All the Reviews

In BM Carroll’s latest crime novel, one family’s celebration turns to disaster as a teenager disappears amid a crowd of concert-goers.  Full Review at Newtown Review of BooksRead review

A new crime novel by Garry Disher is always exciting. In Sanctuary, he introduces a new protagonist: a female lone wolf.

Meet Grace. She’s a very good thief, having been taught by experts and practising since she was a kid. Specialising in small, high-value hauls, she’s mobile and extremely astute – this is a woman who knows her Jaeger-LeCoultre watches from the Patek Philippes. She’s also always moving, very watchful, cautious to a fault. And tired of that life. ... Read review

A disgraced son of a powerful Australian media tycoon, the traumatised daughter of a small town newspaper editor, coincidentally owned by the aforementioned tycoon. One is sent to "learn the ropes of journalism" / ie been kicked down the line, the other is in town after something sent her legal career into free fall. Then the local newspaper editor dies in a seeming shark attack and things get messy.

Byron Bay does have a reputation for being a laid back, holiday destination, pumped full of influencer types, and some serious money. So when Jack Harris is sent there to ... Read review

Growing up in any rural community in the 1970's meant a LOT of talk about football. The boys that played were always the hero's, the girls that watched never mentioned, except if they were connected to the tuck shop at the ground in some way. Or cleaning the change rooms, and the toilets, and running around driving football players here and there. (Well to be fair they still weren't much mentioned no matter how much of the actual work they did). Needless to say I have a deep, abiding, all consuming loathing of all things "aussie football", and the relentless cascade of bullshit that ... Read review

If you were a resident of Melbourne (or any larger city I suppose), the announcement of one of the many COVID lockdowns was a sudden jolt to the nervous system. 

What JP Pomare has done, in HOME BEFORE NIGHT, is add an extra layer of complexity when Lou realises her son Samuel isn't going to make it home by the cut off time of 8pm, supposedly staying with his girlfriend instead. She's not handling that particularly well, having not been at all convinced by the girlfriend on initial meeting. But that turns to major concern when Samuel doesn't seem to be contactable - he's ... Read review

Helen FitzGerald is one of those authors who really knows how to write engaging and very offputting central characters that you care about, despite their obvious failings, flaws, and downright stupidity from time to time. As is the case in HALFWAY HOUSE where central character Lou O'Dowd is .. well ... quite something.

Infuriating, annoying and quite beguiling, she's part ingénue, part ruthless user, and oddly extremely sympathetic and relatable. Maybe it's the wide eyed devil may care"edness" of her lifestyle, maybe it's the sneaking suspicion that she's well aware of ... Read review

The thing with any novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist is to remember the stages of reading.

Stage One is always, oh wow, why do I take so long to pick up these books. This is just amazing. 

On the whole his work is amazing. It's horror sure, and that's something I'd normally go out of my way to avoid, but it's his version of horror, which always has something extra. It's not just about the shock, it's about the why's and where's of human behaviour, and the how did we get here's. Or at least that's what all his novels I've read have felt like to me. 

... Read review

There's a quote on the blurb for this book which goes:

Guy Ritchie meets Elmore Leonard – this is a fast-paced humorous crime thriller with splashes of dark and sinister

Which is where I could leave this review because it sums it up perfectly.

Fast paced: A BETTER CLASS OF CRIMINAL belts along, mind you that's a word worth keeping in mind, there's belting violence aplenty here which comes at the reader like a battering ram.

Humorous: If you like dark, cynical, pointed and very "gangster" styled ... Read review

Book number five in the Fiji Island Mystery series featuring local rugby hero, now policeman Inspector Joe Horseman and his team, this time investigating the death of a fit young reality TV star who dies most unexpectedly on a small island off the coast of Fiji, in the middle of filming a wildly popular show which features, for the first time, a Fijian contestant.

Readers who are new to this series would be able to step in at any point as the author here plays very fair with just enough personal background to get where Horseman, and his 2IC, DS Susie Singh, in particular ... Read review