It’s pretty disturbing to be inside the head of Mike, who can’t let go of his love/obsession with Verity. Even though she’s about to marry another man, he thinks it’s all part of an elaborate game they play. Mike is an original character, a psychopath but not entirely evil. This book is a notch above […]
Thriller
Truth by Peter Temple
Wow, the dialogue in this one is so fast, furious and full of slang and shortcuts, you feel like you’re watching The West Wing, but with filthy mouthed Australian cops. Temple demands a lot of his readers but never leaves us behind. Truth, along with it companion piece The Broken Shore, set a high standard in […]
Only Daughter by Anna Snoekstra
Lovely to read a novel set in my home town of Canberra. Only Daughter concerns an unnamed imposter pretending to be Bec Winter, a teenager who disappeared eleven years ago. Her return ‘home’ is deeply unsettling; the responses of her family are far from what one would expect. The ending is quite awesome and overall it’s […]
Scrublands by Chris Hammer
There’s only so many ways you can say a town is hot and dry without becoming boring, but Chris Hammers just about manages it. A priest shoots five men dead out of the front of his church; he is then shot dead by police. Journalist Martin Scarsden comes to town to explore the motivation behind […]
Broken Ground by Val McDermid
This decent little thriller is the fifth in McDermid’s series featuring slightly bloshie, coffee-loving DCI Karen Pirie, head of the Historic Cases Unit in Edinburgh. This time Pirie has a particularly nasty enemy in her superior officer and a lot of grief and gin to get through, but she is as doggedly determined as ever […]
What She Knew by Gilly Macmillan
This great little thriller was originally published in 2015 under the title Burnt Paper Sky. What She Knew takes us to terrifying places: the shock and the guilt that comes when a mother gives her eight year old son permission to ‘run ahead’, out of her sight, in a public park because she wants to give […]
The Party by Lisa Hall
Nothing new to see here, people. Move along. This alleged thriller involves a lot of cliches and a predictable ending. With so many great thrillers out there, I wouldn’t waste valuable reading time on this one. Can’t believe I did.
All the Hidden Truths by Claire Askew
A recommendation from Erin Kelly on the cover of any book is enough to make me buy it, and this one was money well spent. It’s about a young man who shoots and kills thirteen women on a college campus in Scotland, and about the police and families trying to pick up the pieces afterwards. […]