San Francisco, 1856. Irish-born James ‘Yankee’ Sullivan is being held in jail by the Committee of Vigilance, which aims to rout the Australian criminals from the town. As Sullivan’s mistress seeks his release and as his fellow prisoners are taken away to be hanged, the convict tells a story...Read more
It’s 1918, in a Wellington that few people would recognise today, and two major events are about to the signing of the Armistice to end World War I, and the soldier-borne plague we now call the Spanish flu. Into this comes Wellington's only female lawyer, leading her group of Sapphist...Read more
Out in that country the sun smeared the sky and nothing ever altered, except that one day a scrap man came by . . .
Her name is scarcely known or remembered. All in all, she is worth less than the nine shillings and sixpence counted into her father’s hand. She bides her time. She...Read more
Hans Bengler, a young entomologist, leaves Sweden for the Kalahari Desert, determined to find a previously undiscovered insect to name after himself and advance his career. Instead, he finds a young boy, whose tribe has been decimated by European raiders. Accustomed to collecting specimens...Read more
It's January 1943. Australia is at war and Perth is buzzing.
US troops have permanently docked in the city in what local men refer to bitterly as the American occupation, and Perth women are having the time of their lives. The Americans have money, accents like movie stars,...Read more
1943 is a dangerous time to fall in love...
In wartime Melbourne loose lips sink ships, so when Australian Women's Army sergeant Stella Aldridge overhears soldiers whispering about a revenge killing, she follows her instincts to investigate, despite finding herself drawn to one...Read more
1943 - Winton, Southland, New Zealand. Marine Randolph Harrington, the charismatic and handsome saxophonist of a visiting United States Marines jazz band, is found murdered by the banks of the Oreti River.Read more
After surviving an assassination attempt in Sydney, HRH Prince Alfred, accompanied by his pet baby elephant, Tom, arrives in colonial New Zealand in 1870. The authorities are on high alert as there are Fenian troubles in the goldfields.Read more
In a secret chamber uncovered by a fire that nearly destroys the nineteenth-century chapel at Archangels University, architect Harriet Darling finds a skull. The police have a body and murderer in mind, and on campus, rumours are rife. But Harriet wants to save the chapel from further harm...Read more
Seven prisoners escape from Westhofen concentration camp. Seven crosses are erected in the grounds and the commandant vows to capture the fugitives within a week. Six men are caught quickly, but George Heisler slips through his pursuers' fingers and it becomes a matter of pride to track him...Read more
Why would someone bury a bucket of precious jewels and gemstones and never return?
Present Day. When respected American jewelry historian, Kate Kirby, receives a call about the Cheapside jewels, she knows she’s on the brink of the experience of a lifetime...Read more
It's 1863, and Melbourne is transitioning from a fledgling colony to a thriving, gold-fuelled metropolis. But behind its shiny new façade, the real Melbourne can be found in the notorious red-light district of Little Lon, full of brothels where rich and poor alike can revel all night. The...Read more
In the bestselling Black Kettle and Full Moon , master storyteller Geoffrey Blainey takes us on another absorbing journey – a guided tour of a vanished Australia. Covering the years from the first gold rush to World War I. Blainey paints a fascinating picture of how our forebears lived – in...Read more
Greymouth, New Zealand, 1866: The Burgess gang is heading towards town, and a young surveyor from one of the country's leading families has vanished. Inspector James is preparing for trouble.
In the gold-mining town of Greymouth, where drunks fall asleep...Read more
A woman who braved public disgrace to expose a brutal marriage.
1838, England: When eighteen-year-old heiress Frances Dickinson impulsively marries Lieutenant John Geils, she soon discovers there is much about her husband she did not know. A cruel and violent man, John keeps...Read more
In Death Comes As the End, Dame Agatha Christie transports us back to ancient Egypt 2000 B.C. where a priest’s daughter, investigating a suspicious death, uncovers an asp’s nest of jealousy, betrayal, and serial murder.
It is Egypt in 2000 BC, where death gives meaning to life....Read more
Foreshadowing the nightmare visions of the twentieth century in which evil is perceived as central to the condition of man, His Natural Life is a novel of startling power and originality.
It is the greatest novel to come out of colonial Australia and pinpoints with...Read more
It is 1919. The Great War has ended, but the Spanish flu epidemic is raging across Australia. Schools are closed, state borders are guarded by armed men, and train travel is severely restricted. There are rumours it is the end of the world.
In the NSW town of Flint, Quinn...Read more
Amidst the chaos of wartime London, criminals hunted their prey without fear of reprisal. Many operated under the cover of darkness, emerging when the city sank into the oblivion of its nightly blackout; others simply struck whenever opportunity presented itself. At a time when Londoners...Read more
A brutal murder. A wartime promise. A woman on the run.
Juliet's elderly grandparents are killed in their Adelaide home. Who would commit such a heinous crime - and why? The only clue is her grandfather Karl's missing signet ring.
When Juliet's estranged sister, Lily,...Read more
One fine March day in 1868, gunshots rang out at a society charity event in Sydney's harbourside suburb of Clontarf. In the aftermath, Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh - son of Queen Victoria - lay close to death, while the assembled crowd seized and beat his attacker, Irish-born Henry James O'...Read more
It's 1944 and Theo Cazalle is returning to the family he left in Bonnemort, an estate deep in the French countryside, when he went off to fight with the Free French. Memories of Bonnemort have sustained him through four years of war, but when at last he comes home, he finds his world in...Read more
The Irish community who came seeking gold brought their old-world conflict with them to the new land of Australia. The Orange and the Green focussed their antagonism on neighbourhood pubs in 1875, at a time of waning profits and underemployment on the famous Ballarat goldfields. The mines...Read more
John Lacey's lust for power and gold brings him riches and influence beyond his wildest dreams. Only he knows the terrible crime he committed to attain that wealth. Years later, as Lacey ruthlessly presides over the town he has built and named after himself, no one has the courage to...Read more
It is May 1957. In London eight friends gather for a party. They are all displaced persons who have survived the worst World War II could throw at them. This gathering will be a time to share the fragile joy of liberty. But before the night is out, one of them will be dead. Who would commit...Read more
Set against Iceland's stark landscape, Hannah Kent brings to vivid life the story of Agnes, who, charged with the brutal murder of her former master, is sent to an isolated farm to await execution.
Horrified at the prospect of housing a convicted murderer, the family at first...Read more
A forgotten manuscript threatens to unravel the past …
Fresnes Prison, 1940: Margot Bisset, a former maid from the Riviera, finds herself in a prison cell with writer and French Resistance fighter, Josephine Murant. Together, they are transferred to a work camp in Germany,...Read more
'One rainy Friday evening in the winter of 1993, a taxi swept through the streets of East Melbourne, on its way from the city to Richmond. That year was one of the few remaining when a great deal was known of the world, but not yet so much that the world had become over-known. Small gaps...Read more
Venice, 1762. As Carnevale bursts across the city revellers take to the streets in masks and lavish costumes to lose themselves in pleasure. Yet while Venetians celebrate, a nightmare is about to unfold . . .
Laudomia Codussi, a beautiful young woman tormented by terrifying...Read more
The most dangerous people are those with the most to lose.
It is 1887. The young colony of New Zealand is in the grip of a deep depression. Insolvent speculators conspire with corrupt politicians while Maori land slips from the hands of its owners.
Into this...Read more