This time the temptations are made up of soon to be, recently released and a few in the way off category.
Something He Did
In the gridlocked heart of Melbourne, a split-second of road rage changes everything. For one driver, the crash is a bizarre stroke of luck that sets their life on an upward trajectory they never thought possible. For the other, it is the first domino to fall in a terrifying downward spiral.
Detective Sergeant Claudia Russo doesn't care about the insurance claims—she’s focussed on the search for a missing eighteen-year-old girl. But the girl’s father, a man defined by entitlement and influence, is playing a dangerous game. He’s more afraid of his own double life being exposed than he is of his daughter never coming home. Claudia has secrets too: she’s grieving a tragic loss of her own and losing control of an on-the-job romance that threatens to unravel everything she has worked so hard for.
As all their fates become more entwined, the lesson must be learned: Be kind. Or suffer the consequences.
The Graduate
New graduate Fei Fei Chou is an outlier at her prestigious law firm.
She's too quiet.
She wears too much makeup.
She’s only here because the boss has a thing for Asians.
But Fei isn’t here to climb the corporate ladder – she’s here for revenge.
Thirty years ago, three schoolgirls were kidnapped and abused by a man who’s never been identified. The information Fei needs to find him is buried somewhere in the firm’s records.
Deliberately placing herself in harm’s way, Fei will uncover a secret history of power and privilege that haunts not only her firm, but the nation itself.
Taut, riveting and blackly humorous, The Graduate is a mesmerising legal thriller and a masterfully dark crime debut from a beloved Australian writer.
Neighbourhood Watch
**‘**Neighbourhood Watch is a sharp, stylish thriller with a killer opening hook, a generous dose of dark humour, and a truly distinctive voice.’ Christian White
The annual Curlew Street scarecrow competition is back, and the residents of Melbourne’s inner north have never seen an entry like it. Shirt bloody, head and arms slumped over a scarecrow crucifix: Victoria’s most conservative Supreme Court Judge, Harry ‘The Pope’ Somerton, is dead.
Priyanka Pal, a former psychologist turned homicide detective, is disturbed when her investigation uncovers corruption close to home. Forced to confront the abuses of powerful men – the very reason she left psychology – Priyanka’s faith in the justice system falters.
Emma Bloom is sophisticated, intelligent, and seems to have it all together. But her prickly, estranged sister, Margot, knows the truth. Their attempts at reconciliation spiral into crisis with the death of Emma’s abusive husband, The Pope.
As secrets unravel and Priyanka’s investigation cuts close to home, the sisters risk losing what fragile family ties they have left, and Priyanka’s career is on the edge. None of them will ever feel the same way about themselves (or their neighbours) again.
P.S. Mind the cat.
Stay Buried
The claustrophobia of Room meets the camaraderie of Yellowjackets with a touch of Picnic at Hanging Rock in this dark, immersive, psychological thriller debut with a speculative/lite-horror edge.
Christmas Eve, 1974.
As Cyclone Tracy tears through Darwin, four girls disappear into the heart of the outback. No tracks. No bodies. No answers.
Decades later, one returns.
She claims to be one of the missing. But is she? There is no proof of who she is, only a keepsake that once belonged to another missing woman - Sally, a teen mother whose disappearance never mattered to anyone but Von, the daughter she left behind. Sally's return rekindles the cold case, as desperate families plead for answers - and a dark mystery begins to surface.
A hidden bunker ... a ghost ... scratches on a concrete wall ... pictures inside a View-Master ... and the little girl who understood the darkness better than anyone.
Inspired by true events, Stay Buried is the darkly thrilling tale of secrets unearthed, the will to survive and a legend that refuses to die.
Stay Buried, Jane R. Miles
Compelling, gripping, claustrophobic, and creepy as hell, STAY BURIED was a roller coaster of emotion from start to finish.
On Christmas Eve in 1974 Cyclone Tracy tore through Darwin, creating havoc. Thinking back to that time now, it's frightening how little we knew about it in either the lead up to or the immediate aftermath - communications have changed a lot. But in this story, it's important to remember that nobody knew for sure whether Tracy would hit Darwin, and the size that it would be when it arrived. Hence four young girls, teenagers and younger, went camping on Christmas Eve, in the bush on their own and post the cyclone - they had vanished. No tracks to be found, no bodies, nothing. The families took to referring to them as "The Angels".
There was also a known killer in the area - the bodies of two women had been found, and a third teen mother, Sally, had disappeared around the same time as well.
In the current timeline, Sally's daughter Von is now a young woman, desperate to remind everyone that her mother could also be an "Angel". Slightly different in age from the other four, and definitely different in lifestyle, Sally had been a bit of a wild child, a single mother, prone to working away from Darwin, and somebody that nobody seemed all that interested in searching for - except her daughter Von, who purposely inserts herself into every discussion about the Angels, every update from the police, and every media chance she can get, just to ensure that nobody forgets her missing mother.
Until the day that a woman is found, on the side of the road, near to where the bodies of the two women were dumped years before, naked, and barely recognisable. Is she the missing Sally, and can she cast any light on the fate of the Angels for their grieving (and complicated) families and loved ones?
This is one of those books that readers will find incredibly compelling, as well as decidedly discomforting. Especially if, like this reader, you're very claustrophobic. In that case, some of the earlier timeline might mean you're never going to turn the lights off again - it's very well written, very descriptive and realistic, without being exploitative. Suffice to say, what the four young girls go through is the stuff of nightmares. Balanced against that is the determination that all the women in this story exhibit. In the current timeline Von is as determined, and yet somehow incredibly vulnerable and engaging.
A debut novel, the writing in this is very assured, the dual timelines handled deftly and the inspiration, as explained in the author's notes, very sobering. There's a strong sense of Darwin, the people that live there, the weather that's part of their everyday lives, and the differences in social groupings and standings. There are also very timely reminders of the amount of restoration and recovery that was required post Cyclone Tracy.
It's very sobering to think that the basic premise of STAY BURIED was inspired by true events. Whilst it's mostly about the secrets that won't lay low and the legends or stories that refuse to go away, it's the sheer gritty determination of loved ones like Von, and her small group of collaborators and supporters, that will stay with me. The things that push people like them to work so hard to find an explanation, understand the past that has affected their lives so much, and find their own future.
The Second Child
Set in 1945 between Hitler's death and Hiroshima, The Second Child is a satirical thriller about one young woman's plot to outsmart the supreme dictators in a world on fire. From the critically acclaimed, bestselling author of The First Friend.
You can't choose your family, but you can choose your enemies.
1945: It's the dying days of the war. A triumphant Josef Stalin has the world's future in his hands, but leading up to the Potsdam peace summit he is restless and paranoid, increasingly suspicious that his ambitious security overlord Lavrentiy Beria is plotting against him.
Beria has a secret weapon, his best friend's daughter. A patriot and devotee of Papa Stalin, Melor Murtov has returned from a two-year exile to become Beria's adopted daughter and his eyes and ears among the nepobabies of the Kremlin.
In this palace of intrigue and deception, Melor must play a dangerous game, outwitting treacherous power plays and the capricious whims of her frenemies while conducting a secret mission of her own: to find out who murdered her parents before her time runs out.
Against a backdrop of international politics, spying and the true-history intrigue of the closing days of World War Two, The Second Child is a chilling black comedy about survival in the court of madmen.
The Wreck
A gripping survivalist thriller from the author of The Chilling about researchers marooned on a remote island in the Bass Strait while searching for the wreckage of a plane that disappeared under mysterious circumstances twenty years earlier.
In September 1977, a young pilot named Donovan 'Van' Spector vanishes over Bass Strait after a chilling radio transmission: 'A large aircraft seems to be flying above me … it's colossal ... it's soaring down.' Then - silence.
Twenty years later, a rumour surfaces that Spector's plane wreck has been sighted on a remote island in the notorious 'Bermuda Triangle of the South'. A group of researchers sets sail to uncover the truth. On board are Teo Young, an ambitious PhD student chasing a lead, and Hannah Buttery, a UFO enthusiast with an agenda of her own.
After a storm leaves them stranded on the island, with the rest of their party missing, Teo and Hannah are left facing a terrifying reality. Their lives are in danger. No one is coming to their rescue. And a sinister presence is lurking in the shadows ...
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