Body Count, PD Martin (review by Sunnie Gill)

Australia's loss is America's gain. 

The Victorian Police sent Sophie Anderson on the FBI's International Program, a six week course at Quantico to refine her profiling skills. When the FBI discovered she had dual citizenship she was offered a profiling job with the FBI unit at...Read more

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Appeal Denied, Peter Corris

When Hardy got himself into hot water in THE UNDERTOW, you just had to wonder if this was the end of Sydney's most famous hard-boiled detective.  In APPEAL DENIED he doesn't get his licence to be a private investigator back; he's got no money; his house and car are falling apart and his...Read more

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Bankrupts and Bandits, Frederick Guilhaus

There has been a slowly bubbling sub-genre of crime fiction based in the financial world that seems to have been going on for ages in Australia, and every now and then you'll fall across one of those books - normally in a second hand shop now.  I can't remember where I spied BANKRUPTS AND...Read more

Kickback, Garry Disher

There's a new Wyatt on the way, and that means it's as good a time as any to do a little tidying up of the back catalogue.

Wyatt is a very careful man, because he has to be.  Wyatt robs banks, lifts payrolls, gets girls, leaves girls, lives the life of a loner, trusts few,...Read more

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Crooks Like Us, Peter Doyle

This is going to sound like one very weird review - but I just can't figure out how to explain the effect of CROOKS LIKE US by Peter Doyle without using words like fascinating, haunting, astounding, beautiful and absolutely and utterly mesmerising.

This book is a fascinating...Read more

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Babylon, Stephen Sewell

A young English backpacker gets into a car with an older Australian man somewhere in the Australian outback, and the violence, threatening, rape, pillage, murder and general mayhem commences. Somehow young, innocent, a bit wet Mick the backpacker stays. Despite the drugging and rape of a...Read more

The Scent of Murder, Felicity Young

Somebody, years ago, in "one of those long and philosophical nights around the dinner table" made a comment about history always being written by the victor, and it's stayed with me ever since (even though it's not an original proposition). I'm always reminded of it when a new Dody...Read more

Claustrophobia, Tracy Ryan

Using a title like CLAUSTROPHOBIA obviously sets certain expectations for readers, which luckily, in this outing are uncomfortably well imagined. There's something incredibly claustrophobic about everything to do with this book. The enclosed, world that the two main characters Pen and her...Read more

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Eden, Candice Fox

Right from the commencement of HADES, the first Archer / Bennett book by Candice Fox, it was obvious that this was a series to be watched. Dark, confrontational, emotional and compelling, that book started a journey into the consequences of human damage, and EDEN picks that up, twists it...Read more

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Detective Work, John Dale

It's been a bit of a wait for the arrival of what seems to be the first crime fiction novel, DETECTIVE WORK from Australian author John Dale. Well enough worth the wait to wonder why it's taken so long, and to certainly hope that it's the beginning of a new series.

There's...Read more

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Dead Men Don't Order Flake, Sue Williams

Cass Tuplin has returned in second book DEAD MEN DON'T ORDER FLAKE. Proprietor of the recently rebuilt Rusty Bore Takeway, she's a fish, chip and dim sim dispenser extraordinaire with a sideline in private enquiries. Which means she's one of those slightly nosy women who can find out stuff...Read more

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Burn Patterns, Ron Elliott

Partly a story around Iris Foster, partly a story around arson, BURN PATTERNS puts a complicated woman at the heart of a story about complicated offenders. Known as "The Fire Lady" Foster is a psychologist with a messy past that she's tried to put behind her. Until mid consultation with...Read more

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Forgotten, Nicole Trope

Everyone is saying this is one for fans of Jodi Picoult, which probably explains a lot of my reaction, because I'm not much of a fan of Picoult's books. I also suspect I may have overdosed on domestic noir of the "harried mother / useless father / tedious kids" variety. For that reason this...Read more

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Cedar Valley, Holly Throsby

“On a normal morning, a lone police car would be parked out the front of the station, waiting for something illegal to happen.”

Cedar Valley, Holly Throsby’s second novel, begins with the arrival of two strangers on the first day of summer in 1993. One, Benny Miller,...Read more

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A Few Right Thinking Men, Sulari Gentill

A FEW RIGHT THINKING MEN introduces Rowland Sinclair to fans of Australian historical crime fiction.  Set in 1930's Sydney and Yass, A FEW RIGHT THINKING MEN takes a reader into a world where the affects of the Great Depression are being felt, and the tension between the Proto-Fascists and...Read more

Goodwood, Holly Throsby

Small town living in 1990's Australia is big in GOODWOOD, which is interesting as this is a slow burning, confined, seemingly "small" story in the life of 17 year old Jean. She lives in Goodwood, a small town, near a bigger town, with her mother, near her grandparents, surrounded by people...Read more

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Gathering Dark

A convicted killer. A gifted thief. A vicious crime boss. A disillusioned cop.
Together, they’re a missing girl's only hope.

Blair Harbour, once a wealthy, respected surgeon in Los Angeles, is now an ex-con down on her luck. She’s...Read more

Life Before, Carmel Reilly

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

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Catch Us The Foxes, Nicola West

Before starting out, this review is going to contain possible SPOILERS. I'm finding it almost impossible to talk about CATCH US THE FOXES without them.

 

 

Flagged as Twin Peaks meets The Dry, this is also described as a deliciously dark and twisted...Read more

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Brimstone, Russel Hutchings

The first in the Mantra-6 series (Nitrate has been released now), the author of BRIMSTONE, Russel Hutchings, is a former SAS Warrant Officer with over 20 years' service in the Regiment. That experience shows very clearly in the authority of the action sequences, and the way that operational...Read more

Day's End, Garry Disher

The thing about a book by Garry Disher is that I know it's going to be good. But every single time I find myself marvelling at just how good.

Disher is a master at the art of the space - be it in the narrative, the place or the thing. He evokes a sense of place better than any...Read more

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Double Lives, Kate McCaffrey

Harrowing and insightful, DOUBLE LIVES by Kate McCaffrey is a very topical exploration of issues around gender, identity, acceptance and truth. There is, for some readers, some confrontational and topical subject matter being addressed here, revolving as it does around the murder of...Read more

Broken Bay, Margaret Hickey

Mark Ariti is back in the third novel in this series, and for the first time, the setting moves from the bush to the seaside. On a short "break" away in the small fishing town of Broken Bay, on South Australia's Limestone Coast, he seems to be approaching it as less holiday, more purgatory...Read more

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