This Thursday temptations post is upcoming releases, or books that are out now.
The Bookshop Detectives: Murder and Mojitos
The Bookshop Detectives are on the case!
Booksellers Garth and Eloise Sherlock (and their cowardly dog, Stevie) have been roped into hosting Murder and Mojitos, a glamorous Art Deco festival event starring Cuba’s queen of crime fiction.
Between flapper frocks, rooftop hijinks and competitive cocktail shaking, it should be the bookshop’s biggest break yet. But when mysterious parcels arrive at the shop and a body turns up on a quiet local beach, every clue points back to Arthur Pinter – the literary-obsessed serial killer from the Sherlocks’ past.
With the mojitos flowing and half of the town in costume, Garth and Eloise must untangle a web of old betrayals, new alliances and international intrigue before the festival’s finale turns into a bloodbath. Can they protect their staff, their small town and their beloved bookshop – or will this be their final chapter?
The Cross
In the dying days of 1974, a mysterious yellow sports car speeds into the quiet Riverina town of Gunnawah. While the locals are initially intrigued by the stranger in their midst, nobody is prepared for what comes next.
At the town's only newspaper, the Gunnawah Gazette, cadet journalist Adelaide Hoffman starts looking into a proposed new resort development on the banks of the Murray. Her street-smart boss, Valdene Bullark, and Val's long-time friend, Wayne Trevaskis, have been around the block and they're pretty sure something shady is going down. Meanwhile, the town's only cop, raw recruit Jack Overlund, is about to learn the stranger has brought more than an oversized ego to the town.
Over the years, the echoing, heat-rimmed days of the Riverina have concealed a lot. A secretive priest. A pregnant teenager. The dark shadows of the Nugan Hand Bank. A faded TV star. A deadly shame. When big city money arrives and long-buried secrets threaten to surface, some will be forced to deal with their past and others will have to grapple with their future.
The richly comic and deeply dark companion novel to Gunnawah, The Cross is set in a time of football, meat pies, Gough Whitlam and shag-pile carpet. A quintessentially Australian crime story of ratbaggery, religion and revenge that deftly blends gripping crime with acerbically funny, moving and distinctly Australian characters.
Nautilus
The explosive sequel to the bestselling The Turing Protocol asks a chilling question: what happens when the power to rewrite the past becomes a weapon?
Nautilus is no ordinary machine. Created by Alan Turing during World War II, it can send messages eight weeks back in time—a discovery so dangerous that Turing established strict protocols for its use. Only members of his bloodline can operate it, and only to prevent global catastrophe.
For decades, the rules have held.
Until now.
Annabelle Turing has inherited custody of Nautilus, unaware that the man she trusts most—her husband, Edward—has secrets of his own. Edward sees the machine not as a safeguard for humanity, but as the key to unimaginable wealth, influence and control.
But he isn’t the only one hunting Nautilus.
Across the globe, shadowy factions are closing in, determined to exploit the machine’s power to manipulate markets, topple governments and reshape history itself. As rival forces converge, Annabelle is thrust into a deadly race against time to protect the one invention capable of saving the world—or destroying it forever.
Because once the past can be controlled, no future is safe.
The Rising
In a town scarred by floodwaters, the past refuses to stay buried.
When a catastrophic flood rips through the rural town of Birradurra, a shocking cold case is discovered. Unearthed from the mud are the skeletal remains of a baby.
Shaken by this and haunted by her traumatic past, journalist Bec Carter is consumed with getting justice for the victim.
But when her friend Harry who vowed to help with the investigation vanishes in violent circumstances, authorities look to Bec for answers.
Now the prime suspect in Harry’s disappearance, Bec must fight to clear her name and uncover the facts before another flood hits.
But nothing is straightforward, and someone will do anything to keep the past from resurfacing.
Twisty, atmospheric and utterly gripping, The Rising is a heart-stopping thriller where every secret comes with a cost — and some truths are better left hidden.
Teeth Kicker
Pay your debts. Protect your family. Never cross a loan shark.
This blisteringly original crime thriller and exciting debut smashes Mr Inbetween, Monkey Grip and Animal Kingdom into a gutter opera on the vicious, bent and drug-laden streets of Newcastle - written by the Pushcart nominated writer and 2009 shark attack survivor
Vincent Silk is back in the decaying maw of Australia's Steel City after losing everything – his money, his self-respect and his friends and family. He wants to make amends but first he has to pay back an unhinged loan shark. With no way to make good, Vincent is forced to take on a brutal new role: working as an enforcer, a teeth kicker, collecting debts in a town where everyone owes someone something.
Vincent is big and imposing, so he should be a natural at hunting down late-payers, but he hates the violence and his conscience weighs heavy. Every knock on a door tests his resolve, especially when his next target turns out to be Henrietta, the woman who once saved him from an OD - and the person he's in love with. Vincent wants to protect her, and he knows running isn't an option. The shark would come for their families, including Vincent's younger brother, Ray.
Vincent and Ray have a complicated past, scarred by a horrific car accident that made Ray an amputee and left Vincent with a metal plate in his head. As Ray spirals into his own trouble, Vincent enacts a brash plan to solve everyone's problems ...
Until it all unravels, and he's left with an impossible choice.
The Writers' Room
Seven writers. One murder. Whose story do you believe?
Clara Newsome was twenty-two when she died. A prodigiously talented writer, she'd seemed destined to take the literary world by storm.
Twenty years later, her four best friends have done rather well for themselves. Now successful screenwriters and producers, they've finally decided to adapt Clara's only novel into a television series, recruiting Clara's son Xavier to help. A creative retreat in a remote mansion in the NSW Southern Highlands, ten days of brainstorming, and a story that's been waiting two decades to be told. What could possibly go wrong?
Quite a lot, as it turns out. Because housekeeper Barb Young has just found a body at the bottom of a nearby cliff.
The police are happy to call it an accident, but Barb is not the sort of woman who settles for a convenient explanation. As she starts asking questions nobody wants to answer, she discovers that everyone in the writers' room has something to hide. And that the real story of Clara's death might not be the one they've all been telling.
James O'Loghlin's twisty, suspenseful and darkly humorous crime novel follows unlikely amateur detective Barb Young - who readers first met in Liars - on a new adventure, as she sets about solving a mysterious death with charm, stealth and the world's most disarming interrogation technique.
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