Crime

Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud and the Last Trial of Harper Lee by Casey Cep

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

Harper Lee – author of the slightly well known To Kill a Mockingbird – was by Truman Capote’s side when he wrote the brilliant work of fictionalised nonfiction, and arguably the first ‘true crime’ tale, In Cold Blood. After…

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Eight Lives by Susan Hurley

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

When a young Vietnamese-Australian doctor makes a medical breakthrough, inventing a drug that could essentially help broken immune systems fix themselves, everything seems as golden as the name bestowed upon him: David Tran, Golden Boy. But seven months after David…

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The Scholar by Dervla McTiernan

Reviewed by Elke Power

Regular Readings Monthly readers will no doubt remember how obsessed we were by Irish born, Perth-based Dervla McTiernan’s debut crime novel. After turning the final page of The Rúin in early 2018, surviving the wait until we could read her…

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Two Girls Down by Louisa Luna

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

Jamie Brandt has just about had enough of her two girls – in the same way any parent who loves their kids can also tire of them after a long week – when she leaves them in the car outside…

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Call Me Evie by J.P. Pomare

Reviewed by Hilary Simmons

Novels with fragmented narratives are not for everyone – but with the rise of psychological thrillers such as Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train, they’re becoming increasingly popular. Fragmented stories can make for gripping reading, especially when…

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The Lost Man by Jane Harper

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

Jane Harper won so many awards for her debut novel, The Dry, that I could use my entire word count just listing them. But if I did that, I wouldn’t have the chance to tell you to go and…

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The Spotted Dog by Kerry Greenwood

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

There are few in the crime world quite as capable at both solving mysteries and baking an excellent sourdough as Corinna Chapman: baker extraordinaire, sometime detective, and general lady-about-town. Kerry Greenwood – of Phryne Fisher fame – returns to the…

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Leave No Trace by Mindy Mejia

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

Mejia’s first book, The Last Act of Hattie Hoffman, was a wonderful study of a small town dealing with large problems. In Leave No Trace, the trouble is much more personal. The city of Duluth is rocked when…

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Loose Units by Paul F. Verhoeven

Reviewed by Fiona Hardy

Decades after a youthful Paul Verhoeven inadvertently sees a crime scene photo that he’s never been able to shake, he sits down with his ex-cop father John to find out why. Why he couldn’t shake it, how his father coped…

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Trace: Who Killed Maria James? by Rachael Brown

Reviewed by Anna Rotar

At number 736 High Street Thornbury on 17 June 1980, Maria James was stabbed sixty-eight times in a frenzied attack at the back of the bookshop she owned and lived in. Fast forward thirty-eight years and the case has still…

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