#amreading

We took a couple of weeks off over Christmas / New Year and spent the time driving around in the new car (working out how to drive it / charge it / where the cup holders are - all that sort of stuff), and managed a couple of days of long meanders with the dogs when it wasn't hot enough to melt concrete. Also did some reading - some of which was catchup / some f2f bookclub and some, just because. All of them are marked as review to come as it'll take me a little while to tick off the general admin / email backlog / what was I doing before the break work stuff.

Those books that you hear of one minute, read the next, and then see it has been snapped up by a film production company?

This is one of those.

I'm actually half way through this extremely promising piece of writing.

From the Blurb:

Jessica James had the perfect life. She had a good job, supportive friends, and her husband Geoff and her son Jack both adored her. Everything changed the moment she found out she was having another child. 

Lots and lots of noise about this one.

From the Blurb:

For the past two weeks, seventeen-year-old Kate Bennet has lived against her will in an isolated cabin in a remote beach town--brought there by a mysterious man named Bill. Part captor, part benefactor, Bill calls her Evie and tells her he's hiding her to protect her. That she did something terrible one night back home in Melbourne--something so unspeakable that he had no choice but to take her away. The trouble is, Kate can't remember the night in question.

Given how long it took me to get the spelling of reminiscences right, I think I'm still in holiday mode. Or a lousy speller. We took a few weeks off over Christmas and New Year and actually took the time off - very little was done on computers, tablets and smartphones. We nearly melted in a couple of early season heatwaves that just reinforce the idea that we're all going to hell in an incinerator ... where was I oh yeah, 2018 Reading Reminiscences. There were some very good books around in 2018 and this is less recommendation and more a meander around in the ones I really enjoyed.

A nice comic styled novella just because.

From the Blurb:

A rookie spy. Europe on a knife edge. A distinct lack of coffee.

Eva Destruction is back in her first ever assignment. Straight out of the MI6 academy, Eva is on the trail of a supposedly dead fellow agent. It’s a nothing assignment given to a rookie, but when suicide bombers hit a NATO conference the mission is kicked into high gear. Eva chases a carnage of gunfire and explosions across Europe in search of the mysterious shadowy organization, ‘The Tempest’. 

Second in the Rory James series from Bendigo based author Colin King.

From the Blurb:

When a Melbourne couple in witness protection are found assassinated in their bed, zoology student Josh Marshall recognises the address. He quickly realises he had inadvertently been an unseen witness to a bent cop divulging the couple's location to the hitman ... and he has the hard evidence to prove it.

Second in the DCI Daley series - I've been listening to this one recently - really enjoying the slight touches of humour in this series.

From the Blurb:

I'm very behind with posting things - got some major website work under way so I'm behind, I'm disorganised and I'm very distracted at the moment. I finished this book night before last - coming out later in November from Echo Publishing, but more on that when the review is posted.

From the Blurb:

An atmospheric crime novel with a burning moral dilemma at its heart.

Started this one last night and what with the heat and never-ending dry it feels like home... ;)

From the Blurb:

For Cass Tuplin, proprietor of the Rusty Bore Takeaway (and definitely not an unlicensed private investigator), it’s weird enough that her neighbour Vern has somehow acquired a lady friend. But then he asks Cass to look into the case of the dead rats someone’s dumped on Joanne’s doorstep.

Started reading the third Georgie Harvey / John Franklin novel by Sandi Wallace last week ... this time set in the Dandenong Ranges, which was a bit of a blast from past - rain / storms / fog / trees down / cold. Vaguely remember how all of that worked.

From the Blurb:

How could police lose three children?

Three missing children.

A wild storm.

A long way from home.

Melbourne journalist Georgie Harvey is on hand when three children disappear from a police-run camp in the Dandenong Ranges.

Cato Kwong is back in the much anticipated fourth novel in the series, and I'm blissfully happy about that.

From the Blurb:

From the shamefully overdue pile (turns out I have quite a few shameful piles...)

From the Blurb:

Cocaine. Construction. Corruption.

The unholy trinity of Sydney

Self-made property mogul Tina Leonard has already lost her business, her home and custody of her children because South East Banking Corporation left her bankrupt. Now it appears she is being framed for the murder of her banker Oliver Randall, a senior executive of the corporation. Her motive? Revenge for ruining her life and her business.

I remember very well when this triple murder occurred, so I'm hoping this book will cast some light into dark places.

From the Blurb:

'The slaughter was extravagant and bloody. And yet there were people in the small town of Wedderburn in Central Victoria who, while they did not exactly rejoice, quietly thought that Ian Jamieson had done them all a favour.'

Another from the was reading pile (I've been computer avoiding for a few days).

From the Blurb:

Four years ago, in the small town of Birravale, Eliza Daley was murdered. Within hours, her killer was caught. Wasn’t he?

So reads the opening titles of Jack Quick’s new true-crime documentary. A skilled producer, Jack knows that the bigger the conspiracy, the higher the ratings - and he claims Curtis Wade was convicted on flimsy evidence and shoddy police work. Millions of viewers agree.

This is the latest in the rural noir pile, and 50 or so pages in feels like a very good entry indeed.

From the Blurb:

Perhaps if Sweetapple hadn’t stopped to help the idiots who had just near run him off the road in their ute, things may have gone entirely differently.

Post the #neddies it is sometimes hard to get back in the reading groove, so I'm starting with something rather different from what I'd normally contemplate going near. So far the plan is working...

From the Blurb:

The Girl on the Train meets Before I Go to Sleep with a dash of Bridget Jones in this chilling tale of love gone horribly wrong …

From the just finished pile.

From the Blurb:

An outsider detective. The vigilante killer with a message. A cold case they both want solved.

From Amazon Bestseller S.D. Rowell comes a heart-pounding crime mystery that will keep you thinking until the final page… 

Big change of pace, but I'm actually reading something written by someone who is not from our neck of the woods!

From the Blurb:

Murder wasn't the hard part. It was just the start of the game.

Joshua Kane has been preparing for this moment his whole life. He's done it before. But this is the big one.

This is the murder trial of the century. And Kane has killed to get the best seat in the house.

But there's someone on his tail. Someone who suspects that the killer isn't the man on trial.

From the heaving great pile of reading matter that I'm very behind with.

From the Blurb:

When Andy and Mel’s double date turns into a snuff film, Andy fights back, killing one of her attackers, leading to an unwanted aftermath of attention and threats. 

Detective Daniel Connor links the attack to the recent discovery of six female bodies found buried in bushland on Sydney’s Northern Beaches – three double homicides now thought to be part of an organised snuff-film ring. 

You've probably noticed that there are a few of us posting here, and recently it's turning into a bit of a three way tussle who gets in first with a review (okay 2 way, it's rarely me :) ) so given that predictabilty - my turn to read this now.

From the Blurb:

There's a LOT of buzz going around about this one.

From the Blurb:

In an isolated country town brought to its knees by endless drought, a charismatic and dedicated young priest calmly opens fire on his congregation, killing five parishioners before being shot dead himself. 

Slight (okay extreme) change of pace.

From the Blurb:

Rebecca wondered if she was looking at an elaborate hoax. She wasn't.

Along with a dozen other journalists and food-industry celebrities, she had just witnessed the unveiling of the baked head of one of Adelaide's most celebrated chefs. The head of Leong Chew sat on a pewter platter. The cloche had just been removed, revealing Leong Chew, clearly not at his best.

One that I finished over the weekend - review to come asap.

From the Blurb:

A fugitive in the present. A runaway in the past.

Eliza Carmody returns home to the country to work on the biggest law case of her career. The only problem is this time she’s on the ‘wrong side’ – defending a large corporation against a bushfire class action by her hometown of Kinsale.

So I read this one over the weekend but it's another that a review will come out in the next day or so, in the meantime ... read it.

From the Blurb:

‘Her name is Sammy Went. This photo was taken on her second birthday. Three days later she was gone.’

On a break between teaching photography classes, Kim Leamy is approached by a stranger investigating the disappearance of a little girl from her Kentucky home twenty-eight years earlier. He believes she is that girl.

Catching up on some of the true crime books stacked about the place.

From the Blurb:

Career criminal John Killick was involved in the most audacious prison break in Australian history when he escaped from Sydney’s Silverwater prison after his partner in crime Lucy Dudko commandeered a scenic helicopter flight at gunpoint.

Australia’s ‘Bonnie and Clyde’ spent 45 days on the run before being caught… Killick was sentenced to 23 years jail; Dudko to ten. After his release, the pair meet up again but are they the same people? Is the magic still there?

Following on from Gideon Haigh's A Scandal in Bohemia, a factual account of the life and fate of Molly Dean, now The Portrait of Molly Dean, a fictional look back and Molly's life from the point of view of independent art dealer Alex Cayton. A fabulous read.

From the Blurb:

An unsolved murder comes to light after almost seventy years...

Finished this late last night because I wanted to read it and because next up (after a bookclub read) it's Katherine Koviac's book The Portrait of Molly Dean.

From the Blurb:

An unsolved murder takes one of Australia’s foremost writers of non-fiction into the 1930s Bohemian demi-monde, exploring the fate of a talented young woman trying to make her way in that artistic, sexualised, ‘liberated’ world.

Because I've been doing a lot of "required reading" recently, I decided to indulge myself in random dips into the Discworld series on audio. Of course a while ago I also promised myself I'd read the entire Discworld series from start to finish again, so I'm blithely ignoring myself and am, as a result, all over the place - Unseen Academicals being Book 37 in the series. I'd pretend that I picked it because of the coincidental timing with the World Cup but we all know that's tosh. I picked it because I picked it.

From the Blurb:

Turns out that injury to my partner (he's okay) is something that will bite into your reading time. Things ground to a bit of a halt last week what with himself managing to require hospitalisation for a back injury. He's feeling a lot better now and might have got off with one of those dreaded "you're not as young as you think you are" warnings over a back which we all know is dodgy. Anyway, this has been lurking on the reading pile for way too long.,

From the Blurb:

Started this one last night.

From the Blurb:

Not all murder victims are mourned, but the perpetrator must always be punished ...

For Robert Church, superintendent of the Parramatta Female Factory, the most enjoyable part of his job is access to young convict women.Inmate Grace O'Leary has made it her mission to protect the women from his nocturnal visits and when Church is murdered with an awl thrust through his right eye, she becomes the chief suspect.

I am sort of keeping pace with myself again, having just finished this book...

From the Blurb:

All she wanted was to escape. But why does she still feel trapped. A gripping psychological drama by the author of Mothers and Daughters and Into My Arms.

Latest, just finished read. Hopefully this is the start of another series.

From the Blurb:

The young detectives call Alan Auhl a retread, but that doesn’t faze him. He does things his own way—and gets results.

He still lives with his ex-wife, off and on, in a big house full of random boarders and hard-luck stories. And he’s still a cop, even though he retired from Homicide some years ago.

Another from the pile up of things I should have mentioned a week ago.

From the Blurb:

A top executive dies suddenly.

An accident?

A murder?

An inside job?

Hundreds of suited suspects in one city office.

Detective Sergeant Brian Shaw is recalled from Yorke Peninsula.

From sleepy country town to throbbing city throngs, clashing personalities, old scores to be settled, frustrated ambitions, jealousies, and something new: female tellers.

A hotbed of suspicions from managing director to tea lady.

A memoir originally published in 2015 I listened to Sue Perkins on the audio version of this and thoroughly enjoyed it.

From the Blurb:

When I began writing this book, I went home to see if my mum had kept some of my stuff. What I found was that she hadn't kept some of it. She had kept all of it - every bus ticket, postcard, school report - from the moment I was born to the moment I finally had the confidence to turn round and say 'Why is our house full of this shit?'

I am actually reading this one right now. I'm all caught up in other words!

From the Blurb:

Ten years after surviving special operations in Afghanistan, Danny Clay is working as a scriptwriter in the emotional war zone of TV production. His best mate and editor is Vietnamese neighbour Zan who may or may not have killed a man with her bare hands. When their writer friends start dying in mysterious circumstances, Danny must resurrect his old army sapper skills to prevent himself and Zan becoming the next victims.

Another from the have read pile - this is the 3rd book in the Natalie King series.

From the Blurb:

Natalie King has been hired to do a psychiatric evaluation for the children’s court. A custody dispute. Not her usual territory, but now that she’s pregnant she’s happy to do a simple consult.

Turns out Jenna and Malik’s break-up is anything but simple. He claims she’s crazy and compulsive; she claims he’s been abusing their daughter Chelsea.

Okay so there's a spot of catching up going on - I have been so busy reading, I've forgotten to post updates.

From the Blurb:

Three bodies… three killers? 

A taxi driver disappears, his burnt-out cab the only evidence of his last stop. In the same desolate area, a body is found in the boot of a stolen car half-submerged in a muddy creek. It’s not the cab driver… 

Really like the way that Ellie Marney creates the settings for these books - they feel very real and the people in them authentic.

From the Blurb:

Boozer, brawler, ladies’ man – nineteen-year-old Harris Derwent is not a good guy.

Nearly caught up now - finished this earlier this week.

From the Blurb:

Meet Timothy Blake, codename Hangman. Blake is a genius, known for solving impossible cases. He's also a psychopath with a dark secret, and the FBI's last resort.

A 14-year-old boy vanishes on his way home from school. His frantic mother receives a terrifying ransom call. It's only hours before the deadline, and the police have no leads.

It's been quite a while since I caught up with these listings as you can probably tell by now.

From the Blurb:

In a single day, a simple mistake will have life-altering consequences for everyone involved.

A moment of distraction, an unlocked car and a missing baby. How on earth could this happen?

All Malia needed was a single litre of milk and now she's surrounded by police and Zach has disappeared. 

Another from the past reading pile.

From the Blurb:

Six international artists are invited to a residency in southern Spain. What could possibly go wrong? 

Writer’s block and paintings of oranges. 

Love, lust, revenge.

A sculptor left for dead on the side of a mountain. 

Part love story, part thriller and wholly page-turning, Dig Two Graves shows us once again that ‘Morwood is a classy act.’ – The Australian 

For readers who like their crime/thrillers gore-free and more refined.

This is the third book now in the Agatha Christie Book Club series.

From the Blurb:

It was supposed to a frivolous night out. The champagne was flowing, the rugs were arranged, and the Agatha Christie Book Club had settled in to watch their favourite mystery Evil Under the Sun on the moonlit screen above. 

Yet it all comes to a crashing halt when a woman’s lifeless body is discovered lying between the jumble of picnic baskets and blankets. She has been strangled and discarded like an empty champagne bottle. 

Set in Mexico, among the worst of the worst behaviour of the cartels, and to be frank, men, a union activist makes a stand. Tim Baker has created wonderful characters in Pilar and Fuentes.

From the Blurb:

The only thing more dangerous than the cartels is the truth...

In Ciudad Real, Mexico, a deadly war between rival cartels is erupting, and hundreds of female sweat-shop workers are being murdered. As his police superiors start shutting down his investigation, Fuentes suspects most of his colleagues are on the payroll of narco kingpin, El Santo.

2nd in the Lewis Trilogy, I've pretty much started this one straight after the first, The Blackhouse.

From the Blurb:

A body is recovered from a peat bog on the Isle of Lewis. The male Caucasian corpse is initially believed by its finders to be over 2000 years old, until they spot the Elvis tattoo on his right arm. The body, it transpires, is not evidence of an ancient ritual killing, but of a murder committed during the latter half of the 20th century.

Turned into the perfect read for a hot Saturday afternoon.

From the Blurb:

Amy is a store detective at Cutty’s, the oldest and grandest department store in the country. She’s good at her job. She can read people and catch them. But Cutty’s is closing down. Amy has a young baby, an ailing mother, and a large mortgage. She also has a past as an activist.

Started this one last night, it's due for publication sometime soon and so far it's really engaging. 

From the Blurb:

Latest from the audio pile.

From the Blurb:

Peter May has crafted a page-turning murder mystery that explores the darkness in our souls, and just how difficult it is to escape the past. Winner of Prix Ancres Noires 2010. The Blackhouse was published in French as L'Ile des Chasseurs D'Oiseaux before publication in English, and won the prestigious 'Prix des Lecteurs' (readers' prize) at the Le Havre festival of crime writing.

Started this one over the weekend and didn't get nearly enough reading time to finish it, which has turned out to be a bit annoying as it's very good.

From the Blurb:

Can a man who’s lived a life of crime ever escape his past? The world’s most reluctant private investigator is about to find out.

Former bad boy turned local hero, Bill Murdoch, should be happy with his little piece of paradise. After all, he’s got the fancy car and the big house by the beach. The only trouble is he’s slowly suffocating in small town life. 

Listening to this on audio for a change - first book in the DCI Daley series, that I confess to having randomly chosen from a list of audio books.

From the Blurb:

One from the weekend's pile

From the Blurb:

Detective Ngaire Blakes is back on the case when a skeletonized murder victim is discovered - a crime that took place during the Springbok Tours of 1981. A period that pitted father against son, town against city, and police against protestors.

Another from the currently reading pile.

From the Blurb:

Former Special Forces soldier Jeff Bradley is meeting with the mafia in Bari, Italy, to discover the whereabouts of his nemesis—criminal overlord Avni Leka—when he receives a message from an old friend. Barry is on board a tourist bus that has been hijacked by terrorists near Istanbul. Strapped with explosives, it is racing across Turkey to the northern borders of Syria, Iraq and Iran.

The latest from the NZ pile.

From the Blurb:

Particularly intriguing one from recent day's reading.

From the Blurb:

Cassy blew a collective kiss at them. 'See you in September,' she said. A throwaway line. Just words, uttered casually by a young woman in a hurry. And then she'd gone.

It was supposed to be a short trip - a break in New Zealand before her best friend's wedding. But when Cassy waved goodbye to her parents, they never dreamed that it would be years before they'd see her again.

Another from the New Zealand pile read over the weekend.

From the Blurb:

Another from the weekend's New Zealand piles.

From the Blurb:

"In the silence she could hear the oncoming hum, like a large flock approaching. She didn’t want to hear his story; she’d had enough of them."

Tess is on the run when she’s picked up from the side of the road by lonely middle-aged father Lewis Rose. With reluctance, she’s drawn into his family troubles and comes to know a life she never had. 

Set in Masterton at the turn of the millennium, Tess is a gothic love story about the ties that bind and tear a family apart.

Another from the weekend's pile of New Zealand fiction, the second in the Raymond Electromatic trilogy.

From the Blurb:

A blend of science fiction and stylish mystery noir featuring a robot detective: the stand alone sequel to Made to Kill

One from a weekend's reading catch up on the New Zealand / Ngaio Marsh piles.

From the Blurb:

A SUICIDE. A MURDER. A CONSPIRACY. 

DIGGING UP THE PAST CAN BE DEADLY . . .

A thirteen-year-old boy commits suicide.

A sixty-five-year old man dies of a heart attack.

Dan Forrester, ex-MI5 agent, is connected to them both. 

And when he discovers that his godson and his father have been murdered, he teams up with his old friend, DC Lucy Davies, to find answers.

Another from the New Zealand piles.

From the Blurb:

How do you protect your family when you can't remember who's hunting them? A gripping international thriller, perfect for fans of Lee Child and Mason Cross 

A family in England is massacred, the father left holding the shotgun.

PC Lucy Davies is convinced he's innocent

A sleeper agent in Moscow requests an urgent meeting with Dan Forrester, referencing their shared past.

His amnesia means he has no idea who he can trust.

Easter reading pile number whatever I'm up to now.

From the Blurb:

“I was aware of the weight of Spoole’s head, clutched against my stomach. I hadn’t thought of a head being something that was heavy to carry. Another new thing learned.”

Starting off with this one over the Easter long weekend.

From the Blurb:

Army veteran Hunter Grant thought he had left war behind in Afghanistan – a conflict that left him with physical and psychological scars. But finding an unconscious girl in the Northland bush and gradually untangling her story involves him in a war of a different kind in his own country.

From the current reading pile.

From the Blurb:

SUPERPOWERS SHOULD NOT BE WASTED ON THE YOUNG

Euphemia Sage watched helplessly as Jane, covered in blood, clutched her precious jewelry and was bundled into the Mercedes. Just a few days earlier she’d discovered that Alison, her mousy receptionist at Sage Consulting, had been working as a loan shark on the side. And now Alison, her husband and those thick-necked men in the cheap suits wanted the money back.

Another from the weekend's pile (don't you love cool, slightly damp weekends!)

From the Blurb:

“We are The Division. This is what we do.” 

A politician’s daughter goes missing in Turkey, as Russia bombs neighbouring Syria and chaos explodes throughout the Middle East. Rob Moore of Division 5 is sent from London to find her, but he’s a man with his own problems. 

Another from the weekend pile

From the Blurb:

If art can capture a soul, what happens when one of those souls escapes?

When art appraiser Anita Cassatt is sent to catalogue the extensive collection of reclusive artist Leo Kubin, it isn’t only the chilly atmosphere of the secluded house making her shiver.

From this damp (YEAHHHH) weekend's reading

From the Blurb:

Theft. Murder. Love Tested.

A priceless Shakespearean First Folio is stolen from an English manor house.

A man is dead.

Oxford student Stephanie Cooper is drawn into the dangerous criminal world of art theft when she meets attractive young detective Luke Spencer.

As her rock-star boyfriend tours Japan with his band, Stephanie and Luke's quest becomes personal as they follow an increasingly perilous trail that leads from Oxford to London, Paris and Venice.

From the current reading pile.

From the Blurb:

The third novel in this Australian murder mystery series takes the reader behind the friendly laid-back facade of Darwin, Australia’s northern capital, into a world where a crocodile roams the waterways in search of revenge and evil ripples in the hearts of humans.

From the current pile.

From the Blurb:

When Mickey got out of the fiasco that was Lehman Brothers, he thought he had left high-risk finance behind. Now he passes his days driving a London black taxi and filling in with the occasional domestic private investigation. 

One from the weekend's pile.

From the Blurb:

Peter Fraser was our greatest prime minister on the international stage. He proved it as World War Two was ending and he played a major part in shaping the United Nations. In the process he made enemies. He is back in New Zealand, where a plot is under way to kill him. If it is successful, New Zealand’s influence on the international stage ends and the country descends into chaos, a divided country ripe for international manipulation.

And finally, from the past weekend.

From the Blurb:

Chapman Bouttell, an Australian homicide detective, is drawn violently back into a conspiracy he thought he’d escaped while serving in the Vietnam War when members of his former army unit were found murdered. 

Another from the weekend's reading pile.

From the Blurb:

A stranger just put Kelsey’s boyfriend in a coma. The worst part? She asked him to do it. 

A quick departure from the #yeahnoir pile.

From the Blurb:

“The Claremont”, an outdated, run-down apartment building, is thrown into turmoil when its latest and most celebrated resident, Crispin Fairchild, conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, is found murdered. 

From the NZ piles about the place - an historical novel set in Dunedin.

From the Blurb:

Second from the reading pile from yesterday.

From the Blurb:

An enforced day off yesterday with the power out for maintenance meant some reading catching up.

From the Blurb:

Police sergeant Harry Brent, working in Queenstown, New Zealand is accidentally shot by a hunter. While still on light duties he is posted to the Christchurch office to work on cold cases. 

What does the difference between the shadows mean? Who is the body in the trench at Tekapo Military Camp? Harry’s eye for detail and his need to know set him on the path to answering these questions. 

A novella squeezed in amongst other things. Okay other things I should have been doing but still...

From the Blurb:

Sixteen-year old Heidi has always dreamed of being a society photographer for the rich and famous. Instead, her first film project plunges her into a world of subterfuge as she joins a courageous group of teenage protesters committed to saving orangutans in the wild. 

Another from the staggeringly varied #yeahnoir pile

From the Blurb:

It's Broadway in Reefton, the new, booming 1870s gold town.

Suspiciously, Gordon Trembath, a naive young police constable has been left in charge over Christmas and New Year. He is immediately faced with investigating a murder carried out by sly-groggers in the valley.

In the meantime, the town has been invaded by "a collection of scamps, card sharps, liars and chats who have come to town for the pickings available in the holiday season."

And we're caught up for the moment - currently reading this one.

From the Blurb:

On Sundays peace was restored. He would lie down, dream and remember. He would enjoy. And later on the bell would ring. He would get up and walk downstairs. He would open the front door. And his life would come to an end . . . 

Garda Inspector Michael McLoughlin is trying to enjoy his retirement – doing a bit of PI work on the side, meeting up with former colleagues, fixing up a grand old house in a genteel Dublin suburb near the sea. 

Another from the previously reading pile.

From the Blurb:

When Dean Bradley is brutally murdered for his new shoes, undertaker Ken Tamati does a lovely job on the corpse — but next morning, the body has vanished from the funeral parlour.

That day, a mysterious figure — witnesses give wildly conflicting descriptions — begins rescuing victims of assault all over Auckland and healing their horrific injuries with a dazzling light. They call him the Rainbow Man.

Another from the past overdue for mention pile.

From the Blurb:

Martin Fallaway is dying. With no family to whom he can leave his surplus fortune, he holds a contest on his tropical island, where ten families compete to be the last team left in order to claim the prize of thirty million dollars.

From the was reading pile, this is fascinating.

From The Blurb:

Minnie Dean: the first – and only – woman to be hanged in New Zealand. Baby farmer and child murderer, or hardworking wife and mother, supporting her family by caring for unwanted children in a society that shunned her?

Karen Zelas explores the trials of Minnie Dean using a myriad of voices, including Dean’s own, from her childhood in Scotland to the gallows in Invercargill, 1895.

The follower of this blog will realise that I'm not prone to personal posts, but I need to apologise.

I'm very very behind with reviews, mentions, comments and generally things that those kind enough to send me review books would expect.

From the piles of reading, sod all blogging I've been doing recently.

From the Blurb:

From the wonderfulness that is the pile of New Zealand Crime fiction.

From the Blurb:

‘Cynthia can understand how Anahera feels just by looking at her body.’

It's that time of the year where posting becomes erratic and reading consumes every spare moment. Sometimes life is hard ;)

From the Blurb:

“There was Polly’s tokotoko on the ground. Carved and polished, with its eel head, the snout inlaid with pāua. Alexia picked it up and cracked it across the cop’s shoulders. She raised it again and hit and hit. She would stop this.”

Started this over the weekend - new crime fiction after a long break from Stella Duffy.

From the Blurb:

Life is good for Laurie and Martha. They have three great kids, a much-loved home in the countryside, and after years of struggle, Laura's career as an architect is taking off at last. Everything's perfect.

Except, it isn't.

Someone is about to walk into their happy family and tear it apart.

Read this one last week. Obviously behind with the mentions!

From the Blurb:

Diving into my New Zealand piles at the moment, this one became this weekend's reading for no particular reason.

From the Blurb:

He’s lost his wife, his job, and his mana. So what now? A PI? He really couldn’t get used to it. Traipsing around after unfaithful wives and little old ladies’ lost dogs? Was this the future for Carlos Wallace? And what of the beautiful matakite? Wasn’t it a sin to fall in love with your cousin? 

This over the weekend for a number of reasons. Firstly "ice". It was so mind-numbingly, life-threateningly hot here over the weekend I needed distraction. Then although set in Iceland, Nicol is a New Zealander and I'm back reading a lot of NZ fiction at the moment. Finally at 98 or so pages long it was a perfect filler between forays into the stinking horrible heat to try to keep livestock pointing in the right direction.

From the Blurb:

From my weekend's reading, this thriller, first in a series based around US SEAL and a threat to the US mainland.

From the Blurb:

The fate of America lies in the hands of one team of US SEALs. The US mainland is under threat as never before. Osama bin Laden is dead, and the world can relax. Or can they? Remaining leaders of Al-Qaeda want revenge, and they want it against the USA. When good fortune smiles on them and the opportunity presents itself to use stolen weapons of mass destruction, it's Game On! 

It has been hot enough to cook outside - and I don't mean on a BBQ. It's deathly hot in these parts at the moment, so I am getting limited reading down, and not a lot of posting at all whilst we battle with the trials and tribulations of stinking heat and no water. I will catch up. It has to cool down again one day surely! Meanwhile something from the because I want to read it pile.

From the Blurb:

I've been dipping into this collection now for a while, working my way through an amazing range of short stories, all set in Australia, written by local authors harking back to the style of Arthur Conan Doyle. As is always the way there's something for everyone in these.

From the Blurb:

I started this the other night and was enthralled from the start. For our first 2018 f2f bookclub gathering.

From the Blurb:

Heartbreaking, joyous, traumatic, intimate and revelatory, Reckoning is the book where Magda Szubanski, one of Australia’s most beloved performers, tells her story.

Promised myself this would be my Boxing Day Test reading this year - which turned out to be the perfect choice, what with that awful wicket.

From the Blurb:

Say it's not so, but detective squads still put their faith in the whiteboard and texta, brainstorming difficult cases. Like this:

Took a little break over Christmas / New Year. Did some reading (not enough). Did some work around the farm (too much). Melted in the heat (a lot). Drank some ridiculously lovely wine (never enough). Ate chocolate (mind your own business about how much). Read a Stuart MacBride novel that featured Roberta Steel which made me happy.

From the Blurb:

From the No. 1 bestselling author of the Logan McRae series, comes a standalone spinoff featuring DS Roberta Steel

Having now officially completely lost control of Mt TBR I'm randomly picking things based on some criteria or another. So I started this one over the weekend. Not sorry.

From the Blurb:

What happens when a drug dealer is forced to turn detective?

Meet Bill Murdoch, the world's most reluctant private investigator.

A two sitting read from 2017 Ngaio Marsh Award winner. There's something about this author's work ...

From the Blurb:

This has been sitting on the to be read pile for way too long.

From the Blurb:

Five women reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking along the muddy track. Only four come out the other side.

The hike through the rugged Giralang Ranges is meant to take the office colleagues out of their air-conditioned comfort zone and teach resilience and team building. At least that is what the corporate retreat website advertises.

It's been busy in these parts but I have been getting a bit of reading done. Particularly pleased it was this one, straight from the very hard to put down camp.

From the Blurb:

When 25-year-old Bella Michaels is brutally murdered in the small town of Strathdee, the community is stunned and a media storm descends.

I've jumped this up the queue because I needed a bit of a kickstart to get reading seriously again. It's working.

From the Blurb:

In 1999, a number of young women go missing in the Perth suburb of Claremont. One body is discovered. Others are never seen again. Snowy Lane (City of Light) is hired as a private investigator but neither he nor the cops can find the serial killer. Sixteen years later, another case brings Snowy to Broome, where he teams up with Dan Clement (Before It Breaks) and an incidental crime puts them back on the Claremont case.

Another from New Zealand - this time set in a small town hiding lots of old secrets.

From the Blurb:

The body of missing tourist Bethany Haliwell is found in the small Coromandel town of Castle Bay, where nothing bad ever happens. News crews and journalists from all over the country descend on the small seaside town as old secrets are dragged up and gossip is taken as gospel.

Among them is Miller Hatcher, a journalist battling her own demons, who arrives intent on gaining a promotion by covering the grisly murder. 

One from the more recent piles because it intrigued, and now it's really compelling.

From the Blurb:

I've not been getting much reading done for the last couple of weeks as I'm solo farming at the moment. Hopefully that will sort itself out in the next couple of days when my partner returns from an overseas work trip, and I'm taking to a relaxing chair for a few days :)

From the Blurb:

Everyone loves Summer Ryan. A model student and musical prodigy, she's a ray of light in the struggling small town of Grace, Alabama - especially compared to her troubled sister, Raine.

There is no way in this world that a Rowland Sinclair book is going to lurk long on the reading piles around here - started this one last night. Want a Chrysler Airflow already.

From the Blurb:

Book 8 in the Rowland Sinclair Mystery Series.

Set against the glamorous backdrop of the 1930s in Australia and overseas, A Dangerous Language is the latest in the much loved, award winning Rowland Sinclair Mysteries.

I'm blatantly cherry picking from the piles now.

From the Blurb:

Terrorism, politics and betrayals collide in this unputdownable, fast-paced thriller from a highly recognisable political insider.

Picking a few random self-published books from the Ned Kelly submissions in 2017 leds me to the third Inspector West book from SA author, Peter Mulraney.

From the Blurb:

Murder. Arson. Revenge. 

Detective Inspector West investigates the grisly deaths of two elderly priests: one in a suspicious fire; the other obviously murdered. 

The inspector is not the only one hunting the priest killer. 

From the recent reading piles I've been catching up with - strong first book in what's intended as an ongoing series.

From the Blurb:

London, 1863: Women in Waterloo are turning up dead, their sexual organs mutilated and removed. When another girl goes missing, fears grow that the killer may have claimed their latest victim.

The police are at a loss and so it falls to courtesan and professional detective, Heloise Chancey, to investigate.

The bonus about being laid low by illness has definitely been the excellent books to read - this was one of them.

From the Blurb:

When eighteen-year-old Chloe Emery returns to her West London home she finds her mother missing, the house covered in blood. Everything points to murder, except for one thing: there’s no sign of the body.

One from this year's Ned Kelly submission list, set around Warrnambool in Victoria.

From the Blurb:

After a medical mishap, Dr Vince Hanrahan crashes professionally and personally, is all but struck off, and the Medical Board kicks him all the way down the Princes Highway to be a rural GP. Supervised. On notice. He rents a dump, lives off takeaway, and plans to see out his time before regaining his rightful position on the specialist pedestal. 

Just in time for f2f bookclub reading.

From the Blurb:

This one has been sitting there on Mt TBR for a while now, just winking and asking to be read.

From the Blurb:

Welcome to the Misfit Mob…

It’s where Police Scotland dumps the officers it can’t get rid of, but wants to: the outcasts, the troublemakers, the compromised. Officers like DC Callum MacGregor, lumbered with all the boring go-nowhere cases. So when an ancient mummy turns up at the Oldcastle tip, it’s his job to find out which museum it’s been stolen from.

Bittersweet reading. On the one hand I've sort of been hoarding it a little, knowing that this will be the last ever Inspector Anders book, but on the other hand I've been keen to read it. 

From the Blurb:

Inspector Anders of the Rome Police became a hero when he closed down an anarchist group years ago. But in the action he lost a leg - and his nerve. Since then, he's made his moral compromises. Now, battle-weary, he'll do one last job.

Fell over the first in the series via the Ned Kelly listings in recent years - particularly pleased to see a 2nd novel in the series now out.

From the Blurb:

From the weekend's pile - really liked the earlier one in this series.

From the Blurb:

Wisecracking social worker Stella Hardy returns, and this time she’s battling outlaw bikie gangs, corrupt cops, and a powerful hunger for pani puri.

On a stormy Halloween night, Stella gets a call from her best friend, Detective Phuong Nguyen. Phuong has a problem. Or rather her lover, Bruce Copeland, does.

From last week's reading pile.

From the Blurb:

When a body is found buried near the desolate forest road of Kellers Way, Detective Melanie Carter must identify the victim if she is to have any chance of finding the killer. That's no easy task with fragmentary evidence from a crime committed years earlier and a conspiracy of silence from anyone who might have information.

Started this one last night.

From the Blurb:

Neve Ayres has always been so careful. Since her mother’s death when Neve was seven, she’s learned to look after herself and to keep her cards close. But now her deliberately constructed world has collapsed: her partner’s left her when she was eight months pregnant. And so, alone with her newborn son, she’s retreated to her cliff-top holiday house in coastal Flinders.

There, another child comes into her life. 

Second from this weekend's reading pile.

From the Blurb:

A fast-paced international thriller by top Melbourne author of fiction and non-fiction, Roland Perry. This is a sequel to Perry’s first book titled The Honourable Assassin (2015) in a new series of thrillers that incorporate actual events, criminal organisations and key figures in the underworld of Asia as they play out globally, involving international law enforcement and intelligence operations.

Really enjoyed the first of this series, Through a Camel's Eye.

Bobby lay curled like a seahorse, like a puppy… red marks round his throat… facing Swan Island.

The local senior constable, Chris Blackie and his deputy Anthea Merritt, expect the murder investigation to be handled by Geelong-based detectives from the Criminal Investigation Unit. But they’re blind-sided by the interest personnel from the secret military training base on Swan Island take in the case, strongly suspecting that the Detective Inspector may be taking direction from them.

A slight change of setting - moving to Tokyo and a book by an American Professor of Literature and author resident in Tokyo.

From the Blurb:

Detective Hiroshi Shimizu investigates white collar crime in Tokyo. He’s lost his girlfriend and still dreams of his time studying in America, but with a stable job, his own office and a half-empty apartment, he’s settled in. 

I did some housekeeping over the weekend. The sort where you sweep all the books off the pile to be read and pluck out one that you really want to read. I did restack the pile again and promise I'm doing some catching up with badly overdue review books. But it was nice to get some tidying up done :)

From the Blurb:

Deaf since early childhood, Caleb Zelic is used to meeting life head-on. Now, he’s struggling just to get through the day. His best mate is dead, his ex-wife, Kat, is avoiding him, and nightmares haunt his waking hours.

One from the should have read this ages ago pile.

From the Blurb:

To her clients and colleagues, Iris is a therapist in a city psychology practice. But to the police and fire services, she is the Fire Lady – a profiler of arsonists.

After a troubled young man burns down her office, Iris just wants a quiet life. But her peace is shattered when a bomb goes off at a local school. Called in to help, Iris meets James, delusional and dangerous, and Chuck, a lone investigator tracking a serial arsonist he calls Zorro.

Whilst not "strictly" crime fiction this is a fascinating intertwining tale that had me up way past when I should have nodded off last night.

From the Blurb:

When Madeleine d’Leon conjures Ned McGinnity as the hero in her latest crime novel, she makes him a serious writer simply because the irony of a protagonist who’d never lower himself to read the story in which he stars, amuses her.

When Ned McGinnity creates Madeleine d’Leon, she is his literary device, a writer of detective ction who is herself a mystery to be unravelled.

The second novel out of New Zealand I've been able to read that explores the after-affects of crime. Let's hope this is not just a glitch in the continuum as both of these novels now have been thought-provoking and challenging.

From the Blurb:

This has been languishing on the pile for Way. Too. Long.

From the Blurb:

One year on and Pufferfish - aka Detective Inspector Franz Heineken - remains haunted by his failure to apprehend the killer of a young Hobart woman. Every time he sees a merchant vessel leaving the city's port he thinks of Angie, because that's how her murderer escaped. And that merchant seaman may still be coming and going with impunity, waiting for another opportunity.

The best part about playing catchup is getting to read some very good examples of different sub-genres.

From the Blurb:

Another from last week's reading - to be reviewed at http://www.newtownreviewofbooks.com

From the Blurb:

A hot summer. A shocking murder. A town of secrets, waiting to explode. A brooding, suspenseful and explosive debut that will grip you from the first page to the last.

Had a bit of a break from work last week so I'm behind with posting these. This was one of those books that I have been looking forward to, set in a part of the world that's not a million miles from home - then and now.

From the Blurb:

In the long, hot summer of 1989, Ben and Fab are best friends.

Started reading this one from the badly neglected to be read pile last night.

From the Blurb:

Political journalist Nick Hunter suddenly loses his memory. He can't find his wallet, his computer password or even his name. When it comes to women it's even more confusing. Does he have a lover or a wife?

Re-started this late on Sunday, the first in the Dan Forrester series.

From the Blurb:

Dan Forrester, piecing his life back together after the tragic death of his son, is approached in a supermarket by a woman who tells him everything he remembers about his life - and his son - is a lie.

Grace Reavey, stricken by grief, is accosted at her mother's funeral. The threat is simple: pay the staggering sum her mother allegedly owed, or lose everything.

Late in mentioning this one, particularly as I've been reading and re-reading it a couple of times now.

From the Blurb:

Murder, political intrigue, bent cops and the fate of a nation - a thriller set in the murky underworld of 1951 New Zealand.

A man overboard, a murder and a lot of loose ends ...

In Auckland 1951 the workers and the government are heading for bloody confrontation and the waterfront is the frontline. But this is a war with more than two sides and nothing is what it seems.

Was extremely fortunate to read this over the weekend. Beautifully written story about not just the trial but the legal mind behind so much that we take for granted (and should be grateful for) in this country.

From the Blurb:

One of the most shocking murder trials in Australia's legal history, and the tribulations of the man who conducted it

Another from the greatly overdue pile.

From the Blurb:

A chance encounter in a fish-’n’-chip shop set Brendan Murray on the trail of a mystery. Had a gay man been secretly murdered on HMAS Australia during the Second World War?

The veteran he spoke to was certain. ‘I knew about it,’ he said. ‘We all did.’

But was the story true? If so, who was the dead man? And why was it so hard to find out?

Second from the weekend's reading pile - this time about detector dog Elsie, written by her handler Steve Kelleher.

From the Blurb:

The final from this weekend's reading pile.

From the Blurb:

Meet BADNE$$. He's the enigmatic, impulsive, exasperating, destructive, big-hearted Aussie outlaw who stole millions of dollars in daring bank robberies and became a folk hero as big as Ned Kelly when he masterminded two spectacular prison breaks in the space of six weeks.

From over the weekend's reading pile - one about the Calabrian Mafia in Australia and the largest haul of ecstasy in the world.

From the Blurb:

Bestselling writer and organised-crime expert Keith Moor takes us behind the headlines of the world's biggest seizure of ecstasy to expose a sophisticated mafia network in Australia.

Read this over the weekend in time for next week's f2f bookclub gathering (which is a change recently - I'm started and finished the book!)

From the Blurb:

Narrator Don Tillman 39, Melbourne genetics prof and Gregory Peck lookalike, sets a 16-page questionnaire The Wife Project to find a non-smoker, non-drinker ideal match. But Rosie and her Father Project supersede. The spontaneous always-late smoker-drinker wants to find her biological father. She resets his clock, throws off his schedule, and turns his life topsy-turvy.

Another from the weekend's reading - particularly interesting as this is something I'd not known a lot about beforehand.

From the Blurb:

A gritty and compelling account of an elite police group, the Middle Eastern Organised Crime Squad (MEOCS).

One from a long weekend pretty much spent reading.

From the Blurb:

The powerful true story of the first police officer to lift the lid on police corruption in Queensland and what then happened to him.

'Wherever there is power and money, there is always the risk of corruption. But everyone has a choice: to become involved or to take a stand against it.'

Colin Dillon is an extraordinary man. He was the first Indigenous policeman in Australia. But that is actually a very small part of his story.

From the recent reading list.

From the Blurb:

'A - Assume nothing. B - Believe nothing. C - Check everything.' Ron Iddles

In an incredible twenty-five year career as a homicide detective, Ron Iddles' conviction rate was 99%. Yet that only partly explains why Iddles is known to cops and crims alike as 'The Great Man'.

A new series from Ned Kelly winning author Alan Carter, this time set in New Zealand.

From the Blurb:

Nick Chester is working as a sergeant for the Havelock police in the Marlborough Sound, at the top of New Zealand’s South Island. If the river isn’t flooded and the land hasn’t slipped, it’s paradise. Unless you are also hiding from a ruthless man with a grudge, in which case, remote beauty has its own kind of danger. In the last couple of weeks, two local boys have vanished. Their bodies are found, but the Pied Piper is still at large.

Another from the weekend's reading - thriller set in Columbia, written with a human rights perspective.

From the Blurb:

When Luzma’s brother Jair unwittingly uncovers the plan by Colombia’s most notorious drug cartel to smuggle an unprecedented cocaine shipment into the US, it puts their family in grave danger.

Read this one last week and spent most of the time reading it laughing.

From the Blurb:

"Him: But he did buy you a castle. 

Her: That's okay I can build my own castle out of the fucks I no longer give." 

Meet Eva Destruction, the only thing quicker than her mouth is her talent for getting into trouble. It’s true she’s always had an eye for a bad boy but when she falls for billionaire super-villain Harry Lancing, it seems that even Eva may have bitten off more than she can chew. 

Catching up on some recently read books - this is historical romance / crime fiction from New Zealander Author, Jude Knight.

From the Blurb:

Prue's job is to uncover secrets, but she hides a few of her own. When she is framed for murder and cast into Newgate, her one-time lover comes to her rescue. Will revealing what she knows help in their hunt for blackmailers, traitors, and murderers? Or threaten all she holds dear? 

This is a long book so I've been reading it alongside others for a while now.

From the Blurb:

This non-fiction book explores the true story of H Division, the punishment division within Pentridge Prison, Melbourne, that operated from 1958-1994, which was responsible for cultivating criminals who committed horrific crimes upon their release. 

I read this recently. 

From the Blurb:

A false accusation. A brutal murder. Can Ngaire find a killer before he finds her?

Ngaire Blakes is trying to put her life back together. The ex-cop resigned from the police after a vicious assault left her battling PTSD. Dragged into a murder investigation, she’s shocked to discover that all the evidence points to her.

Started reading this legal based thriller over the weekend.

From the Blurb:

When feisty lawyer Sasha Stace secures the acquittal of a sleazy politician charged with rape, it’s one legal victory too many. Disillusioned, she looks to the High Court bench for more fulfillment. But before she can become a judge, there’s one more criminal defense – a trial with complications, a trial like no other. 

Another from the weekend's reading pile - which wasn't that big unfortunately this time around, bit busy and then next weekend's Eurovision so other than hiding from the media on Sunday before the telecast - will be too flat out cooking :)

From the Blurb:

A funny, disturbing, and deeply affecting novel of power, corruption, and innocence in colonial Africa, by the author of Terms & Conditions.

From the stack of books recently read.

From the Blurb:

It is almost two years since wildfires ravaged the tiny town of Bullock, and Melbourne journalist, Georgie Harvey, is on assignment in the recovering town to write a feature story on the anniversary of the tragedy.

In nearby Daylesford, police officer, John Franklin, is investigating a spree of vandalism and burglaries, while champing to trade his uniform for the plain clothes of a detective.

Picked this one up recently - billed as comic farce.

From the Blurb:

A desolate valley.

A missing mathematician.

A glamorous and beguiling council bureaucrat with a hidden past.

A cryptic map leading to an impossible labyrinth.

An ancient conspiracy; an ancient evil.

A housing development without proper planning permission.

All leading to the most mysterious mystery of all.

First from the last weekend's reading.

From the Blurb:

A cryptic message left next to a charred corpse in the middle of Reykjavík leaves police worried they have a gang war on their hands.

Across town Detective Grímur Karlsson investigates a missing girl from a nice suburban family and gets far too close to the truth for his own good. 

It becomes clear the two cases are connected and Karlsson doggedly pursues the trail that leads from junkies on the seedy streets of Reykjavík all the way to the very top of Icelandic society. 

Second from the weekend's reading.

From the Blurb:

Detective Jim Kelleher's daughter Annie is a teenage prostitute who's addicted to crystal meth but in his eyes she's still a lamb being preyed upon by wolves. He feels she's far too close to her Polynesian gangster boyfriend and the motorcycle gang and the triads he deals drugs with... and is there even some more forbidden cargo? Meanwhile, Jim's new partner Stuart has the unenviable task of trying to stop Jim from falling victim to the same temptations he's trying to save his daughter from.

From the weekend's reading selections.

From the Blurb:

From the weekend's reading.

From the Blurb:

London in the 1770s is bursting with opportunity. It's a city fuelled by new ideas and new money, where everything is for sale - including entree into the ruling class.

Second from the weekend's reading.

From the Blurb:

Solikha Duong lives the carefree life of a village girl in northern Cambodia until her world is torn apart by ‘truck men’ from the south. But Solikha is tough, resourceful, and won’t give up without a fight ...

Alice Kwann is on vacation when she’s set upon by thugs at a stopover in northern Nevada. But Alice too is tough, resourceful, and won’t give up without a fight ...

Final from the weekend's pile.

From the Blurb:

Grammy night, 2021. Ruby wins 'Best Song' and makes an impulsive acceptance speech that excites nature lovers across the world. While Ruby and her band celebrate, an extreme evangelical sect, funded by covert paymasters, dispatches a disciple on a ruthless mission to England.

As the band plays its sold-out tour, Ruby is pursued by eco-groupies insisting she use her new fame to fight climate change.

One from the Easter break where not enough reading was done.

From the Blurb:

When a woman's body is discovered frozen in the ice of a river near the alpine resort of Queenstown, Detective Sergeant Malcolm Buchan faces both a mystery and a moral dilemma. The identity of the nude woman is critical to the motives and manner of her murder, and Buchan is personally involved. So are a number of locals, from ski bums to multi-millionaire businessman.

Another from the over Easter pile.

From the Blurb:

A beautiful New Zealand summer. An ugly past that won’t stay buried.

Paediatric surgeon Claire Bowerman has reluctantly returned to Auckland from London. Calm, rational and in control, she loves delicately repairing her small patients’ wounds. Tragically, wounds sometimes made by the children’s own families.

Final dip into the #yeahnoir pile for the weekend.

From the Blurb:

Rachel McManus has just started at the New Zealand Alarm and Response Ministry. One of the few females working there, she is forced to traverse the peculiarities of Wellington bureaucracy, lascivious colleagues, and decades of sedimented hierarchy. She has the chance to prove herself by investigating a suspected terrorist, who they fear is radicalising impressionable youth and may carry out an attack himself on the nation's capital. 

Second from the NZ list over the weekend - this is another in what's an increasing number of books from that part of the world exploring consequences.

From the Blurb:

A bit of a chilly, sometimes showery weekend meant any excuse for some reading - and this was the standout of the entire bunch.

From the Blurb:

Bobby Ress is a cop.

He believes in God and making a difference. 

He loves his wife and he loves his daughter. 

He has a place in the world. 

A change of format / style from all the crime fiction I've been reading lately - and a local true crime book about the goings on in the Health Services Union.

From the Blurb:

Kathy Jackson was hailed as a heroine for blowing the whistle on the million-dollar fraud of Michael Williamson, the corrupt boss of the Health Services Union. While remaining steadfast in this very public ordeal, she endured bitter personal attacks from enemies in the Labor Party and the union movement.

But what if Jackson was just as corrupt as Williamson? Or worse?

Picked this one up on the weekend - so far rather engaging read.

From the Blurb:

A small community, broken families, a bloody murder, and an ending you won’t see coming 

When Frida Delaney returns home to New Zealand after a self-imposed exile the last thing she expects to find is her neighbour’s bloody body and to be caught up in a murder inquiry. An inquiry that reaches into the darkest side of politics, financial conspiracy and families. 

Started this one on Sunday night - first in the Ngaire Blakes series.

From the Blurb:

Forty years ago Magdalene Lynton drowned in a slurry. She choked to death as her hands scrabbled for purchase on the smooth concrete walls. A farmhand discovered her bloated body three days later.

Or she didn't.

Paul Worthington just confessed to her murder.

Forty years ago Magdalene Lynton died in a dirty shed. He smothered her life along with her cries for help and tossed her defiled corpse into a river when he was done.

Or he didn't.

From the weekend's reading list.

From the Blurb:

On 2 December 2010, the body of a 24-year-old woman was found at the bottom of the rubbish chute in the luxury Balencea tower apartments in St Kilda Road, Melbourne, twelve floors below the apartment she had shared with her boyfriend, Antony Hampel.

Slipping this one in as a bit of a change of pace from fiction.

From the Blurb:

In this tell-all book, discover how the justice system works and why, at times, the innocent are convicted and the guilty set free.

Bill Hosking looks back at his career as a criminal barrister in a candid account of his time at the bar. He tells the true story behind some of his most famous cases, including the Hilton bombings, ‘Toecutter’ Jimmy Driscoll’s attempt to avoid prison time, and the Anita Cobby trial.

Long weekend reading part 1

From the Blurb:

Long weekend reading part 3.

From the Blurb:

Set against a backdrop of actual events in 1995, Martyn Percival, a middle-aged New Zealander, seeks adventure on his first OE to the United Kingdom. A chance sighting, providing a possible link between an explosion that has rocked the nation and the whereabouts of a renegade IRA operative, has Martyn reporting his suspicions to an attractive police sergeant in the Cotswolds. 

Part 2 of the long weekend's reading.

From the Blurb:

From 1977 to the end of 1986, Duncan McNab was a member of the NSW Police Force. Most of his service was in criminal investigation. The many unsolved deaths and disappearances of young gay men are the crimes that continue to haunt him.

Another from the Ngaio Marsh piles - this time a police procedural styled book set in Auckland.

From the Blurb:

This is more of a novella - entered in the 2017 Ngaio Marsh Awards.

From the Blurb:

Started this NZ based story on the weekend.

From the Blurb:

The New Zealand government – led by autocratic Prime Minister Wynyard Nairn – approves the establishment of a USA naval facility, and in the middle of Wellington’s pristine harbour.

Given the anti-nuclear stance in the country, all hell breaks out!

Fun read for next month's f2f bookclub

From the Blurb:

From the author of The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared comes a picaresque tale of how one person's actions can have far-reaching-even global-consequences On June 14, 2007, the king and the prime minister of Sweden went missing from a gala banquet at the royal castle. Later it was said that both had fallen ill, but the truth is different. 

This comes with a lot of very positive press and comments. It certainly starts off in the unusual manner that I've come to expect from really good Scandinavian crime fiction.

From the Blurb:

Sometimes life is very unreasonable. I've been reading Ragdoll now for a few days and having to put it down to ... work, eat, sleep, do stuff is really start to become very bloody annoying.

From the Blurb:

A body is discovered with the dismembered parts of six victims stitched together like a puppet, nicknamed by the press as the 'ragdoll'.

Assigned to the shocking case are Detective William 'Wolf' Fawkes, recently reinstated to the London Met, and his former partner Detective Emily Baxter.

What's this doing on a crime fiction site? Well everyone's entitled a holiday and for me, a summer spent with Jim Maxwell and the rest of the ABC cricket commentary team is one of my favourites. I was very relieved to hear Jim's wonderful voice back on the radio this year, albeit somewhat limited due to his ongoing health problems, but there was this book to fill in some of the gaps as well. And you can read this with Jim's intonation in your head if you're of a mind, and probably some think, mildly batty enough.

The third Frank Swann book - the setting is wonderfully done - and oddly nostalgic :)

From the Blurb:

It’s the early 1980s: the heady days of excess, dirty secrets and personal favours. Former detective Frank Swann is still in disgrace, working as a low-rent PI. But when he’s offered a security job by the premier’s fixer, it soon becomes clear that someone is bugging the premier’s phone – and it may cost Swann more than his job to find out why.

f2f Bookclub Read

From the Blurb:

Set in Singapore between the 1970’s and 1990’s, Inheritance follows the familial fissures that develop after teenaged Amrit disappears in the middle of the night. Although her absence is brief, she returns as a different person.

Have been hiding out from computers, reading a lot and catching up on a lot of nothing in the lead up to returning to work tomorrow. So a catchup on the reading list before then.

From the Blurb:

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who believed in fairytales. Now she is out to get your happy ending.

One day changes Jody's life forever.

She has shut herself down, haunted by her memories and unable to trust anyone. But then she meets Abe, the perfect stranger next door and suddenly life seems full of possibility and hope.

Another that's been lingering on the reading piles way too long.

From the Blurb:

Everyone keeps telling me I have to move on. And so here I am, walking down the road where he died, trying to remember him the right way.

A year after her husband Zach's death, Lizzie goes to lay flowers where his fatal accident took place.

As she makes her way along the motorway, she thinks about their life together. She wonders whether she has changed since Zach died. She wonders if she will ever feel whole again.

Bittersweet experience reading this - the last Cliff Hardy novel.

From the Blurb:

A missing teenager, drugs, yachts, the sex trade and a cold trail that leads from Sydney to Norfolk Island, Byron Bay and Coolangatta. Can Cliff Hardy find out what's really going on?

Will one man's loss be Hardy's gain?

'I'd read about it in the papers, heard the radio reports and seen the TV coverage and then forgotten about it, the way you do with news stories.'

This one came highly recommended so I've been trying to shuffle it up the list for a while now.

From the Blurb:

When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does what anyone would do: he Googles the name on her credit card.

This was a bit of a personal treat read.

From the Blurb:

Another that's been lurking on the piles for way too long. Perhaps that should be the New Year's Resolution - more reading!

From the Blurb:

A gripping suspenseful thriller with journalist Noel Baker who, after reading a particularly disturbing coroner’s report, investigates the deaths of a group of abused children. The killer is still on the loose…

This was a brilliant reading experience, and a history lesson into the bargain. Intricate but fascinating.

From the Blurb:

Charles Levin, Detective Leo Junker’s mentor — and the same man who betrayed Leo — is dead.

Now Leo must find out why. He must follow the thread of the dead man’s own tragedies, which will lead inexorably to the betrayal of Charles Levin’s soul — and the soul of his nation.

This is a series that has been on my radar for a while, and of course, I've been slow in getting to it and I'm starting with Book 2.

From the Blurb:

Sometimes reliving the past revives old demons . . .

In a Stockholm apartment, five-year-old Tilde watches from under the kitchen table as her mother is brutally kicked to death.

Meanwhile, in another part of town, psychotherapist Siri Bergman and her colleague Aina meet their new patients - a group of women, all of whom are victims of domestic violence.

Picked this up over the weekend - lordy it's good. For review at http://www.newtownreviewofbooks.com.au

From the Blurb:

Lot of sitting around waiting recently - so an ebook, and something set in Asia for a change.

From the Blurb:

Good and bad. Life and death. Some choices aren't black and white

A grief-stricken young mother switches her dead baby for an abused child, then spends the next decade living a lie. She remarries and starts to feel safe when she gets a note: 'I know what you did'. Can she save her family from her dark secret?

Time to immerse myself again in Scandinavian crime fiction, although this is a re-read of a book that's been recently re-released. The first in the Stubo and Vik series.

From the Blurb:

From the embarrassingly overdue pile...

From the Blurb:

When Brigitte and her family moved from the city, they were supposed to be happier. And safer. But soon her crime-writer ex-boyfriend turns up in town to promote his new novel, in which a woman is found dead — murdered — in a country lake. Hours later, Brigitte watches the police pull a body from the water near her Gippsland home.

2nd in the really enjoyable Mason & Dixie series - set in Thailand and the trans-gender community. 

From the Blurb:

Bangkok private eye duo Mason & Dixie are hired to provide protection to Australian soap opera star Belle Cooper, who came under vicious attack from the moment she announced her participation in a Bangkok pageant.

This is one I will admit I've been trying to read for a while. Interesting snippets of life at that time, surrounded by enormous amounts of Lady this and Lord whoever type gossipy stuff that was a boring as...

From the Blurb:

Perfect filler read around weekend activities.

From the Blurb:

1928

After eight years abroad, Rowland Sinclair has come home to a house he hates, and a city which seems conservative ... and dull. 

He longs to return to the bright lights of Europe. Until an old friend persuades him to join Sydney Art School. 

There, under the tutelage of the renowned Julian Ashton, Rowland learns to paint and finds himself drawn into the avant-garde world of Sydney’s artistic set. 

Time for a change as I've been reading a lot of local or straight-forward crime fiction recently. This from an author who is known for their blend of psychological horror and realism.

From the Blurb:

For generations, the urban legend of Granny Hatchet has plagued the quiet residential area of Suvikylä in northern Finland. As the story goes, this immortal killer murders her victims with a hatchet, then buries the hearts in a potato field and eats them after they’ve rotted black. But not everyone is convinced it is just a story.

The fifth in the Dody McCleland series - murder, investigation, women's rights and some crossroads for both McCleland and Pike.

From the Blurb:

The fifth in the Dr Dodi McCleland series - Agatha Christie meets Phryne Fisher

A wonderful collection of writings from a range of inmates in the Junee Correctional Centre. Heart-felt, confrontational, often extremely raw, this is the sort of collection of writings that you need to take your time with, dip in and out of, re-read and think about. More to come on this wonderful volume.

From the Press Release:

Latest from the review pile - this time for http://www.reviewingtheevidence.com

From the Blurb:

Home can be the most dangerous place of all...

In this chilling psychological thriller, one woman’s dark past becomes another’s deadly future.

In 2003, sixteen-year-old Rebecca Winter disappeared.

Read both of these in preparation for our next f2f bookclub meeting. I predict an excellent discussion.

From the Blurb - To Kill a Mockingbird:

I'm an idiot and I'm now two books from different series by author Felicity Young behind. So last night I tossed a coin to decide which one comes first - Flare-Up it is, to be followed closely by A Donation of Murder.

From the Blurb:

Outback murders, dodgy thieves, organised crime and arson - a small outback community is crackling with nerves, as Cam Fraser investigates.

I have been intrigued about this book since first mentioned.

From the Blurb:

The gripping and graphic true story of Sydney's underbelly.

The verdict is guilty.

So far, I'm really liking this one...

From the Blurb:

Bashir “Bish” Ortley is a London desk cop. Almost over it. Still not dealing with the death of his son years ago, as well as the break-up of his marriage. 

Across the channel, a summer bus tour, carrying a group of English teenagers is subject to a deadly bomb attack, killing four of the passengers and injuring a handful of others. Bish’s daughter is one of those on board. 

Profoundly personal retelling of a family torn apart by a suicide and then a triple murder.

From the Blurb:

This powerful, unforgettable and uplifting story is one part wrenching family memoir, and one part inspirational journey towards healing and forgiveness – but most of all, it’s an unputdownable journey through one family’s tragedy and how they refused to let it define them.

If there's two things this last bout of extreme weather has taught me - don't try to use the much vaunted SkyMuster for anything and don't think you'll get much reading done when you're running around digging trenches for water to run off.

From the Blurb:

Peter Tanner left the flashy world of commercial law following the tragic death of his wife. Now, as a criminal defence barrister, he crosses paths with some of the less desirable but wealthy members of the nation’s underbelly.

Another from the been waiting far too long pile.

From the Blurb:

A week of despair... a century of evil

Damaged but not yet broken, park ranger Taylor Bridges believes his ghosts are in the past - until a raging forest fire in an isolated canyon of The Falls lays bare the remains of a young woman… and a decade-old killing ground.

After the police enlist Taylor in their investigation, the evidence bizarrely points to a deranged preacher who reigned over The Falls a century ago.

There should be no doubt whatsoever that the reason for reading this is that I'm a big fan of Candice Fox's work.

From the Blurb:

When Sydney police department sex crimes detective Harriet Blue is called into her boss’s office, she never imagined it would be to tell her that her brother is the prime suspect in the brutal murders of three women.

Another from last week's reading - opening salvo in the Holger Munch & Mia Kruger series.

From the Blurb:

A six year old girl is found hanging from a tree. Around her neck is an airline tag which says 'I'm travelling alone'.

A special homicide unit in Oslo is re-opened with veteran police investigator Holger Munch at the helm. He must convince his erstwhile partner, Mia Kruger, an extremely talented but eccentric investigator, to leave the solitary island to which she has retreated in order to take her own life.

Having just had a week off to work on the property, didn't quite achieve the numbers of books to be read that I'd hoped.

From the Blurb:

Carly Townsend is starting over after a decade of tragedy and pain. In a new town and a new apartment she's determined to leave the memories and failures of her past behind. 

However that dream is shattered in the dead of night when she is woken by the shadow of a man next to her bed, silently watching her. And it happens week after week.

From the increasing true crime stacks.

From the Blurb:

When Don Osborne went to Pentridge in 1970, he found a nineteenth-century penal establishment in full working order. It held about 1200 inmates, most of them cooped up in tiny stone cells that sweltered in summer and froze in winter. Some had no sewerage or electric light.

Catching up on the backlist as much as I can - this has been in the queue for a while now.

From the Blurb:

A suicide.

A secret.

To the grave.

That was the promise that ten girls made many years ago, and now the time has come when they will be forced to make a choice. Keep the secret and lose their lives, or reveal it and risk the lives of others.

I've been wanting to see what the buzz was about - particularly as it's a debut and there have been some stonkingly good debuts around recently.

From the Blurb:

Sixteen years. That’s how long Clyde Barr has been away from Colorado’s thick forests, alpine deserts, and craggy peaks, running from a past filled with haunting memories. But now he’s back, having roamed across three continents as a hunter, adventurer, soldier of fortune, and most recently, unjustly imprisoned convict. And once again, his past is reaching out to claim him.

This is more of a have read, than an am reading, as I tore through this very rapidly.

From the Blurb:

Sophie is haunted by the things she can't remember - and visions from the past she will never forget. One morning, she wakes to find that the little boy in her care is dead. She has no memory of what happened. And whatever the truth, her side of the story is no match for the evidence piled against her. Her only hiding place is in a new identity. A new life, with a man she has met online. But Sophie is not the only one keeping secrets ...

Having had a stellar run of reading recently I've been doing a fair amount of starting, and then not being able to go on with books this week. Nothing to do with the books.

From the Blurb:

These are the true and uncensored accounts of Australia’s hardest inmates, from Australia’s hardest inmates.

Started reading this a few nights ago and as much as I say I'm not really one for paranormal, this is a great, Australian "blokey" paranormal series.

From the Blurb:

Freelance journalist Harry Hendrick is beginning to realise that you’re only as good as your last exclusive, and buzz doesn’t pay the bills, when he’s blackmailed by the police into investigating a series of bizarre suicides.

It rained over the weekend so I gave myself a treat to celebrate.

From the Blurb:

Rebecca Thorne is a successful television journalist, but her world is thrown into turmoil when her Saturday night programme is axed because of falling ratings. Not only will she lose her job but her big story on the convicted triple murderer Connor Bligh, whom Rebecca believes is innocent, has to be abandoned.

It was still rainy on Sunday so I continued the celebration.

From the Blurb:

Giverny. During the day, tourists flock to the former home of the famous artist Claude Monet and the gardens where he painted his Water Lilies. But when silence returns, there is a darker side to the peaceful French village.

If somebody could explain to me why the hell I waited so long to read this book then I'd be eternally grateful.

From the Blurb:

It starts in a suburban backyard with Darren Keefe and his older brother, sons of a fierce and gutsy single mother. The endless glow of summer, the bottomless fury of contest. All the love and hatred in two small bodies poured into the rules of a made-up game.

A personal story, written by victim's friend, 40 years after the killing of a young woman in Rockhampton, Queensland.

From the Blurb:

Author Shirley Eldridge and Mima Joan McKim-Hill were friends and colleagues working for the Capricornia Regional Electricity Board in Rockhampton in 1967 when Mima

disappeared while on the job. She had been abducted, raped and murdered and her body abandoned.

Second book read in the latter part of our week off.

From the Blurb:

A tiny tropical paradise off the coast of Australia, Norfolk Island is notoriously laid-back, its inhabitants friendly and independent-minded. They have to be—with no defences and no way to get immediate assistance from the mainland, Norfolk’s population learned to be self-reliant.

This was from last week's holiday reading - probably should mention that it went particularly well with a very good Pyrenees Cab Sav.

From the Blurb:

Can you become someone else without the world noticing? 

When David's wife confesses that she was once a prostitute, the revelation doesn't disturb him - he considers it simply an error of youth. But the following night David collapses from a rare brain disease and within a few months his world is turned upside down.

I will not for a moment pretend that this isn't a treat read, a reward for getting to the end of the holiday and pretty much avoiding everything that we were supposed to do.

From the Blurb:

Sergeant Logan McRae is in trouble…

Perfect little filler and lead in to Drainland

From the Blurb:

A political operative in search of a Senator’s wayward son. A vice-ridden tropical island. This case is way, way too much…

John Dannen is a mysterious and violent man, employed by a powerful Senator. The Senator’s son is causing trouble and even worse, he’s doing it on Tunnel Island, a neon hell-hole run by gambling conglomerates, organized crime and a corrupt police force. But the case is simple enough: hand-deliver a message, get out alive..

To be reviewed at http://www.newtownreviewofbooks.com.au

From the Blurb:

WHO REALLY KILLED THE HADLER FAMILY?

Luke Hadler turns a gun on his wife and child, then himself. The farming community of Kiewarra is facing life and death choices daily. If one of their own broke under the strain, well ...

Another from this week's reading pile, which is, to be honest, from the very overdue section.

From the Blurb:

The Alo Release is a thriller exposing the potential for public opinion to be manipulated during an international crisis.

Nine days before the global release of a genetically modified seed coating set to make starvation history, the IT advisor for an environmental group receives a cryptic email from an old friend working for the seed corporation.

Attempting a bit of a week off work - which should mean a bit of catching up on reading. She says hoping.

From the Blurb:

On the night Leo Stone returns—notionally from the dead, in reality from the Democratic Republic of the Congo—Cass Tuplin gets a call from Gary Kellett. A call about an actual dead person: Gary’s daughter, killed in a car crash. Gary’s adamant it wasn’t an accident.

Another from the go away I'm busy pile...

From the Blurb:

'It was suffocatingly hot, and the audience of howling children was viciously indifferent to the violence being done to my integrity as an artist by every ghastly syllable I was obliged to utter and by every mincing step I was obliged to take. As the foul smell of the ancient wig I was wearing wafted into my nostrils, I began to view the bombing of Darwin with something like nostalgia.'

Due out in September, but there's only so much alluring sitting around a book like this can do before a reader just has to sit down and read the thing.

From the Blurb:

A heist thriller set in Queensland, Melbourne and Thailand. Think Richard Stark's Parker, Garry Disher's Wyatt, and Wallace Stroby's Crissa Stone. Add a touch of Surfers Paradise sleaze and a very dangerous stopover in Asia.

From now until the final page is turned on this one be warned. I really don't care what anybody else wants, unless it's a life-threatening emergency, I'm busy.

From the Blurb:

I was "patiently" waiting for my partner to finish this one after we were lucky enough to see the author talk about the book at an event in Dunnolly. And then a heap of other books snuck in front. I've still got some that should be being read right now, but I really wanted to read this so it's my "treat of the month".

From the Blurb:

Last night I was all set for a watch of Le Tour de France. Love the stages in the mountains, for the scenery as much as the tactical team riding. But then I picked up DEVOUR, devoured the first 50 pages and lost track of the tour shenanigans completely. Fell asleep with the book on my nose.

From the Blurb:

Their greatest fear was contaminating an ancient Antarctic lake, buried beneath the ice for millions of years. They little knew about the catastrophe they were about to unleash.

Welcome to the high octane world of Olivia Wolfe.

I started reading this before this current cold snap - but now it's feeling oddly apocalyptic.

From the Blurb:

When environmental scientist Laura Alvarado is sent to a remote Antarctic island to report on an abandoned whaling station, she begins to uncover more than she could ever imagine.

Reminders of the bloody, violent past are everywhere, and Laura is disturbed by evidence of recent human interference. Rules have been broken, and the protected wildlife is behaving strangely.

Attempting to read this one over the weekend for our next f2f bookclub gathering.

From the Blurb:

As a young woman, Roseanne McNulty was one of the most beautiful and beguiling girls in County Sligo, Ireland. Now, as her hundredth year draws near, she is a patient at Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital, and she decides to record the events of her life.