Carmel Shute, who helped co-found Sisters in Crime Australia in 1991, stood down as Secretary at the 2024 Annual General Meeting on Friday 25 October, following its TV Noir event at South Melbourne’s Rising Sun Hotel. She is being replaced by former President, Moraig Kisler, who is fresh from a year’s break. Carmel will continue to work on programming. A committee of eight was elected unopposed.
The crime novels by Bronwyn Hall (The Chasm), Erina Reddan (Deep in the Forest), and Claire Sutherland (The Crag) are all set in small towns in rural Victoria where idyllic surrounds hide shocking secrets and crimes. It’s up to resourceful and smart women to uncover the truth and put things to right. The three authors will be talking to Sisters in Crime’s Ruth Wykes about why the bush is such a compelling ‘scene of the crime’ and what sent them there.
For the October Murder, Monday Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to award-winning Sydney author, Natalie Conyer. Natalie was born and grew up in Cape Town, but has lived in Sydney for many years.
She is a crime fiction tragic, so much so she did a doctorate in it. Her first novel, Present Tense aet in South Africa, won the 2020 Ned Kelly Award for Best Debut Crime Fiction. Its sequel, Shadow City, was released in September by Echo and is mostly set in Sydney.
Christine Gregory became attracted to New-Age ideas in her late teens. This largely involved visits to Bryon Bay to stay at the Arts Factory, late nights of drinking, and a full-throttle immersion into the alternative music scene of the noughties. Twenty-five years later, in an evening writing class the tutor asked students to create a scene incorporating all the five senses. She put pen to paper and like magic, the words flowed.
For the October Author Spotlight, New Zealand author Barbara Sumner spoke to Georgina Baron-Ross, about her debut novel, The Gallows Bird (Pantera Press). This novel whisks readers away to 19th-century London. Meet ‘Birdie,’ a young woman of lowly station with grand ambitions. Despite her humble beginnings, Birdie believes she is destined for finer things, driven by the legacy of her aristocratic mother. But then she becomes a convict bound for Botany Bay.
For the October Crime Stack, Echo Publishing has kindly offered 20 copies of Opal, the thrilling third installment in the bestselling DS Lucas Walker series by Patricia Wolf, the Berlin-based author who hails from Mt Isa. A small mining community. A murderer at large. And a flood that has trapped them all . . . …
Sisters in Crime Australia is proud to announce that 28 stories by 28 authors have been shortlisted for its 31st Scarlet Stiletto Awards for best crime short stories written by Australian women. This year 195 stories are vying for a record $13,400 in prize money. All authors receive a framed certificate and, if lucky, they also win one of the 16 prizes on offer. The first-prize winner also scores a spectacular trophy – a scarlet stiletto shoe with a steel stiletto heel plunging into a mount.
To mark the 30th anniversary of the Scarlet Stiletto Awards for best short stories in 2023, Sisters in Crime, Susanna Lobez, actor-turned-barrister-turned-broadcaster-turned-true-crime-author, has been progressively narrating the winning stories in a podcast – Scarlet Stiletto Bites: Scintillating stories by Australian women. Find out how to listen here.
Catch up with the latest crime events from around the nation. So many authors, so many books, so many festivals and so much talent – and so much reading pleasure ahead. Check out the Terror Australis Professional Development Program for Genre Writers, being held in Franklin, Tasmania from Sunday 3 to Saturday 9 November. Join internationally successful authors – New Zealand’s Vanda Symon, RMIT lecturer Angela Meyer, journalist Poppy Gee and martial arts master Alan Baxter.
Every month Sisters in Crime brings you new reviews from women who write criminally good books.