CHARITY NORMAN Remember Me. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
A dementia diagnosis reveals clues to a decades-old mystery in this new novel from the author of The Secrets of Strangers – Charity Norman’s third to be shortlisted for NZ’s Ngaio Marsh Awards. In June 1994, 21-year old Emily Kirkland had been working at a petrol...
BRIOHNY DOYLE Why We Are Here. Reviewed by Sally Nimon
Briohny Doyle’s third novel explores the impact of multiple losses in a single life, exacerbated by the effects of the pandemic. ‘What should survive and how? And how do you know when survival has transpired?’ This is the central question posed in Why We Are Here, the...
ANNA KATE BLAIR The Modern. Reviewed by Jessica Stewart
Set in New York, Anna Kate Blair’s debut novel explores the art of curation, sexuality, modernism, and knowing one’s own mind. This is a novel to savour, its language crystalline, its acute observations tumbling one after the other. In the opening paragraph,...
DOMINIC HOEY Poor People with Money. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
Fast paced, heart-wrenching, darkly comic, Dominic Hoey’s new crime novel is dark and unrelenting. Do you remember when I was a hero, Eddy? Back when everyone thought I saved you, before my face looked like a broken dinner plate. Mt Albert girl, 15, rescues brother...
CHRIS WOMERSLEY Ordinary Gods and Monsters. Reviewed by Robert Goodman
Chris Womersley’s latest novel explores the intersection of the supernatural and the suburban in this coming of age story. Australian author Chris Womersley has an eclectic back catalogue; even his two connected novels – Cairo and The Diplomat – are very...
LEAH KAMINSKY Doll’s Eye. Reviewed by Kim Kelly
Part literary romance, part cultural odyssey, Doll’s Eye is a lively challenge to the tropes of contemporary Australian Holocaust fiction. Author, physician, Jew, lover of science, nature and language: these bright strands of Leah Kaminsky’s real-life identity...
RENÉE Blood Matters. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
Steeped in a sense of culture, people and place, Blood Matters is crime fiction set at the heart of a family and community. Author Renée is a towering figure in New Zealand. A legendary playwright, novelist and activist, Renée is of Māori (Ngāti Kahungunu), Irish,...
DV BISHOP The Darkest Sin. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
Set in Florence in 1537, The Darkest Sin is the second novel featuring Cesare Aldo, an officer of the feared Otto di Guardia e Balia. This series currently includes The City of Vengeance and The Darkest Sin, with a third volume, Ritual of Fire, on the way. The first...
BENJAMIN MYERS Cuddy. Reviewed by Robert Goodman
Benjamin Myers’ new novel is a homage to his home city of Durham and its patron saint. Award-winning British author Benjamin Myers was born in the northern English city of Durham in 1976. This is a fact to keep in mind when coming to his latest novel Cuddy,...
EMILY PERKINS Lioness. Reviewed by Ann Skea
In this new novel from the author of The Forrests, a woman who appears to have it all begins to question her life choices. Therese and Claire live in the same four-storey former sewing factory once wholly owned by Therese’s husband’s family – but they have very...
SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA Silver Nitrate. Reviewed by Robert Goodman
Mexican horror movies, a Nazi occultist and dark magical powers – Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s new novel has them all. Silvia Moreno-Garcia has not yet written two books in the same genre. Though that statement may depend on how you understand genre. Her latest novel,...
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