Friday Update: The Reading Queue (3rd July)

Be careful who you cross.

Evin leads a quiet, orderly life as a classic motorcycle restorer in a small seaside town. Until she witnesses a gang-affiliate’s nasty little secret. A body washes up on the coast several days later, dragging her further into a dangerous maelstrom. Turns out Evin was one of the last people to see the victim alive.

For a humble and reserved character this is wholly unfamiliar territory. Though skilled and capable when tinkering with old bikes, her life swerves into bewildering chaos as she confronts the violence and increasing darkness of her situation.

Forced to take perilous counter-measures this reluctant hero risks everything, descending to places she’s never imagined and entrusting her ultimate survival to one of the machines she herself has created.

When exhausted new mother Frida attends Baby Rhyme Time at the local library, she feels a sense of purpose that has been lacking in her anxious, apartment-bound, sleep-deprived life. But at the end of the session a piercing scream is heard, followed by the thump of a body, and the library becomes a crime scene.

Before long, Frida finds herself part of an unlikely group of sleuths investigating the murder. Between gossip and cups of magic at their local cafe, they are too busy having fun to realise how close they are to danger . . .

When human remains are discovered in a forest, police are baffled, the locals are shocked and one group of old friends starts to panic. Their long-held secret is about to be uncovered.

It all began in 1999 when sixteen-year-old Aaron ran away from home, drawing his friends into an unforeseeable chain of events that no one escaped from unscathed.

In The Ledge, past and present run breathlessly parallel, leading to a cliff-hanger nobody will see coming. This is a mind-bending new novel from the master of the unexpected.

On the Coral Coast of Western Australia, solo traveller Katy is on a mission to find her free-spirited sister, Phoebe, who disappeared along the same route a year ago. But as she drives her campervan further into the wild north, Katy realises she's not as alone as she'd first believed. Soon she is pulled into a complicated web of secrets, lies, myths and stories that force her to question everything she thought she knew about her sister.

In this nerve-shredding outback thriller, our obsessions with freedom and beauty collide with our fear of what lies in the wilderness, and the truth behind Phoebe's disappearance proves stranger and darker than Katy could ever have guessed...

A wickedly twisty and atmospheric thriller set at a writers' retreat in the South of France, The Writers Retreat is Knives Out meets Anna Downes’ The Safe Place from an exciting new voice in the thriller/mystery space.

Welcome to The Writers Retreat – a creative haven for writers to hone their plotlines and sharpen their characters while soaking up the Provençal atmosphere. But this year’s retreat offers something different, as real-life blurs with fiction, and suspense isn't contained to the page.

Kat Hale is a bestselling Australian author crumbling under the pressure of writing her second novel. On a whim, she has fled to a writers retreat in the South of France run by internationally acclaimed author Helen Thorne. What Kat hopes will be two blissfully uninterrupted weeks to focus on her writing in anonymity quickly turns into something more sinister, when Kat begins to suspect that Helen isn't quite as perfect as everyone seems to believe.

Will Kat’s drive to uncover the truth about Helen be any match for Helen’s desire to hold onto her career, her reputation and her writing retreat, or is Kat at risk of falling victim to a more dangerous climax?

In the harbour city of New Plymouth in the 1960s there’s a fizz of seedy sexuality beneath a veneer of respectability. Godfrey’s world is the Balmoral Hotel his parents own, where visiting sailors drink and local fringe-dwellers congregate.

When Reggie, the openly gay barman, goes missing Godfrey senses something sinister. There’s a prevailing attitude of inevitability. Godfrey doesn’t get it, but he’s hungry to understand. Guided by his daytime-television and pulp-fiction detective heroes and a very active imagination, he attempts to solve the mystery—in the process stumbling into his own sexual adventures and discovering a new-found power in a perplexing adult world.

It's 1999. Joel likes suburban life just fine: dole cheques rolling in, hanging out with his best mate, and the future comfortably on hold.

That is, until he lands a job at a smash repair shop.

Under the wing of a charismatic car thief, he learns panel beating, discovers pride in his work, and enters a world of responsibility, risk, and unspoken rules.

When a reckless decision involving a stolen car goes wrong, Joel is left with guilt he can’t outrun.

As pressure from work and the people he has begun to care about closes in, he is forced to confront the cost of loyalty and the uneasy truth about the person he is becoming.

Donkey Drop is a gritty Australian coming-of-age novel about friendship, consequences, and the choices that stay with us long after they’re made.

What would you do if someone you knew came back from the dead?

Gin is an architect on the brink. LIT, the Auckland-based practice she shares with her girlfriend, Clary, has been precarious since their third partner – Clary’s ex, Billy – disappeared, presumed dead. 

Now, several years later, LIT’s financial problems and Gin’s personal debts are snowballing. Clary – emotionally fragile since the disappearance – is growing increasingly remote and elusive. When Gin begins to be haunted by glimpses of Billy, she blames stress and guilt. But could he be back, threatening to expose the past? 

Trapped in a web of secrecy and betrayal, Gin’s downward spiral gathers force as she begins to suspect her paranoia hides an even more shocking truth – one that will send her whole life up in flames. 

This stunning debut literary-suspense novel from award-winning writer Anna Woods explores the insidious charm of those who gaslight us, and examines the blurry line between love and control.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing ...

The town of Hopeville is thrown into chaos when the body of Silas Ziccone, president of the notorious bikie gang the Outcasts,is found next to his abandoned car on a dirt road. Evidence suggests Silas was not alone when he was murdered, but there are no witnesses and the locals aren’t talking. When Silas’s son Anton steps into his role determined to get revenge on those responsible police fear an all-out bikie war.

Journalist Lars Nilsson is writing a book on outlaw motorcycle clubs and is sent by his former editor to cover the story. Police warn Lars to stay away, but undeterred he pursues a lead that takes him into the centre of the gang rivalry. 

With debts to pay and a teenage son to raise alone, all Silas’s girlfriend Ashley wants is to escape to Western Australia and start afresh but Anton is keeping her close. There’s one person who may be able to help her get out but when your whole life’s a lie, how do you know who’s telling the truth? 

The Informant is a simmering crime thriller that gives a window into the world of outlaw motorcycle gangs, organised crime and police corruption that will keep readers gripped until the heart-stopping end.