The Family Doctor

Author: Debra Oswald Publisher/Year: Allen & Unwin/2021 Publisher description Paula is a dedicated suburban GP, who is devastated by the murder of a friend and her children by their estranged husband and father. Stacey and the children had been staying with her after fleeing his control, and Paula is haunted by the thought that she …

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Other People’s Houses

Author: Kelli Hawkins Publisher/Year: Harper Collins/2021 Publisher description The perfect house. The perfect family. Too good to be true. Kate Webb still grieves over the loss of her young son. Ten years on, she spends her weekends hungover, attending open houses on Sydney’s wealthy north shore and imagining the lives of the people who live …

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The Silent Listener

Author: Lyn Yeowart Publisher/Year: Viking/20219 AND The Second Son Author: Loraine Peck Publisher/Year: Text/2021 Reviewer: Sue Turnbull Two debut crime novels about families (the sort that screw you up) from opposite ends of the genre spectrum. While Loraine Peck gives us a fast-paced gangland thriller set in the western suburbs of Sydney, Lyn Yeowart offers …

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Revenge in Rubies

Author: A. M. Stuart Publisher/Year:Berkley Prime Crime, New York/2020 AND Singapore Sapphire Publisher/Year: Berkley Prime Crime, New York/2019 Reviewer: Robyn Walton The name A. M. Stuart isn’t known to many readers of historical crime fiction, but this is an author who arrives with a string of historical romance and mystery titles that began in the …

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The Second Son

Author: Loraine Peck Publisher/Year: Text Publishing/2021 Publisher description Duty always has a price. When Ivan Novak is shot dead putting out his garbage bins in Sydney’s west, his family wants revenge, especially his father Milan, a notorious crime boss. It’s a job for the second son, Ivan’s younger brother Johnny. But Johnny loves his wife …

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Death Beyond the Limit

Author: B.M. Allsopp Publisher/Year: Coconut Press/2020 Publisher description Can a landlubber detective track down crime on the high seas? ​Inspector Joe Horseman stares into the eyes of a disembodied head. Fished out of a shark’s gut, the unknown victim is soon dubbed ‘Jona’ by the media. Did the tiger shark kill Jona or was he already dead when it clamped its …

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Charlotte Pass

Author:  Lee Christine Publisher/Year:  Allen & Unwin/2020 Publisher description When ski patroller Vanessa Bell discovers human bones high on Mount Stillwell at Charlotte Pass ski resort, Detective Sergeant Pierce Ryder of the Sydney Homicide Squad is called in to lead the investigative team. Arriving in the isolated, snowed-in village with Winterfest celebrations underway, Ryder soon …

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The War Widow

Author: Tara Moss Publisher/Year: Harper Collins/2020 Publisher description Sydney, 1946. Though war correspondent Billie Walker is happy to finally be home, for her the heady postwar days are tarnished by the loss of her father and the disappearance in Europe of her husband, Jack. To make matters worse, now that the war is over, the …

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Death in Daylesford

Author: Kerry Greenwood Publisher/Year: Allen & Unwin/2020 Publisher description Surrounded by secrets, great and small, the formidable Miss Phryne Fisher returns to vanquish injustice. When a mysterious invitation arrives for Miss Phryne Fisher from an unknown Captain Herbert Spencer, Phryne’s curiosity is excited. Spencer runs a retreat in Victoria’s spa country for shell-shocked soldiers of …

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Sticks and Stones

Author: Katherine Firkin Publisher/Year: Bantam/2020 Publisher description 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 – …

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