by NRB | 16 May 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
Is Michael Trant Australia’s Lee Child? No Trace delivers a heroic protagonist and a rush of adrenalin in the remote Pilbara. Michael Trant’s Wild Dogs (2022) was an action-packed thriller that introduced Gabe Ahern as Australia’s answer to Jack Reacher. Thankfully...
by NRB | 9 May 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
If you’ve ever wondered what a crime novel written by Noel Coward might be like, Naked Ambition could provide some clues. Fans of Robert Gott’s earlier William Power series, or his newspaper cartoon The Adventures of Naked Man, will not be all that...
by NRB | 2 May 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
James McKenzie Watson’s thriller-like debut brings coherence to a life breaking apart. James McKenzie Watson’s first novel Denizen is partly a thriller and partly a depiction of generational abuse and its consequences, drawing on the author’s upbringing in rural...
by NRB | 25 Apr 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
Dennis Lehane returns to familiar territory in his latest novel, but Small Mercies is far from predictable. American writer Dennis Lehane burst onto the crime scene with his hard-hitting debut A Drink Before the War (1994), the first of his Kenzie and Gennaro novels....
by NRB | 23 Mar 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
SD Hinton’s debut novel uses the structure of a thriller to explore myriad responses to trauma. Jake Harlow is a decorated Special Forces veteran, returned from a tour in Afghanistan that went horribly wrong for him. Captured by the Taliban, he was mentally and...
by NRB | 16 Mar 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
Rebecca Makkai’s fourth novel examines our obsession with true crime – and where that can lead. True crime and true crime podcasts are having a moment, not only in the real world but also in fiction. However, in fiction, writers can start to get behind the...
by NRB | 9 Mar 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
This fierce, unflinching thriller asks timely questions about threatening behaviour. Why don’t we recognise it? Stop it? Dark Mode is a novel, as the note at the beginning makes clear: While the characters and their precise circumstances are fictitious, the...
by NRB | 28 Feb 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
This latest offering of Australian rural noir contrasts urban and small-town sensibilities from the perspective of a child protection officer. Readers of Crows Nest will not be surprised to learn that author Nikki Mottram has an extensive background in child...
by NRB | 14 Feb 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
Maryrose Cuskelly’s novel seems to have taken Arthur Conan Doyle’s maxim to heart: ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’ Cuskelly was born in Queensland, where there were several high-profile child...
by NRB | 31 Jan 2023 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
The fourteenth instalment of Barry Maitland’s groundbreaking Brock and Kolla crime series is also the last. Scottish-born, English-raised and, since 1984, Australian-based, Barry Maitland published the first Brock and Kolla novel, The Marx Sisters, in 1994. On his...
by NRB | 13 Dec 2022 | Crime Scene, Fiction |
Holly Throsby’s third novel takes inspiration from a notorious real-life missing persons case. What would you do if you believed someone was a murderer? You don’t have proof, necessarily, but you have witnessed a series of events that seem to add up to an...
by NRB | 25 Nov 2022 | Crime Scene, Extracts, Non-fiction |
Did Kathleen Folbigg kill her babies? John Kerr makes the case for taking another look. In 2003 Kathleen Folbigg was convicted of killing her four children: Caleb, 19 days old (1989); Patrick, 8 months old (1991); Sarah, 10 months old (1993); and Laura, 19 months old...
ANNA DOWNES Red River Road and LISA KENWAY All You Took From Me. Reviewed by Justine Ettler3 October 2024These two new crime thrillers from Australian writers Anna Downes and Lisa [ … ]
KATHERINE WILES No Autographs Please. Reviewed by Sally Nimon2 October 2024Katherine Wiles’ life as a professional opera singer seems glossed with [ … ]
ANTONIA PONT The Memory Library. Reviewed by Ann Skea1 October 2024Memories are not merely recounted in Antonia Pont’s novella. How would you like [ … ]
ALINA BELLCHAMBERS The Order of Masks. Reviewed by Amelia Dudley26 September 2024Spies, magic, intrigue, and the human cost of an expanding empire all feature [ … ]
