Sorted on book title (not in series order)
THE LABYRINTH OF DROWNING is Canberra based author Alex Palmer's third book featuring (now) ex-cop Paul Harrigan and his agent partner Grace Riordan.
The body of a sex-worker in Sydney bushland quickly becomes not just another case for Grace, as the violent injuries trigger...Read more
A new collection of 17 short stories, 4 of which are previously unpublished, THE LADY WITH THE GUN ASKS THE QUESTIONS would be the perfect introduction point for anyone new to the Phryne Fisher series, or for those of us looking for a bit of diversion in unusual times.
It's...Read more
Bit of explaining first - LAST ONE TO LEAVE and FIND US are available as stand-alone ebooks / novellas. They are also available together in printed form under the title FOOL ME TWICE. I read the two separate novellas, but...Read more
This is a novella that I picked up from Amazon based on some comments I'd seen about the author's writing style, which turned out to be right. This is a great little novella that introduces a murder, an investigator and his sidekick, fleshes out his background and gives me some personality...Read more
A mystery thriller that turns into an unresolved dystopian nightmare was not what I was expecting when I started LEFT BEHIND. Nor was it necessarily obviously where it was heading as the story of a camping trip to K'gari started out. Two couples, connected through...Read more
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;...Read more
The second Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper book LET THE DEAD LIE has now been released, following on the from highly praised A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE.
LET THE DEAD LIE takes Cooper into different physical circumstances, working in a very bleak city, doing menial labour and...Read more
Set in Australia, but with a decidedly American feel to it, LETHAL IN LOVE is a serialised novel in six parts. Fascinating idea and one that I've always wondered why somebody hasn't done. Released over a period of time, each episode is probably best described as a long novella in length,...Read more
It's been a Long Time since I was a young adult - or whatever it was that they called us in those days. I should declare I'm not 100% sure I know why I was reading a book that's so obviously for young adults as LIAR is. I should also declare that I'm profoundly and very dogmatically...Read more
Alec de Payns is on the run - and wanted for murder - in the new thriller by the bestselling author of The Frenchman
While recruiting a Russian human source embedded in the shadows of illicit financial networks, French spy Alec de Payns...Read more
LIBERATION ROAD is billed as a novel of World War II, but it's really a story of two men. Rabbi Ben Kahn is a Chaplain with the American Army in France - his personal crusade is to find out what happened to his son - a missing fighter pilot. Joe Amos is a black truck driver on the Red...Read more
The 4th novel in the Reggie da Costa series, LIES AND DECEPTION is a nicely twisty tale of the just desserts served up to a serial conman and his accomplices by a determined crime reporter and his ... accomplices.
If you're new to this lovely series, set in the early 1920's in...Read more
In her first full length novel for adults, educational and children's writer Carmel Reilly has delivered a crime fiction book that tackles sibling relationships and family secrets full on.
Set in two main timelines, in 2016 Lori receives a visit from a policeman to tell her...Read more
One of Australia’s great storytellers: Michael Robotham’s crime fiction and the tantalising premise of his new novel.
Michael Robotham’s latest novel, published ten years after his first, was more than 20 years in the making. In a recent interview, the author said:...Read more
LINE OF SIGHT by Western Australian based writer David Whish-Wilson, uses the real-life murder of brothel madam Shirley Finn as the basis for his fictional murder of Ruby Devine (hat-tip to Tilly perhaps?)
In the fictional version the facts of Ruby's murder are extremely...Read more
I'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. ...Read more
There are times in life when you just need something frivolous, fun and slightly tongue in cheek. Australian readers are lucky to have the Cass Tuplin series from Sue Williams to fulfil that need.
The tongue in cheek bit is the important thing to remember when it comes to Cass...Read more
The Lone Child focusses on character development, imbued with sadness, longing, regret and loss.
Following on from her stunning debut novel, What Came Before, Anna George has created another claustrophobic and compelling...Read more
Barry Weston's debut novel THE LONG CON, brings Queenslander and ex-cop, now PI, Frank Cousins to the mean streets of Hobart in search of a client, good pizza, a lot of booze and coffee, and with a bit of luck, Detective Sharon Becker. In the aftermath of The Fitzgerald Inquiry into Police...Read more
The start of what one selfishly hopes is a long series, THE LONG GAME, introduces readers to Detective Sergeant Zoe Mayer. She's back at work after a traumatic incident, working with her old homicide partner Charlie, accompanied by her service dog, the gorgeous Harry, who helps her handle...Read more
THE LONG WEEKEND is the debut, self-published crime fiction novel from Victorian based author Terry R. Barca. Set in inner Melbourne, using the beautiful Windsor Hotel as a backdrop for most of the action, it features recently retired / newly married Sam and his wife Scarlett on a relaxing...Read more
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...Read more
Wendy James has once more taken a close up, and uncomfortable look at the reality of family secrets. Something that she's not only specialising in, she's particularly good at into the bargain.
We're programmed to think that the family unit is safe, staid, even boring (perhaps...Read more
I'm going to start this review in an odd way, by declaring that I didn't like Jane Harper's second book FORCE OF NATURE as much as I had been expecting to. Initially I thought this was because it read like an idea that Aaron Falk had been hammered into it later on, weakening the plot,...Read more
Writers who take the decision to build their novels around characters who are less than sympathetic, veering towards frustrating, appear to be making one of the braver literary decisions you can come across. Needless to say Rebecca Wilding is a difficult prospect in THE LOST SWIMMER....Read more
It's a question that has preyed on a lot of people's minds over the years - why do women fall for, and stay with, the worst possible men? What author Laura Elizabeth Woollett has done is imagine her author's pen into the minds and lives of some of these women in her series of short stories...Read more
I do like a bit of a romp novel, and LOVE HONOUR AND O'BRIEN is nothing if not a bit of a romp. Which surprised me a bit - because the blurb sounded just a little dauntingly like it might be too chick-lit for me. But Jennifer Rowe's return to mystery writing has hugely exciting, so...Read more
This is one of those little books that I've been keeping an eye out for over the last few years, finally tracking down a copy recently. At 141 pages it was just the right size for dropping into the suitcase that we're dragging backwards and forwards between houses at the moment....Read more
Bleak, stark, pitiless, violent, hypnotic and strangely satisfying was my immediate reaction to THE LOW ROAD, and interestingly it's staying with me for quite a while after I've finished it. Mind you, THE LOW ROAD is not by any means an easy or enjoyable book.
Bleak - well...Read more
THE LOW ROAD is an austere portrait of two of life’s losers. Lee has never really had a chance. He lost his parents suddenly at the age of ten. Wild, on the other hand, was successful and threw it all away. Lee is incapacitated through his gunshot wound. Wild is so hopelessly addicted...Read more