Book picks similar to
The Good Mother by Rae Cairns
crime
australian
fiction
arc
You Sent Me a Letter
Lucy Dawson - 2015
on the morning of her 40th birthday, Sophie wakes in the darkness of her bedroom, and finds a stranger watching her from the foot of her bed. The intruder hands Sophie a letter and issues an ultimatum: the message is to be opened at her forthcoming party, in front of gathered family and friends, at exactly 8 p.m. Any failure to comply will not end well. Sophie can only think of one person who hates her enough to have hired a professional to menace her like this: her fiancé's ex-wife. But what can the letter possibly contain? And why must it be read in front of everyone she loves best? This will be no ordinary 40th party. Sophie is not the only person holding a secret about the evening ahead. When the clock strikes eight, the course of several people's lives will be altered forever.
Pieces of Her
Karin Slaughter - 2018
. . ?Andrea knows everything about her mother, Laura. She knows she’s spent her whole life in the small beachside town of Belle Isle; she knows she’s never wanted anything more than to live a quiet life as a pillar of the community; she knows she’s never kept a secret in her life. Because we all know our mothers, don’t we?But all that changes when a trip to the mall explodes into violence and Andrea suddenly sees a completely different side to Laura. Because it turns out that before Laura was Laura, she was someone completely different. For nearly thirty years she’s been hiding from her previous identity, lying low in the hope that no one would ever find her. But now she’s been exposed, and nothing will ever be the same again.The police want answers and Laura’s innocence is on the line, but she won’t speak to anyone, including her own daughter. Andrea is on a desperate journey following the breadcrumb trail of her mother’s past. And if she can’t uncover the secrets hidden there, there may be no future for either one of them. . . .
The House Next Door
James Patterson - 2019
But a few quick tasks became a long lunch-and now things could go too far with a man who isn't what he seems....The Killer's Wife (with Max DiLallo): Four girls have gone missing. Detective McGrath knows the only way to find them is to get close to the suspect's wife...maybe too closeWe. Are. Not. Alone (with Tim Arnold): The first message from space. It will change the world. It's first contact. Undeniable proof of alien life. Disgraced Air Force scientist Robert Barnett found it. Now he's the target of a desperate nationwide manhunt-and Earth's future hangs in the balance.
While You Were Sleeping
Kathryn Croft - 2016
Today you’ll find out that was all a lie.Tara Logan adores her perfect little family: husband, Noah, and two children, teenager Rosie and eleven-year-old Spencer. But her happiness is shattered when she wakes up one morning in her neighbour’s bed, with no memory of how she got there or what happened between them. And worse – he has been stabbed to death.Convinced she didn’t kill Lee and scared of losing everything she cares about, Tara flees home and stays silent, holding her breath as the investigation grips the neighbourhood.But as her daughter spirals out of control, and her husband becomes increasingly distant, Tara starts to wonder if someone in her life knows what really happened that night. When the police turn their questions towards her, Tara realises she has to find out. But what will it take to uncover the real story, and can she survive the truth?
One Last Child
Anni Taylor - 2020
The heat was stifling that day, the tinkle of an ice-cream van in the air....Three-and-a-half years later, in the dead of winter, the children are returned to their families...one by one.All except for Ivy - the granddaughter of Homicide Detective Kate Wakeland. The other four children say Ivy is dead.Speculation grows that the mysterious abductor is enacting a cruel revenge plot due to a murderer that Kate put in jail years before.Kate isn't sure what to believe. But one thing is certain - she's about to begin the battle of her life. When the children were first stolen, she was prevented from investigating the case.But now, Kate will be relentless in uncovering the identity of the abductor and discovering what happened to Ivy.
Friend Request
Laura Marshall - 2017
But Maria Weston is dead. Isn't she?
1989. When Louise first notices the new girl who has mysteriously transferred late into their senior year, Maria seems to be everything the girls Louise hangs out with aren't. Authentic. Funny. Brash. Within just a few days, Maria and Louise are on their way to becoming fast friends.2016. Louise receives a heart-stopping email: Maria Weston wants to be friends on Facebook. Long-buried memories quickly rise to the surface: those first days of their budding friendship; cruel decisions made and dark secrets kept; the night that would change all their lives forever.Louise has always known that if the truth ever came out, she could stand to lose everything. Her job. Her son. Her freedom. Maria's sudden reappearance threatens it all, and forces Louise to reconnect with everyone she'd severed ties with to escape the past. But as she tries to piece together exactly what happened that night, Louise discovers there's more to the story than she ever knew. To keep her secret, Louise must first uncover the whole truth, before what's known to Maria - or whoever's pretending to be her - is known to all.
Copycat
Alex Lake - 2017
The other, she has never seen. But everything in it is accurate. Recent photos of her and her friends, her and her husband, her and her kids. Even of her new kitchen. A photo taken inside her house.She is bemused, angry, and worried. Who was able to do this? Any why?But this, it soon turns out, is just the beginning. It is only now–almost as though someone has been watching, waiting for her to find the profile–that her problems really start…
The Chalet
Catherine Cooper - 2020
One luxury getaway. The perfect murder.French Alps, 1998Two young men ski into a blizzard… but only one returns.20 years laterFour people connected to the missing man find themselves in that same resort. Each has a secret. Two may have blood on their hands. One is a killer-in-waiting.Someone knows what really happened that day.And somebody will pay.
Her One Mistake
Heidi Perks - 2018
It all started at the school fair…Charlotte was supposed to be looking after the children, and she swears she was. She only took her eyes off of them for one second. But when her three kids are all safe and sound at the school fair, and Alice, her best friend Harriet’s daughter, is nowhere to be found, Charlotte panics. Frantically searching everywhere, Charlotte knows she must find the courage to tell Harriet that her beloved only child is missing. And admit that she has only herself to blame.Harriet, devastated by this unthinkable, unbearable loss, can no longer bring herself to speak to Charlotte again, much less trust her. Now more isolated than ever and struggling to keep her marriage afloat, Harriet believes nothing and no one. But as the police bear down on both women trying to piece together the puzzle of what happened to this little girl, dark secrets begin to surface—and Harriet discovers that confiding in Charlotte again may be the only thing that will reunite her with her daughter....This breathless and fast-paced debut—perfect for fans of Big Little Lies and The Couple Next Door—takes you on a chilling journey that will keep you guessing until the very last page.
The Ruin
Dervla McTiernan - 2018
But he's never forgotten the two children she left behind...When Aisling Conroy's boyfriend Jack is found in the freezing black waters of the river Corrib, the police tell her it was suicide. A surgical resident, she throws herself into study and work, trying to forget - until Jack's sister Maude shows up. Maude suspects foul play, and she is determined to prove it.DI Cormac Reilly is the detective assigned with the re-investigation of an 'accidental' overdose twenty years ago - of Jack and Maude's drug- and alcohol-addled mother. Cormac is under increasing pressure to charge Maude for murder when his colleague Danny uncovers a piece of evidence that will change everything...This unsettling crime debut draws us deep into the dark heart of Ireland and asks who will protect you when the authorities can't - or won't. Perfect for fans of Tana French and Jane Casey.
The Attack
Catherine Jinks - 2021
Her current clients are a group of ex-military men who run a tough-love program for troubled teens.The latest crop looks like the usual mix of bad boys and sad boys. Then Robyn takes a second look at a kid called Darren. Last time she saw him his name was Aaron, and Robyn was his primary school teacher. And she was somehow at the centre of a vicious small-town custody battle involving his terrifying grandmother.Bruising classroom dynamics, manipulative parents and carers and horrendous small-town politics form the backdrop to a nail-biting thriller in which the tensions of ten years ago start to play themselves out, building to a violent climax in the present day.Robyn escaped the past once. Now it’s back—and this time there’s no way out.
The Stillwater Girls
Minka Kent - 2019
When the youngest grows gravely ill, their mother leaves with the child to get help from a nearby town. And they never return.As months pass, hope vanishes. Supplies are low. Livestock are dying. A brutal winter is bearing down. Then comes the stranger. He claims to be looking for the girls’ mother, and he’s not leaving without them.To escape, Wren and her sister must break the rule they’ve grown up with: never go beyond the forest.Past the thicket of dread, they come upon a house on the other side of the pines. This is where Wren and Sage must confront something more chilling than the unknowable. They’ll discover what’s been hidden from them, what they’re running from, and the secrets that have left them in the dark their entire lives.
I Found You
Lisa Jewell - 2016
He has no name, no jacket, no idea what he is doing there. Against her better judgement she invites him in to her home.Surrey: Twenty-one-year-old Lily Monrose has only been married for three weeks. When her new husband fails to come home from work one night she is left stranded in a new country where she knows no one. Then the police tell her that her husband never existed.Two women, twenty years of secrets and a man who can't remember lie at the heart of Lisa Jewell's brilliant new novel.
Creepy Crawly (DI Jake Sawyer, #1)
Andrew Lowe - 2018
Sharp, tough and pathologically fearless.Now he’s quit the capital and returned to his home town in England’s Peak District, to investigate the savage murder of his mother, thirty years earlier.When the body of a teenage boy is found in a shallow grave, close to woodland where Sawyer used to play as a child, he’s called in to help decode the killer’s nightmarish methods.But as the victims stack up and the case takes an unexpected turn, Sawyer must risk his own life to hunt the hunter and save an innocent.
Creepy Crawly is Book One in the DI Jake Sawyer series. Dive in now and discover a new breed of detective, with stories that reveal the dark side of one of England's brightest beauty spots.
Praise for Andrew Lowe:"Prose that gets under your flesh and into your bones.""Taut and compelling. Not a wasted word.""Plot and character perfectly intertwined.""Keeps you reading through the night.""Poetic and utterly gripping."(Amazon reviews).