Recently awarded a Golden Dagger for his second book in the series, Silence of the Grave, Arnaldur Indriadason's first book Tainted Blood, or Jar City as it was originally titled in English, is a taut, sparsely written police procedural set in a grey, cold and wet Reykjavik, Iceland....Read more
Venetia Aldridge QC, distinguished barrister, is found dead in her Middle Temple Chambers, stabbed once cleanly through the heart; sat in her chair; wearing a full wig covered in blood.
She had recently successfully defended Garry Ashe, accused of killing his aunt, and has been...Read more
Sandra Mahoney and her partner Ivan are security consultants, so what she is doing poking around the death by natural causes of a well known politician seems to confuse Sandra as much as everybody else. In EDEN, the third Sandra Mahoney series book by Dorothy Johnston, Sandra is home alone...Read more
There are books stacked up in the corners of this house that I look at fondly and think I must read that.. I've got to read that... and next thing you know it's a few years down the track and I'm still mumbling must to myself. DRY DOCK is one of those books that wants me to take myself...Read more
If you are teetering on the edge of fully-fledged vegetarianism FLESH HOUSE could be the trigger that pushes you over. MacBride is one of those author's who seem to be able to take the grotesque, the frequently cruel and absolutely obscene and wrap that in humanity. FLESH HOUSE is one of...Read more
Nigel Latta is a clinical psychologist who specialises in assessing and treating sex offenders. It's dark place he has to visit on a regular basis and EXECUTION LULLABY reflects that. It's a compelling read if you have the stomach for it, with a very clever twist at the end. I found...Read more
One thing that will strike readers of A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE firmly between the eyes is how an apartheid society is so incredibly foreign from the ways in which others of us live. That's not to say that there is an overtly "political" agenda in this book, rather the book does not take a...Read more
Fans of Barry Maitland's Brock & Kolla series have had a wait on their hands. The last book - Spider Trap - was released in 2006, with a standalone book Bright Air in 2007. Leaving aside the eagerness with which we fans wait for the next book in a favourite series, there's also the...Read more
DEAD-END ROAD is third novel Detective Harry Mason novel from South African author Richard Kunzmann - the earlier books are BLOODY HARVESTS and SALAMANDER COTTON. It was the first of this series that I've read, and I'm not sure that was necessarily a wise move.
It's been a...Read more
One of the things that I've really come to expect from author Neil Cross is not quite knowing what to expect when you pick up one of this books. CAPTURED is the latest in a set of standalone novels that have just all been fantastic, and I'm happy to report that CAPTURED keeps up the...Read more
English village mysteries are one of the categories that remind me that even though I love the dark and noir side of crime fiction, a little lighter fare every now and again is good for the psyche. Or at least a welcome change in approach. I'm always on the lookout for a new "series" of...Read more
Wyatt is back in a new adventure set on the far side of morality. Introduced in Kickback, Garry Disher's fast-selling, widely praised crime novel, Wyatt reappears in the South Australian outback, intent on snatching a payroll. But Wyatt is not the only one eyeing the funds. The Outfit has...Read more
CONTAINMENT is the third in the Sam Shephard series from New Zealand writer Vanda Symon. It's rapidly stepped up to be one of my all time favourite series for a whole bunch of reasons.
Firstly these are truly humorous books. Subtly, ever so slightly tongue in cheek, the...Read more
Not sure what's weirder, talking to fictional characters, or the feeling that you actually know those fictional characters... Either way, you have to think it's quite a feat for a writer to get you to the stage where you're more than happy to regard her characters as real people. MILES OFF...Read more
Allen & Unwin have re-released Barry Maitland's ALL MY ENEMIES, the third book in the Brock and Kolla series. Given that the book was originally published in around 1996 there were a few things intriguing me. Obviously, whether or not it would stand the test of time, but also, what...Read more
I got confused which is nothing, absolutely nothing, new. But one night, for some reason, I plucked THE INNER CIRCLE by Mari Jungstedt from the stacks, and started reading. Then I got quite convinced I'd already read the book. So I went to check and found UNSEEN, which I then re-read,...Read more
Look, let's just admit that I'm a huge fan of this series and get it over and done with. Love DI Steel, love her glorious over the topness, love McRae's constant sooking and all being put upon. Love the madness of the world in which they have to try to operate as functioning police members...Read more
A DARKNESS DESCENDING is the fourth book from Christobel Kent featuring ex-cop, now private detective Sandro Cellini. As this is the first from the series I've tried, I'm guessing that you may have to start from the beginning to get a handle on the who and hows of these characters. ...Read more
Dark, funny, dark, clever, funny, dark and absolutely brilliant, 13 SHOTS OF NOIR is a short story collection blurbed as in the "vein of Roald Dahl". I need to go back and read Dahl. Unless Brazill's got more of these collections.
Short, sharp and lyrical, these are dark dark...Read more
Being profoundly disinterested in all things AFL, I will admit that for a while I did think the possibility of a real life Centralian Galahs teams sounded quite feasible. As did the idea that drop kicks weren't just drongo's, but somehow something very undesirable in a game (okay so I had...Read more
Many frequent readers of crime fiction (and I count myself in both these numbers) are over the mad serial killer sub-genre. This could make the opening monologue of BROKEN MONSTERS something that makes you put down the book and step away. Whilst the subject matter remains confrontational,...Read more
Combining history with mystery and a hefty dose of romance, A HISTORY OF CRIME was both a fascinating and slightly frustrating read.
The background to Frédérique Bonnell and her connections to France and New Zealand were unknown territory for this reader - as was the idea that...Read more
The third in the DS Allie Shenton series, readers might be best served to have at least read one of the earlier books (this reviewer has read FOLLOW THE LEADER only and that helped make sense of a lot of the sub-plot elements).
Whilst the main plot of ONLY THE...Read more
Honkaku is a subgenre of Japanese Crime Fiction that came into being sometime in the early 1920's. The original definition was "a detective story that mainly focuses on the process of a criminal investigation and values the entertainment derived from pure logical reasoning". The term was...Read more
DEAD WOOD is the second book from Tasmanian author s.j. brown, located in his home state, featuring Police DI John Mahoney.
Set within the fallout of the GFC, the novel explores the haves and the have not’s as a result of financial shakedown, within the framework of the very...Read more
There is so much to like about the Café La Femme series (of which THE BLACKMAIL BLEND is #1.5), that a novella drizzled into the middle of existing novels, A TRIFLE DEAD and DROWNED VANILLA is a lovely treat - dare one suggest the icing on the cake? It seems that there is a third book in...Read more
The novella THE MISTAKE is short, sharp, packed with a punch crime fiction set in Iceland, written by ex-pat New Zealander Grant Nicol. Set in Reykjavik, there's a lot that's laid on the line, as you'd expect in something constrained by length. There's been a brutal murder and the clear...Read more
Two initial observations - book covers, especially for some reason, I've noticed, when the books are Sub-Continent or Asian based, can't be trusted; and we need a new genre - something along the lines of Food Crime Porn. The latter for the sort of books that describe food that would make...Read more
Two mutton pasties, an almond slice and a custard tart are not the normal order that a superior officer would give to a subordinate faced with a possible armed siege. But then, Andy Dalziel's never been one for all that official mucking about and Hector's never been one that anybody really...Read more
GUNSHINE STATE has been compared to Garry Disher's Wyatt series for a very good reason. The anti-hero characterisation here is as crisp and clear as you'd want, with Gary Chance the sort of loner survivor that has stepped straight from the pages of classic noir into the bright lights and...Read more