All the Reviews

Someone Else's Skin, Sarah Hilary

Right from the commencement of SOMEONE ELSE'S SKIN there's something extremely engaging about the protagonist DS Marnie Rome. Arriving at her parent's house, five years earlier, to the sight of ambulances and police outside, and the news that her parents are dead inside, it's not hard to feel the shock that she is experiencing. Made even more harrowing by knowing she's a cop / she's been at this sort of scene many times before. Instantly this author has established a central character who is human, struggling with an awful event in their own life, capable of empathy for victims and ... Read review

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No Free Man, Graham Potts

Fast paced, heaps of action, a lot of lurking baddies, a flawed hero and comparisons with the work of Tom Clancy and Matthew Reilly are going to be coming in droves.

NO FREE MAN is the debut thriller from ex-RAAF member Graham Potts, taking it's protagonist, Stepan Volkov straight to the heart of ... well everything it seems. Starting out in a small Australian town, Volkov wasn't expecting to be identified by the most unlikely of people to walk into that pub, right at that time. Connections to Australia are maintained as local agents Hartigan and Singh set off in pursuit ... Read review

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After the Circus, Patrick Modiano, Mark Polizzotti (Translation)

In the middle of the sixties, in Paris, a young man being questioned by the police is released and a waiting girl called straight in. He has no idea who she is and yet he then waits for her in a nearby café. They return to his apartment and spend the night in his room. Why is really not explained or explored. Nor is there any explanation of who these two are. Instead the reader is pulled immediately into something infused with doubt and restrained in its menace.

Whilst the blurb does clearly indicate that Patrick Modiano's writing style is to revisit motifs and episodes, ... Read review

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Patrick Modiano

Crime Scenes Stories, Zane Lovitt (editor)

Taking a central theme of "is there really such a thing as an innocent person?" and asking a combination of well known and emerging Crime Fiction Writers from Australia to address the question, has culminated in the creation of CRIME SCENES - a short story collection which works on a number of levels.

Short story collections like this provide a reader with glimpses into an author's style and voice, sometimes presenting something very different from known series books or previous works. In the case of previously known authors, this can confirm a liking for their work, or ... Read review

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Amanda O'Callaghan

Melanie Napthine

Michael Caleb Tasker

David Whish-Wilson

Summer Girl, Kelly Vero

Crime fiction with a vampire as the central protagonist, set on the island of Malta. If this sounds like your ... err cuppa ... give it a try.

Jack Sant is a Knight of Malta, a sort of consultant detective keen to solve the country's worst cold cases, and a vampire.

A scenario that is greatly assisted by this author's style of laying it on the line as part of the story progression - so as a woman is attacked late at night, and rescued, the backgrounds of both attackers and rescuer just fall into place. No big deal is made of the vampire aspects, as is no ... Read review

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Dastardly Deeds, Ilsa Evans

The fourth book in the Nell Forrest series, DASTARDLY DEEDS sees heroine Nell on a much needed holiday cruise around the Mediterranean. Except it seems that everyone has decided to go with her - her mother and her partner, her ex-husband and his new partner, her sister, a couple of daughters, and the police detective that used to be her lover. Instead of the chef and a thief though the cast also includes more locals, a class reunion, a murderer and a possible suicide.

For new readers to the series, humour plays a very big part in these books. It's a questioning, self- ... Read review

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That Empty Feeling, Peter Corris

The forty-first Cliff Hardy book came out earlier this year. That Empty Feeling is classic Cliff Hardy - stripped down, hardboiled, quintessentially Australian-noir ticking all the required boxes - pace, twists, turns, sex, violence and pitch-perfect dialogue. This time around, the cynicism and world-weariness have a little poignancy attached to them as well. The discovery of the obituary of an old client - Barry Bartlett sets Hardy off reminiscing, harking back to the late 1980's.

Back then, Hardy had taken on a case for Bartlett sorting out a family mystery. ... Read review

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Waterfront, Duncan McNab

Of course, now it makes perfect sense that a society arriving on fleets of ships, initially supported by ships full of cargo, and later by exporting via those same docking points would end up with a congregation of illicit interests and activity within those very docks. The idea that the troubles of modern day waterfronts being linked back to earliest white arrival after reading WATERFRONT by Duncan McNab now not only makes perfect sense but has a historical grounding that had simply never occurred to this reader before.

Billed as true crime, this is also obviously also ... Read review

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Eden / Fall, Candice Fox

Candice Fox is on the verge of scoring a rare hat-trick at this year’s Ned Kelly awards with the release of the third book in her Frank Bennett and Eden Archer series. In 2014, Candice Fox’s Hades blasted onto the Australian crime-fiction scene and won the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Crime Novel. As the judging panel from the Neds put it:

Like a junkyard sculpture, Hades combines a number of current genre tropes into something new and exciting. A little bit Dexter, a little bit procedural, overall a great first
... Read review

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Nowhere Girl, Ruth Dugdall

The fourth book in the series sees probation officer Cate Austin out of the familiar ground of career, single parenthood and England in a new life in Luxembourg. She's moved there, with her young daughter Amelia, to live with boyfriend and local police detective Olivier Massard. The adjustment to life in a new location, with a new language swirling around her is hard enough, but the disconnection from her career and what feels like a walk away from her own family problems, means that Austin is slightly lost and very out of sorts.

Because Austin is obviously feeling so ... Read review

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The Lion's Mouth, Anne Holt

The Hanne Wilhelmsen series from Norwegian author Anne Holt is fabulous, even if it is being translated out of sequence. Which means in THE LION'S MOUTH, Wilhelmsen, who doesn't make an appearance until later in the novel and is not the central investigator anyway, is also walking around. In the novels already made available to many of us she's in a wheelchair permanently. Allowing for the slight confusion that could cause, these books work well as you can, worse comes to worse, approach them as standalones if necessary, although obviously character introduction and development always ... Read review

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The Kolkata Conundrum, Kalyan Lahiri

The first in a new series of books set in India, THE KOLKATA CONUNDRUM is lyrical and amusing writing, steeped in a sense of place and culture that will leave readers craving more.

Young Orko Deb is the much doted on son of a mechanic father, not at all interested in stepping into his father's footsteps. Instead he finds himself seconded to work for an uncle who operates his own fledgling security company. Most of their employees, like his uncle, are ex-services and considered to be most reliable and diligent security guards. The violent murder of the resident of an ... Read review

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Nations Divided, Steve P. Vincent

The third book in the Jack Emery series of thrillers from Melbourne based author Steve P. Vincent, NATIONS DIVIDED picks up the ongoing storyline of a special agent that's happier than he's been in a long time. Because nobody has tried to shoot him or blow him up for years, and despite his reservations, he's rather liking his job as Special Advisor to the President of the United States.

The President's term is coming towards an end, and with elections looming, the administration is keen for a big win on the board, and what bigger achievement than a peace accord between ... Read review

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Steve P. Vincent

Twister, Jane Woodham

Set in Dunedin, New Zealand, local writer Jane Woodham obviously loves the place that she lives in. Incorporating a lot of local landmarks, geographical elements and a strong sense of place, TWISTER is her debut novel featuring DSS Leo Judd and a series of investigations into everything from animal torture to gay bashings, and the death of a young schoolgirl.

Starting out in an apocalyptic style, Dunedin is gripped initially by a flu epidemic, and then, after five days of biblical rain, an unusual twister rips through the place, causing havoc, and exposing the body of a ... Read review

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City of Light, Keri Arthur

Does it sound like there is a lot going on in this novel? There is. Vampires, shifters, wraiths, hybrids, rifts; the reader needs to keep sharp as to what Tiger must do in order to break through every obstacle in her rescue efforts. It’s a little exhausting. A debut fantasy novel must in some ways keep it light on the rules and regs, so that we can easily pickup up the vernacular and have some sense of confidence in knowing how everything works. It’s not so easy to visualize the landscape in CITY OF LIGHT; some elements seem to contradict.

Arthur has created a world still ... Read review

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Give the Devil His Due, Sulari Gentill

Sulari Gentill’s award-winning historical crime series is written with verve and spirit, the fiction woven seamlessly into actual events of the time.

Review of Give the Devil His Due, and the entire Rowland Sinclair series at Newtown Review of Books Read review

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Helldiver, Chris Allen

Alex Morgan is back in the 4th book in the Intrepid series and he's got his mojo back. Just in time as the black ops Intrepid division is in real trouble and Morgan and Elizabeth Reigns are the only agents who can sort out the mess.

The Intrepid books are an absolute gem of a thriller series from Australian author (and ex-paratrooper) Chris Allen. Getting the military and action aspects spot on is one highlight, but where Allen really excels is in getting nuance and emotion into an all action type hero, equally capable of hand to hand combat or ruthless gun-play in the ... Read review

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Dark Murder, Helen H. Durrant

DARK MURDER is the first book in a new series built around the character D.I. Stephen Greco. Greco first appeared as supporting cast in an earlier series of books by Helen H. Durrant, but now he's mirrored his ex-wife's move to a new town after their divorce, wanting to continue a good relationship with his young daughter Matilda. His new job at Oldston CID starts off with a series of baffling murders, where the brutal disfigurement of the victims seems to be the only connection. Greco instantly has a number of problems when it comes to solving these cases - the lack of a clear motive ... Read review

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Helen H. Durrant

Skin Deep, Gary Kemble

A paranormal crime thriller with a blokey sensibility, Skin Deep is set in a Brisbane still dealing with the after-effects of many years of Joh rule. Harry Hendrick is a man of his time and circumstance. A journalist by training, he had managed to sabotage his job potential before he even left university. Since then it seems his life has meandered, gently buffeting him along without any overt desire on his part to take control. A flawed character, he’s nonetheless an engaging sort of bloke, tight with his mates despite ... Read review

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The Son, Jo Nesbo

The second book I've read this year with a break out of jail plotline, which means nothing except in my mind. In THE SON, Sonny is a heroin addict, long term prisoner who escapes and goes on a retribution trail on behalf of his father. Simon Kefas is a police officer and husband haunted by his wife's infirmity. He's also the best friend of Sonny's father and the man most likely to see some connections in what seems like a series of unrelated murders.

There's no doubt whatsoever that readers are going to have to accept that a seemingly hopelessly addicted to heroin man, ... Read review

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