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Vodka Doesn't Freeze


Leah Giarratano - 2007
    Knowing first-hand the impact of such men on their prey, Jill is ambivalent about pursuing the killer, but when more men die - all known to police as child sex offenders - she is forced to face the fact that a serial killer is on the loose.As the investigation deepens, Jill unearths a long-established Sydney paedophile ring - a club of wealthy men who have thought until now that that they are untouchable. Despite the deaths of some of its members, the club is still operating and until Jill can shut it down, children are still in grave danger. As she faces predators and their victims, a psychotherapist losing her mind, and her own nightmares come to life, Jill is forced to decide whether or not she really wants to catch this killer.

Shelter


Catherine Jinks - 2021
    A perfect place to hide. That’s one of the reasons she offers to shelter Nerine, who’s escaping a violent ex. The other is that Meg knows what it’s like to live with an abusive partner.Nerine is jumpy and her two little girls are frightened. It tells Meg all she needs to know where they’ve come from, and she’s not all that surprised when Nerine asks her to get hold of a gun. But she knows it’s unnecessary. They’re safe now.Then she starts to wonder about some little things. A disturbed flyscreen. A tune playing on her windchimes. Has Nerine’s ex tracked them down? Has Meg’s husband turned up to torment her some more?By the time she finds out, it’ll be too late to do anything but run for her life.

The Wave


L.E. Luttrell - 2020
    When they meet in Phuket in December 2004 and share their troubles, the future begins to look more promising. Lucy devises a plan to help Kelly escape from her controlling and violent partner. But a tsunami sweeps through the resort causing tragedy and chaos.After recovering from her injuries, Lucy, whose husband died in the tsunami, travels to Llandudno in Wales to visit her in-laws. Thirteen years later, still in Llandudno and having established a successful business there, an unexpected visitor turns up on Lucy’s doorstep who turns her whole world upside down. She then has to consider how far she will go to protect all she holds dear.The Wave is a psychological thriller set in: Phuket, Thailand; Melbourne, Australia and Llandudno, Wales.

A Universe of Sufficient Size


Miriam Sved - 2019
    I cannot recommend this book highly enough.' Heather Morris, author of The Tattooist of AuschwitzI have wished so many times that I had acted differently.I wish that I had been more worthy of you...Eventually the war will end, and then we will find each other.Until then, remember me.Budapest, 1938. In a city park, five young Jewish mathematicians gather to share ideas, trade proofs and whisper sedition.Sydney, 2007. Illy has just buried her father, a violent, unpredictable man whose bitterness she never understood. And now Illy's mother has gifted her a curious notebook, its pages a mix of personal story and mathematical discovery, recounted by a woman full of hopes and regrets.Inspired by a true story, Miriam Sved's beautifully crafted novel charts a course through both the light and dark of human relationships: a vivid recreation of 1930s Hungary, a decades-old mystery locked in the story of one enduring friendship, a tribute to the selfless power of the heart.LONGLISTED FOR THE COLIN RODERICK AWARD 2020PRAISE FOR A UNIVERSE OF SUFFICIENT SIZE'A fascinating, compelling, beautifully written novel.' Liane Moriarty, author of Big Little Lies and The Husband's Secret 'A taut, tender novel about family, secrets, genius and survival. Sved shows great insight into the complicated emotional architecture of family created in the aftermath of trauma.' Emily Maguire, author of An Isolated Incident'A superbly structured novel of family, history, secrets, trauma, and mathematics, stretching from 1930s Budapest to Sydney in the 2000s' Andrea Goldsmith'Sved's prose is as sinewy and powerful as her characters - beautifully controlled and full of revealing moments that... glow in the memory.' Cate Kennedy'A beautifully imagined inter-generational portrait of friendship, love and loss, set across three continents.' Julienne van LoonPRAISE FOR MIRIAM SVED'The best kind of storyteller... hypnotic, startling almost.' Clementine Ford, author of Fight Like a Girl and Boys Will Be Boys'At times I found myself being reminded of the American author Jennifer Egan. Both authors share the ability to surprise with character insights, something so traditional yet so mentally refreshing. The prose is limpid yet razor sharp. Highly recommended.' The Australian

Vigil


Angela Slatter - 2016
    The daughter of one human and one Weyrd parent, she has very little power herself, but does claim unusual strength - and the ability to walk between us and the other - as a couple of her talents. As such a rarity, she is charged with keeping the peace between both races, and ensuring the Weyrd remain hidden from us.But now Sirens are dying, illegal wine made from the tears of human children is for sale - and in the hands of those Weyrd who hold with the old ways - and someone has released an unknown and terrifyingly destructive force on the streets of Brisbane.And Verity must investigate - or risk ancient forces carving our world apart.

The Last Will and Testament of Henry Hoffman


John Tesarsch - 2015
    Afterwards, hisdaughter Eleanor discovers a will, in which he has left his entireestate to a woman she has never heard of before. Hiding it fromher siblings, she sets out to solve this mystery, and to unearth theconfronting truth about her reclusive father’s past.But Henry isn’t the only Hoffman with secrets. In the months thatfollow, his children learn things about each other they could neverpreviously have imagined.The Last Will and Testament of Henry Hoffman is a gripping andmany-layered story of love and loss, conflict and survival. Itexplores subjects that affect us all: guilt and redemption, theinescapability of the past, and how trauma resonates acrossgenerations.

Dark Heart


Catherine Lee - 2013
    Now he’s dead. Murdered in his own home, the women of Sydney can breathe easy again. All but one. His final victim is still missing — chained up, running out of time, and awaiting a captor who will never return.Detective Sergeant Charlie Cooper is desperate to find the missing woman alive. On the verge of quitting Homicide after a decade chasing the brutal killer, this is his last chance to atone for all the victims he failed.After a life-saving heart transplant, Eva Matthews just wants things to get back to normal. But when she learns she has the heart of the serial killer, will nothing stop the nightmares that plague her?Dark Heart is a detective story, a race against time to save a life. But it’s also an exploration of cellular memory, the intriguing medical phenomenon of patients receiving more than just an organ from their donor. The terrifying serial killer may be dead, but that is just the beginning…

Where the Truth Lies


Karina Kilmore - 2020
    In this clever and explosive thriller, a feisty but flawed investigative journalist battles unexplained deaths, big business, trade unions and media manipulation amidst the gritty underside of Melbourne.She was slipping away. The further she fell, the closer the clouds seemed to come. Wispy transparent slipstreams of white. Cirrus. Pain smashed her head. Floating ... When investigative journalist Chrissie O’Brian lands a senior job at The Argus, she is desperate to escape the nightmares of her past. Her life has become a daily battle to numb the pain. But her job is something she does better than anyone else – and the only thing that’s keeping her anchored to this world. A face-off on the waterfront between the unions and big business is just the kind of headline-grabbing story to get her career back on track. But when a dockworker turns up dead, she becomes obsessed with unravelling the truth. When a gruesome threat lands on her desk, it's clear someone will do anything to stop her. But this is one battle Chrissie won't give up without a fight.

Stiff


Shane Maloney - 1994
    So when you throw in a Turk snap-frozen in a local meat plant, drugs planted under the bed, fascist funeral rites, a killer car and blood-sucking parasites, things are suddenly spinning wildly out of control. That's when red-hot Ayisha knocks on the door...

The Tribute


John Byron - 2021
    The spate of cold, methodical attacks has the city on edge, but the serial killer may not even be the darkest player in this story.Desperate for a breakthrough, decorated homicide detective David Murphy draws into the case his art historian sister, Joanna, and his wife, Sylvia. Unravelling the mystery of who is behind the killings pushes each beyond the limits of what they thought possible.The Tribute is a subversive take on modern masculinity and misogyny told through an irresistible crime narrative. Dark and unpredictable, chilling but sympathetic, it weaves a tapestry of narrative threads towards a mesmerizing climax that will challenge the way you think about everyone you meet. Meticulously researched, hugely ambitious and superbly crafted, The Tribute is the most outstanding crime novel of 2021.

Sticks and Stones


Katherine Firkin - 2020
    He just had to pretend.'It's winter in Melbourne and Detective Emmett Corban is starting to regret his promotion to head of the Missing Persons Unit, as the routine reports pile up on his desk.So when Natale Gibson goes missing, he's convinced this is the big case he's been waiting for - the woman's husband and parents insist the devoted mother would never abandon her children, and her personal accounts remain untouched.But things aren't all they seem. The close-knit Italian family is keeping secrets - none bigger than the one Natale has been hiding.Just as the net seems to be tightening, the investigation is turned on its head. The body of a woman is found . . . then another.What had seemed like a standard missing person's case has turned into a frightening hunt for a serial killer, and time is running out.But to really understand these shocking crimes, Emmett and his team will need to delve back through decades of neglect - back to a squalid inner-city flat, where a young boy is left huddling over his mother's body . . .

Orpheus Lost


Janette Turner Hospital - 2007
    She meets an Australian musician, Mishka, and from the moment she first hears him play his music grips her; they quickly become lovers. Then one day Leela is picked up off the street and taken to an interrogation center somewhere outside the city. There has been an explosion in the subway; terrorism is suspected. The interrogator—an old childhood friend—now reveals to her that Mishka may not be all he seems. In this compelling reimagining of the Orpheus story, Leela travels into an underworld of kidnapping, torture, and despair in search of her lover. Janette Turner Hospital, whose works are "richly imbued with a highly lyrical and luminous quality" (San Diego Union-Tribune) again shows her genius, interweaving a literary thriller with a story of passion and the triumph of decency in confusing and dangerous times.

We Were Never Friends


Margaret Bearman - 2020
    What is art? What’s true courage? I could not put it down.’ —Melissa Ashley,bestselling author of THE BIRDMAN’S WIFELotti lives under the shadow of a genius: her father George Coates is a brilliant and celebrated Australian painter.When Lotti meets the outcast waif Kyla at a suburban Canberra school, two worlds are set to collide. Slowly Kyla is drawn into the orbit of the Coates family. Or is it the other way around?As Lotti and Kyla navigate their way towards adulthood, dark secrets start to unravel, with devastating consequences …WE WERE NEVER FRIENDS is unforgettable novel about friendship, the pursuit of a creative life and the legacies we leave behind.‘Margaret Bearman’s intimate, unsettling novel of family dysfunction perfectly captures the ambivalent passions of girlhood while offering an incisive critiqueof the cult of artistic genius. Sharp and subtle at the same time, refusing any easy certainties, WE WERE NEVER FRIENDS is a haunting portrait of the humancapacity for cruelty and love in equal measure.’ —Kirsten Tranter, bestselling author of THE LEGACY

The Wolf Hour


Sarah Myles - 2018
    Edge-of-your-seat suspense combines with a compelling family drama in this story of power, greed and salvation.A searing contemporary thriller about an Australian family in crisis against the backdrop of war-torn Africa.Thirty-year-old Tessa Lowell has a PhD in psychology and is working in Uganda to research the effects of PTSD and war on child soldiers. She joins a delegation travelling across the Congolese border, deep into the African bush, for peace talks with Joseph Kony, notorious leader of the Lord's Resistance Army.  At the camp Tessa meets thirteen-year-old Francis, already an experienced soldier and survivor of shocking violence. The talks stall, and the camp is attacked by other rebels who take Tessa. Isolated in an increasingly volatile situation, she tries to form a bond with Francis. In Melbourne, Tessa's parents are notified of the kidnapping, but learn there is little that government agencies can do. Desperate, they contact their son Stephen, an astute if manipulative businessman based in Cape Town. He agrees to search for his sister but has other reasons to contact the rebel forces.As Tessa's time runs out, her family begins to fracture. Her parents arrive in Uganda to hear awful news about what she has endured. They also learn the devastating truth about the kind of man their son has become. Only they have the power to stop a terrible injustice. But at what cost to their family?

The Good People


Hannah Kent - 2016
    Watching them fade into the grey fall of snow, Nance thought she could hear Maggie's voice. A whisper in the dark. "Some folk are born different, Nance. They are born on the outside of things, with a skin a little thinner, eyes a little keener to what goes unnoticed by most. Their hearts swallow more blood than ordinary hearts; the river runs differently for them." Nóra Leahy has lost her daughter and her husband in the same year, and is now burdened with the care of her four-year-old grandson, Micheál. The boy cannot walk, or speak, and Nora, mistrustful of the tongues of gossips, has kept the child hidden from those who might see in his deformity evidence of otherworldly interference. Unable to care for the child alone, Nóra hires a fourteen-year-old servant girl, Mary, who soon hears the whispers in the valley about the blasted creature causing grief to fall upon the widow's house. Alone, hedged in by rumour, Mary and her mistress seek out the only person in the valley who might be able to help Micheál. For although her neighbours are wary of her, it is said that old Nance Roche has the knowledge. That she consorts with Them, the Good People. And that only she can return those whom they have taken...