Four years ago, adventure-loving Auckland lawyer Rose Carlyle grabbed global attention with her #1 internationally bestselling debut, The Girl in the Four years ago, adventure-loving Auckland lawyer Rose Carlyle grabbed global attention with her #1 internationally bestselling debut, The Girl in the Mirror. Now she’s back with another cracking thriller that shows no let-up or ‘difficult second novel’ wobbles.
Fans of Carlyle’s smash hit debut and new readers alike will find plenty to enjoy in No One Will Know, a twisting, propulsive tale centred on Eve Sylvester, a young woman scrabbling to survive after her life is upturned by fate and circumstance. After a car crash rips away the future Eve was hoping for on her return to Sydney from adventures sailing across the South Pacific, the former foster kid is left broke, desperate, and pregnant.
No living relatives, no good friends, no one to help. Acutely aware of the impact of growing up in tough circumstances, Eve can’t resist a lucrative offer to live-in nanny for glamorous couple on their mansion estate in Paradise Bay on a remote island off the southern coast. But has Eve made a deal with the devil, out of love for her unborn child?
Carlyle shows great mastery of pace and narrative drive in No One Will Know, luring readers into Eve’s story and keeping pages whirring with harrowing events and danger. The read hurtles along like a record-breaking Sydney to Hobart maxi yacht. A cracking ‘beach read’ that also engages emotionally with character and underlying themes.
[This review was originally written for Good Reading magazine in Australia]...more
Robotham’s latest, and the fourth to star forensic psychologist Cyrus Haven and enigmatic ‘human lie detector’ Evie Cormac, opens near the LincolnshirRobotham’s latest, and the fourth to star forensic psychologist Cyrus Haven and enigmatic ‘human lie detector’ Evie Cormac, opens near the Lincolnshire seaside of England, looking out towards western Europe. When Cyrus and Evie witness a horrifying tragedy as bodies of desperate refugees wash up on the beach, Evie becomes catatonic, overwhelmed by nightmarish flashbacks. Cyrus, who has his own traumatic past and was a protégé of Robotham’s long-time protagonist Joe O’Loughlin, knows Evie was held prisoner as a child, likely trafficked, but not where she came from.
As the pair try to piece together Evie’s splintered memories while Cyrus helps the police deal with ongoing targeting of refugees, it becomes clear that evil deeds past and present are linked.
While Robotham is a long-time master of thrilling storylines, his novels are built on much more than intrigue and adrenaline. In particular, he has a great touch for character, drawing readers in with the people in the story as much or more than the story itself.
With the important revelations and character realisations in Storm Child, it’s a landmark novel in an outstanding series (one that’s already earned Robotham his second Gold Dagger, for Good Girl Bad Girl in 2020, and an Ian Fleming Steel Dagger for When She Was Good). Robotham delivers a masterful story that weaves together ripped-from-the-headlines issues of real importance with an entertaining, thought-provoking storyline and characters that make you care, deeply.
[This is part of a review first written for Deadly Pleasures, a US-based magazine]...more
Fox has storytelling talent to burn, and that’s on show in Devil’s Kitchen, a page-whirring tale of a freelance undercover operative infiltrating a clFox has storytelling talent to burn, and that’s on show in Devil’s Kitchen, a page-whirring tale of a freelance undercover operative infiltrating a close-knit group of ‘New York’s Bravest’, who among dragging people from burning buildings, have stolen millions from banks, jewellery stores, and art galleries. When Ben, one of the firefighter burglars, suspects his comrades may be responsible for his girlfriend and her young son vanishing, he reaches out to the authorities, willing to sacrifice himself to bring them home. If they’re still alive.
Enter Andy (Andrea) Nearland, who works for various law enforcement agencies, and has chameleon-like ability to convincingly fit into various situations. Together and apart, she and Ben try to uncover what’s happened before the crew takes on its most dangerous heist yet.
Fox delivers an incendiary storyline, oscillating viewpoints between Andy, a fascinating ‘heroine’ with action-thriller skills and plenty of smarts, and Ben, a man trying to be good, who’s done bad things. Devil’s Kitchen is a one-sitting kind of read, that offers plenty in terms of character and quality writing. Fox’s gets the adrenaline going, but also makes you think, and care....more
Put simply, Everyone on This Train is a Suspect is sublime. It’s ridonkuously clever and brilliantly structured, with Stevenson demonstrating a Penn aPut simply, Everyone on This Train is a Suspect is sublime. It’s ridonkuously clever and brilliantly structured, with Stevenson demonstrating a Penn and Teller level of storytelling magic – giving away some of the secrets, showing you how a trick is done, yet still managing to surprise and amaze. There are lots of twists and turns, both in the mystery storyline and the relationships between characters, including Ernie and his amour Juliette, the former owner of the resort where the Cunningham family killings occurred. Juliette also wrote a book on those events, but chose to accompany Ernie on the Ghan trip even though she’s not on the festival programme herself.
There’s an unabashed playfulness, almost tongue in cheek, to Stevenson’s storyline and storytelling, where he’s both honouring and parodying classic Golden Age mysteries. Ernie offers clues along the way, such as the number of times he’ll mention the killer or killers’ name, updating the count at times for our benefit, and things once again get a little meta, while also being dosed with some high-octane action reminiscent of Western movies as the Ghan chugs through the Australian desert.
Along the way Stevenson seems to show us and his protagonist that death is not just a clever puzzle to solve - it has far greater impact than that. He does this via an extraordinarily clever puzzle, of course. It’s early on in the year, but Everyone on This Train is a Suspect may very well end up one of the best mystery reads of the year; a smile-inducing, brain-whirring magic trick, with heart.
[This is a part of a longer review written for the February 2024 issue of Deadly Pleasures magazine]...more
I was not alone in being mightily impressed by Canberra author Peter Papathanasiou’s hard-hitting 2021 debut The Stoning, where the brutal death of a I was not alone in being mightily impressed by Canberra author Peter Papathanasiou’s hard-hitting 2021 debut The Stoning, where the brutal death of a rural schoolteacher incited a terrific Outback Noir that delivered a fascinating storyline while exploring Australia’s treatment of refugees alongside a clear-eyed look at hypocrisies old and new and the uglier side of modern life in ‘the Lucky Country’.
That book also introduced Detective Sergeant Georgias ‘George’ Manolis, a big city cop sent to his childhood hometown to help the locals investigate the death and douse escalating reprisals, and local Aboriginal constable ‘Sparrow’. In Papathanasiou’s third and latest novel, The Pit, Manolis is on leave in Greece, so it is Sparrow that receives a call from a killer that wants to turn himself in.
Bob wants to make a deal. In his mid-sixties, he’s relatively young compared to some of his fellow residents in a Perth nursing home. Though he’s not the youngest there. Maybe Bob’s paying for past sins. Decades ago he killed someone in the remote mining region of north Kimberley. He offers to show Sparrow where the body is, saying he’s unable to find it without going there himself.
Sparrow isn’t sure, while thinking the juice may be worth the squeeze. But there are a couple of hitches: Sparrow must pretend to be Bob’s carer as they travel north, and they’re joined on the road trip by another nursing home resident: Luke, a 30-year-old who was paralysed in a motorbike crash. What is Bob’s real motivation to take Sparrow deep into the dusty backblocks of Western Australia, and why is the surly Luke along for the ride? What secrets may come to light, if they ever reach their destination and somehow manage to survive a series of misadventures and dangerous encounters?
Papathanasiou delivers a kinetic, fascinating tale that may divide readers when it comes to whether it surpasses or falls short of his excellent debut. Australian social history and harsh landscapes provide a stark backdrop to the mystery of Bob’s quest, his past, and his intentions. As well as the action sparked by clashes the trio face, and sometimes instigate, with an array of humanity that roams the lonely roadways of Western Australia, eking out a living in various ways.
A very good read that centres an indigenous character while exploring varying prejudices and their real-world impact in times present and past. I’m curious to see what Papathanasiou delivers next....more
Fresh off wining a Ned Kelly Award for her terrific first novel Wake – which meshed true crime obsession with rural noir, and had previously won a CWAFresh off wining a Ned Kelly Award for her terrific first novel Wake – which meshed true crime obsession with rural noir, and had previously won a CWA Dagger as an unpublished manuscript – Australian author Shelley Burr plunges readers into another twisting small-town mystery with Ripper (which will be published in the northern hemisphere as Murder Town, next year).
Gemma Guillory is a lifelong resident of Rainier, a tiny rural town that like many across Australia and around the world is now struggling as industries and economies evolve. Seventeen years ago a teenaged Gemma stared down a serial killer, and now a big city business backed by some desperate locals wants to cash in, offering tours of Rainier for true crime fans. Residents are understandably split on resurrecting the town’s past notoriety, but is it the town’s only chance of survival?
When the tour operator is the victim of a copycat-style slaying near Gemma’s store, she must battle fears present and past. Could someone she knows, even loves, have committed murder? While Gemma is drawn into the investigation, so too is Lane Holland, an unusual private eye whose sleuthing must take a different tack, now he’s behind bars (following the events of Wake). Holland is conscripted by a warden with his own agenda to elicit information from the original Rainier Ripper. Could there be a copycat, or did he have a partner? What happened with an unidentified victim?
Burr cements herself as a terrific new voice in Australian, and global, crime writing while avoiding any sophomore slump and proving she’s no one-hit wonder. Ripper (to be released as Murder Town in the northern hemisphere in 2024) is a terrific second effort that delivers tension and humanity, and deftly blends page-turning crime story with explorations of people, place, and trauma.
[This review was first published in the November issue of Deadly Pleasures magazine]...more
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