Cottage, Josephine Pennicott13/04/2012 - 2:56pmJosephine Pennicott has written three dark fantasy novels, and won three Scarlet Stiletto Awards from the Sisters in Crime Australia, so it's no surprise that her latest offering, POET'S COTTAGE has a little of the sensibility of both genres. Set in the small, fictional town of Pencubbit in Tasmania, POET'S COTTAGE is really a story about generational memory. Sadie, and her teenage daughter move to Poet's Cottage after Sadie's mother Marguerite dies. The house, childhood home to Marguerite and her older sister Thomasina, and their parents Pearl and Maxwell is also the ... Read Review |
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Promise, Tony Cavanaugh04/04/2012 - 4:33pmI think it would be fair to say that PROMISE by Tony Cavanaugh has been talked up in these parts. Having read the book now, you can see many of the reasons for the general feeling of enthusiasm, although to be fair, the central storyline of this book is going to be problematic for some readers. In Darian Richards, Cavanaugh has created a very interesting central character. Retired head of Victoria's Homicide Squad, shooting victim, not everything is immediately as it seems with Richards. A hard working cop with the victims and their families at the forefront of his mind ... Read Review |
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After the Darkness, Honey Brown20/03/2012 - 3:49pmThe problem I had with an earlier book of Honey Brown's was that whilst the thriller aspects of the book really worked, I was less convinced by the post-apocalyptic scenario and the happy ever after ending. AFTER THE DARKNESS solved those personal prejudices, and presented me with a thriller that worked on just about every level. I just love thrillers that make the hair on the back of my neck stand up, that present a scenario that's unexpected, quietly disconcerting and extremely worrying. Particularly where the tension ramps up, the outcome's not immediately apparent, ... Read Review |
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Say You're Sorry, Michael Robotham15/03/2012 - 6:50pmWhen SAY YOU'RE SORRY was announced I promised myself that this time - straight to the top of the pile. After all, what's not to look forward to - a solid police procedural with a psychological aspect, written by an Australian, set in the United Kingdom. One of the tricks of this series is that Robotham is switching the main viewpoint around between a couple of central protagonists - ex-cop Vincent Ruiz and clinical psychologist, Joe O'Loughlin. Now at a pinch I'd have to say that Ruiz is my favourite of these two characters, but that's not to say that O'Loughlin isn't also a strong ... Read Review |
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Die Twice, Andrew Grant14/03/2012 - 1:53pmI probably should sit down and give a detailed, reasoned and careful analysis of DIE TWICE by Andrew Grant. But can I just go with "I really liked this book". Because "I really liked this book". I'm not sure why to be frank. Perhaps it was the structure - I liked the opening of chapters laying out a principle that the central character David Trevellyan learnt in basic training, which he then went on to demonstrate. Perhaps it was the level of action which was fast paced, tight and very nicely done. Perhaps it was the character of David Trevellyan, a bit of a later ... Read Review |
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Huckstepp: A Dangerous Life, John Dale09/03/2012 - 1:33pmLooking back at the life, and death in 1986 of Sallie-Anne Huckstepp there's a sense of inevitability about her destiny, a long time before she went on television to accuse NSW detectives of shooting her boyfriend in cold blood. HUCKSTEPP is an excellent book of its type - part biography, part investigation into Huckstepp, and her death, the book looks honestly at Sallie-Anne herself, as well as the crooks, cops and colleagues that she had close contact with over her life. Given that there's never been an answer to who killed Huckstepp, this book seems to come as close ... Read Review |
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Partners & Crime, Rochelle Jackson06/03/2012 - 1:42pm"What was it like for Mary-Ann Hodge to be married to Mark 'Chopper' Read? How was Joe Korp's former girlfriend Tania Herman persuaded to try to kill his wife Maria? And why did hairdresser Sylvia Bruno fall for Melbourne gangland killer Nikolai 'The Bulgarian' Radev?" Why on earth was I reading a book on this subject matter? There was a not inconsiderable part of me that was wondering if I was rapidly tipping right over into some sort of voyeur. Although, the chapter about Tania Herman seemed to be going to answer something that never really came out at the time of the ... Read Review |
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The Man From Beijing, Henning Mankell06/03/2012 - 11:55amTHE MAN FROM BEIJING is a standalone book from the author of the popular Kurt Wallender series, and if the discussions I've seen about it are any indication, it's guaranteed to polarise opinion. Set in Hesjövallen, where something very very bad has happened, police are called to the village by researcher, Karsten Höglin, who arrived in the town to find that this quiet, mostly deserted little village in Sweden is the scene of a massacre. Judge Brigitta Roslin has an unexpected connection to this place, when she discovers that two of the victims are her mother' ... Read Review |
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A Dissection of Murder, Felicity Young29/02/2012 - 5:29pmA DISSECTION OF MURDER is the first in a series of books from Western Australian author Felicity Young. Set in London at the turn of the twentieth Century, featuring Dr Dody McCleland, the first female autopsy surgeon, the action in this book takes place in the midst of the Suffragette struggle, with the crime being investigated the death of a prominent suffragette during a rally that turned particularly violent. More historical crime fiction, in other words. Not so long ago I'd have been dodging this particular sub-genre. Particularly when it comes with a hefty mixing ... Read Review |
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Too Rich, Melissa Chan28/02/2012 - 1:22pmLittle housework first - Melissa Chan is a pseudonym for Dr Jocelynne Scutt, Australian feminist lawyer, writer and commentator. TOO RICH was published in 1991 by Spinifex Press, and I distinctly remember when reading it originally at the time of publication, feeling somewhat "cause battered" by the end of the book. Re-reading it again, some observations remained constant, some became more finely attuned with the passing years. The constant is that whilst nobody could possibly object to the righteousness of the feminist message being delivered, particularly given the ... Read Review |
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Liquid Gold, James Phelan28/02/2012 - 12:57pmI've enjoyed the Lachlan Fox series, but I will admit to having read them way out of order. That doesn't seem to have mattered until LIQUID GOLD, which had me more than a little befuddled, and I'm suspicious it might be because I've missed the book immediately before it in the series. LIQUID GOLD has a fantastic, and pertinent premise - the idea that water is to the 21st century, what oil was to the 20th. As the book opens, central character, investigative journalist, ex Australian Navy Clearance diver, graduate of the Australian Defence Forces Academy, hero of the ... Read Review |
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Reflection of Evil, Bridgette Powell25/02/2012 - 2:55pmREFLECTION OF EVIL by Bridgette Powell is a book flagged as Forensic Science united with Spirituality in a spine chilling murder mystery novel. So right up front I should just say I wasn't particularly convinced. I'm not a fan of this type of cross-over, not being a welded-on fan of the supernatural or metaphysical. Having said that, because I'm a reader and can therefore be a somewhat tricky prospect, I number amongst my favourite books a few that fall exactly into this category. So, long story short, I'll now have a go at this sort of thing, whereas once upon a time I would have ... Read Review |
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The Double Life of Herman Rockefeller, Hilary Bonney24/02/2012 - 12:49pmWhilst nobody deserves to die for sexual activities between consenting adults that could be regarded as unsavoury, THE DOUBLE LIFE OF HERMAN ROCKEFELLER says a lot about the causes of this man's death, and all of the participants in the whole sorry, mucky mess. Herman Rockefeller was killed in January 2010, after a rendezvous at the home of Bernadette Denny, where he had gone, a second time, for sex. He died, it seems, because he lied about his circumstances and therefore his motives, and because the two people found guilty of his manslaughter - Denny and her boyfriend ... Read Review |
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No-One Loves a Policeman, Guillermo Orsi23/02/2012 - 7:56pmI came away from this book with a very strong sense of a culture that is profoundly different from my own, despite the idea that the main character Pablo Martelli seems to spend as much time driving great distances as we do. I also came away from this book with a profound sense of confusion. To this day, I'm really not sure what on earth was going on, I'm not even 100% that Martelli knew what was happening, and there were points when I wondered aloud if the author had the slightest idea what was supposed to be happening as well. I won't be at all surprised to hear that ... Read Review |
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The Devil's Edge, Stephen Booth22/02/2012 - 3:23pmMany fans of Stephen Booth's Fry and Cooper series seem to fall into the pro or anti DS Diane Fry camp pretty firmly. Those in the anti camp may take heart from the fact that she's slightly less present in this book, not making an appearance until later in proceedings. There's also a shift in the power imbalance as Cooper has finally been promoted to the same rank of Detective Sergeant, managing his own team as part of a bigger investigation into a series of home invasions which seem to have culminated in a brutal local murder. It's been a while since I caught back up ... Read Review |
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Blacklands, Belinda Bauer22/02/2012 - 1:51pmWhilst reading BLACKLANDS by Belinda Bauer it was a bit hard to get your head around the idea that this was a debut novel. it's so assured It wasn't at all surprising to find it had won a CWA Gold Dagger. It's the story of how the very determined, engaging and just a bit naive Steven Lamb decides to sort out the mess in his family. As the blurb puts it: "Dear Mr Avery I am looking for WP. Can you help me? Sincerely SL, 111 Barnstaple Road, Shipcott, Somerset. He was only twelve, he reasoned: he couldn't ... Read Review |
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Red Queen, H.M. (Honey) Brown21/02/2012 - 2:09pmApocalyptic scenarios are not my favourite thing. To be frank, a pandemic world-wide threat from a mutant viruses wasn't making me feel a desperate urge to read RED QUEEN. I've been shuffling other books over it in the priority queue for quite a while. But eventually, you've just got to stop sooking about these things and get on with reading. There was some confusion in my mind about exactly what "category" this novel falls into. It won an Aurealis award for Best Horror Novel, but I'd heard comments that indicated that the book, despite the apocalyptic setting, was ... Read Review |
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The Sinner, Petra Hammesfahr21/02/2012 - 10:56amAs you can tell from the blurb, THE SINNER is a whydunnit, as opposed to a whodunnit book, although that's way too simplistic a description. When Cora Bender stabs a man to death in front of family, friends, and a crowded park, nobody realises that she was originally planning to commit suicide. Bender is obviously not in a good place in her life, despite outward appearances. Rejected wholeheartedly by her husband immediately after the attack, it seems an open-and-shut case, which may only be mitigated by a plea of insanity. Except that Rudolf Grovian senses something behind Frau ... Read Review |