All the Reviews

Sydney Bauer’s first book, UNDERTOW was a fast paced thriller and GOSPEL is promoted in the same way.  It doesn’t seem to have quite the same pace and I think it suffers for that.  The first couple of chapters introduce a so many characters that I found it confusing for quite a while.  Bauer’s use of adjectives seemed at times a little unnecessary:  ‘She took  two of the  upturned glasses standing on the crisp white towel  on the black marble counter and poured them both a drink before gliding across the room, extending her long  slender arm and handing him his water.’  It was a very ... Read review

THE DYING BREED is the third book in the Irish PI Ed Loy series from Declan Hughes, Ed being an Irishman who went home after living in the US for many years.  A broken marriage and the tragic death of his young daughter are events that shaped him there, but his childhood in Ireland shaped him even more firmly, and a large number of the characters that he works with on a daily basis are connections from the past.  But he's a PI (in a place where that's still a bit of a novelty) and he's ready for his next case (and pay cheque), so he takes on a very odd investigation in THE DYING BREED ... Read review

One of the strongest messages you get from a true crime book like INSIDE THEIR MINDS is that no matter how hard we try, no matter how much analysis goes on, there is something about so many of the more notorious criminals in our world that the rest of us will simply never fathom.

Rochelle Jackson looks at some of the most notorious, mass murderer Martin Bryant, sex offender Karen Ellis, serial killer Ivan Milat, serial arsonist Peter Burgess, armed robber and serial escapee Brenden Abbott, child killer Kathleen Folbigg, murdered Matthew Wales and gangland killer Carl ... Read review

Michele Giuttari is a real-life Italian policeman, head of the Squadra Mobile for around 8 years in his own right, so it's not too much of a stretch to believe that his central protagonist, Michele Ferrara, is more than a little autobiographical.  The author has allowed his character to be slightly quirky, but undoubtedly he is the hero of the piece, and given the cases that Giutarri investigated, including the Monster of Florence, the reader has to assume that some of the events aren't that far from real life as well.  

As the bodies are found, seemingly pointlessly ... Read review

Nigel Latta did a session at the Crime & Justice Festival earlier this year, that to be brutally honest, we all ended up attending more by good luck than our own good judgement (the session we'd booked was cancelled) so we switched.  I can't remember the last time I felt so lucky to switch to a session about subject matter that so isn't something you want to think about.  Not only does Nigel Latta make you think - he makes you laugh - he makes you squirm uncomfortably - he makes you just a bit weepy at points.  Mostly he makes you glad that there are people like him doing the ... Read review

A difficult setting, and a difficult task for the debut novelist.  Bronwyn Parry does a fine job with bringing a small Australian bush town to life and this is the great strength of the read.  You can taste the dust in the air and truly really picture everyone talking out the sides of their mouths (so thus to avoid the blowflies).  Where it would be a stretch is in calling this a  a crime novel, or even one of romantic suspense as there is no real mystery to solve or any pretense in constructing one.   As a developing relationship drama it serves very well, and will draw the reader in ... Read review

THE MURDER FARM was one of the books that I purposely read as I was seeing the author at a Melbourne Writers Festival session.  I actually picked it up to take on the train in with me - a journey of just on an hour in total.  I can't remember the last time I was tempted to stay on the train and keep reading because a book was so good, but this book definitely tempted me to do so.

Based on true events, but with a different timeframe and a resolution (the true crime remains unsolved), THE MURDER FARM covers the brutal killing of an entire family.  The family live on a small ... Read review

Adam Stubo and Johanne Vik are a couple that met in an earlier book in this series by Scandinavian writer Anne Holt.  Vik is a profiler with a prickly nature, and a complicated past.  Stubo is a Police Superintendent with a gentler, kinder nature and a tragic background.  Vik is hard to develop a personal liking for, Stubo's much easier.  In THE FINAL MURDER their personal partnership has progressed a long way - the leave that Stubo is called back from is his paternity leave - Johanne has just given birth to their daughter.  Stubo and Vik live together with her daughter from a first ... Read review

Nailing my colours firmly to the aerial of the ute, I love a book that evokes a place and a people strongly.  THE BUILD UP is set in and around Darwin in Australia's Northern Territory.  A bit of a frontier town - they have a habit of referring to other states as "the shoe wearing states".  Darwin's always been just that bit different from the rest of Australia - it's tropical, it's closer to Asia than to most other Australian capital cities, and it used to be a town where cultures intermingled comfortably (probably still is - it's been a long time between visits).

Dusty' ... Read review