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Thursday Temptations

UPDATE ADDED: Thu, 04/06/2026 - 2:03pm by Karen Chisholm

This time the temptations are made up of soon to be, recently released and a few in the way off category.

 

Something He Did

BOOK ADDED: Wed, 29/04/2026 - 1:16pm by Karen Chisholm

In the gridlocked heart of Melbourne, a split-second of road rage changes everything. For one driver, the crash is a bizarre stroke of luck that sets their life on an upward trajectory they never thought possible. For the other, it is the first domino to fall in a terrifying downward spiral.

Detective Sergeant Claudia Russo doesn't care about the insurance claims—she’s focussed on the search for a missing eighteen-year-old girl. But the girl’s father, a man defined by entitlement and influence, is playing a dangerous game. He’s more afraid of his own double life being exposed than he is of his daughter never coming home. Claudia has secrets too: she’s grieving a tragic loss of her own and losing control of an on-the-job romance that threatens to unravel everything she has worked so hard for.

As all their fates become more entwined, the lesson must be learned: Be kind. Or suffer the consequences.

PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
SK Lynch
Publication Date: 
Tue, 29/09/2026
115 days remaining to event.
ISBN: 
9781761154850
Publisher: 
Ultimo Press
No of Pages: 
352
Book Type: 
Paperback
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Book Setting: 
Melbourne
Victoria
Australia
Status: 
Listed
Region: 
Australia

The Graduate

BOOK ADDED: Tue, 21/04/2026 - 11:30am by Karen Chisholm

New graduate Fei Fei Chou is an outlier at her prestigious law firm.

She's too quiet.
She wears too much makeup.
She’s only here because the boss has a thing for Asians. 

But Fei isn’t here to climb the corporate ladder – she’s here for revenge.  

Thirty years ago, three schoolgirls were kidnapped and abused by a man who’s never been identified. The information Fei needs to find him is buried somewhere in the firm’s records. 

Deliberately placing herself in harm’s way, Fei will uncover a secret history of power and privilege that haunts not only her firm, but the nation itself. 
Taut, riveting and blackly humorous, The Graduate is a mesmerising legal thriller and a masterfully dark crime debut from a beloved Australian writer.

PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
Rebecca Lim
Publication Date: 
Tue, 28/04/2026
ISBN: 
9781761822513
Publisher: 
Affirm Press
Book Type: 
Paperback
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
Sub-Genres: 
Legal Thriller
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Book Setting: 
Australia
Status: 
To Be Read
Book Source: 
Publisher (Physical)
Region: 
Australia

Neighbourhood Watch

BOOK ADDED: Fri, 15/05/2026 - 4:44pm by Karen Chisholm

**‘**Neighbourhood Watch is a sharp, stylish thriller with a killer opening hook, a generous dose of dark humour, and a truly distinctive voice.’ Christian White

The annual Curlew Street scarecrow competition is back, and the residents of Melbourne’s inner north have never seen an entry like it. Shirt bloody, head and arms slumped over a scarecrow crucifix: Victoria’s most conservative Supreme Court Judge, Harry ‘The Pope’ Somerton, is dead.

Priyanka Pal, a former psychologist turned homicide detective, is disturbed when her investigation uncovers corruption close to home. Forced to confront the abuses of powerful men – the very reason she left psychology – Priyanka’s faith in the justice system falters.

Emma Bloom is sophisticated, intelligent, and seems to have it all together. But her prickly, estranged sister, Margot, knows the truth. Their attempts at reconciliation spiral into crisis with the death of Emma’s abusive husband, The Pope.

As secrets unravel and Priyanka’s investigation cuts close to home, the sisters risk losing what fragile family ties they have left, and Priyanka’s career is on the edge. None of them will ever feel the same way about themselves (or their neighbours) again.

P.S. Mind the cat.

PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
Lauren Williams
Publication Date: 
Tue, 30/06/2026
24 days remaining to event.
ISBN: 
9781761822582
Publisher: 
Affirm Press
Book Type: 
eBook
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Book Setting: 
Melbourne
Victoria
Australia
Status: 
On Order
Region: 
Australia

Stay Buried

BOOK ADDED: Wed, 29/04/2026 - 12:56pm by Karen Chisholm

The claustrophobia of Room meets the camaraderie of Yellowjackets with a touch of Picnic at Hanging Rock in this dark, immersive, psychological thriller debut with a speculative/lite-horror edge.

Christmas Eve, 1974.

As Cyclone Tracy tears through Darwin, four girls disappear into the heart of the outback. No tracks. No bodies. No answers.

Decades later, one returns.

She claims to be one of the missing. But is she? There is no proof of who she is, only a keepsake that once belonged to another missing woman - Sally, a teen mother whose disappearance never mattered to anyone but Von, the daughter she left behind. Sally's return rekindles the cold case, as desperate families plead for answers - and a dark mystery begins to surface.

A hidden bunker ... a ghost ... scratches on a concrete wall ... pictures inside a View-Master ... and the little girl who understood the darkness better than anyone.

Inspired by true events, Stay Buried is the darkly thrilling tale of secrets unearthed, the will to survive and a legend that refuses to die.

Crime Fiction
#AusCrime
PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
Jane R. Miles
Publication Date: 
Tue, 28/07/2026
52 days remaining to event.
ISBN: 
9781038943521
Publisher: 
HQ Books
No of Pages: 
304
Book Type: 
eBook
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Book Setting: 
Darwin
Northern Territory
Australia
Status: 
To Be Read
Book Source: 
NetGalley
Read by Date: 
Tuesday, 14 July, 2026
38 days remaining to event.
NetGalley Archive Date: 
Tue, 14/07/2026
38 days remaining to event.
Region: 
Australia

The Second Child

BOOK ADDED: Thu, 04/06/2026 - 2:00pm by Karen Chisholm

Set in 1945 between Hitler's death and Hiroshima, The Second Child is a satirical thriller about one young woman's plot to outsmart the supreme dictators in a world on fire. From the critically acclaimed, bestselling author of The First Friend.

You can't choose your family, but you can choose your enemies.

1945: It's the dying days of the war. A triumphant Josef Stalin has the world's future in his hands, but leading up to the Potsdam peace summit he is restless and paranoid, increasingly suspicious that his ambitious security overlord Lavrentiy Beria is plotting against him.

Beria has a secret weapon, his best friend's daughter. A patriot and devotee of Papa Stalin, Melor Murtov has returned from a two-year exile to become Beria's adopted daughter and his eyes and ears among the nepobabies of the Kremlin.

In this palace of intrigue and deception, Melor must play a dangerous game, outwitting treacherous power plays and the capricious whims of her frenemies while conducting a secret mission of her own: to find out who murdered her parents before her time runs out.

Against a backdrop of international politics, spying and the true-history intrigue of the closing days of World War Two, The Second Child is a chilling black comedy about survival in the court of madmen.

PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
Malcolm Knox
Publication Date: 
Tue, 01/09/2026
87 days remaining to event.
ISBN: 
9781761472206
Publisher: 
Allen & Unwin
No of Pages: 
400
Book Type: 
eBook
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Status: 
To Be Read
Region: 
Australia

The Wreck

BOOK ADDED: Thu, 04/06/2026 - 12:11pm by Karen Chisholm

A gripping survivalist thriller from the author of The Chilling about researchers marooned on a remote island in the Bass Strait while searching for the wreckage of a plane that disappeared under mysterious circumstances twenty years earlier.

In September 1977, a young pilot named Donovan 'Van' Spector vanishes over Bass Strait after a chilling radio transmission: 'A large aircraft seems to be flying above me … it's colossal ... it's soaring down.' Then - silence.

Twenty years later, a rumour surfaces that Spector's plane wreck has been sighted on a remote island in the notorious 'Bermuda Triangle of the South'. A group of researchers sets sail to uncover the truth. On board are Teo Young, an ambitious PhD student chasing a lead, and Hannah Buttery, a UFO enthusiast with an agenda of her own.

After a storm leaves them stranded on the island, with the rest of their party missing, Teo and Hannah are left facing a terrifying reality. Their lives are in danger. No one is coming to their rescue. And a sinister presence is lurking in the shadows ...

PUBLISHER INFORMATION
Author: 
Riley James
Publication Date: 
Tue, 01/09/2026
87 days remaining to event.
ISBN: 
9781761470905
Publisher: 
Allen & Unwin
No of Pages: 
320
Book Type: 
eBook
Genre: 
Crime Fiction
AUSTCRIME INFORMATION
Book Setting: 
Bass Strait
Victoria
Tasmania
Australia
Status: 
To Be Read
Book Source: 
Purchased
Region: 
Australia
Thursday Temptations

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