NEW RELEASES

Adult Fiction

  • Linda and Levi will never meet. But they're going to change each other's lives.
    In her role at the council's Unclaimed Heirs Unit, Linda Standish investigates the lives of those who've died alone and tracks down any living relatives. She's been a friend to the friendless for the past thirty-three years. And now she's looking forward to an early retirement.
    But before she hangs up her lanyard, Linda takes on one last case - that of Levi Norman - a Welshman who made his home on a remote Scottish island for the past five years.
    What brought Levi here? And who did he
  • leave behind? Obliged to travel (by hearse) with her arch nemesis Fergus Murray, and helped (and hindered) by local residents, Linda searches for clues to a life now lost. And in the process unexpectedly makes new friends, and discovers things about herself she never knew.
By Your Side (Modern & contemporary fiction) Ruth Jones $34.99
  • When your life flashes before your eyes, where would you stop?
    No one can change the past, but the Midnight Train can take you there.The chance to re-live the moments that meant most.To see what kind of person you really were.
    For Wilbur his best days were with Maggie, the love of his life. On his honeymoon in Venice.
    Before he gave it all away.
    He wishes he could go back and live differently. But to do so risks everything . . .
The Midnight Train (Modern & contemporary fiction) Matt Haig $34.99
  • The first time, Yrsa doesn’t intend to kill.
    But the Cambridge professor sitting opposite has manipulated her friend, stolen her research. When she flicks the bee into his Sanpellegrino, she thinks he’ll get a nasty sting.
    Then he’s dead. And Yrsa, who – let’s face it – has been bored for a while, is alive.
    It’s a sweet feeling, finally having some control.
Honey (Fiction & related items) Imani Thompson $34.99
  • Flora is visiting home in Mexico when the family dog leaps up and bites her hand. She winds up in hospital where she undergoes several surgeries under anaesthesia and meets Wilhelmina, an elderly German woman with pneumonia, who collects pre-cinema toys and instruments. The two of them embark on a series of dream-like conversations in the hospital corridors. Wilhelmina puts on a magic lantern show for Flora, leaving her spellbound.
    When things take an unexpected turn, Flora finds herself entrusted with an important mission. She returns to London, where she resumes her job polishing silver at a jewellery shop, and strikes up a strange
  • friendship with Wilhelmina's son, Max. As Flora dips in and out of her imagination, she is increasingly aware it's not only the magic lantern that projects, and her perception of reality is subtly altered.
The Shadow of the Object(Modern & contemporary fiction)Chloe Aridjis$34.99
  • The White House is stunned when the Secretary of Commerce is killed in a plane crash in Turkey. President Jack Ryan isn't ready to write this off as a simple accident. Not only has he lost a good friend, but the Secretary was on an important mission: on the surface he was making an appearance at an economic conference, but the CIA was also using the flight as cover to extract an important asset from the Middle East.Soon, Lt. Commander Katie Ryan and her team are working with the investigators to find the cause of the tragedy, but one shocking revelation changes everything. There were supposed to be 16 people on the plane, but there are only 15 bodies.The quest for answers will lead the team
  • deeper and deeper into a quagmire of lies and deception that will force President Ryan to face an unprincipled enemy with global ambitions.
Rules of Engagement (Thriller / suspense) Tom Clancy $34.99
  • Her 3 o'clock just became a murder case...
    When a body is found near Beachy Head, the police chalk it up to suicide - a tragic but not uncommon end in these parts.
    But local psychotherapist Patricia Phillips isn't convinced.
    The victim? Her three o'clock patient, Henry Clayton.
    The cause of death is supposedly self-inflicted. Yet Pat can't shake the belief that someone wanted Henry Clayton dead. She spends her working life listening to histories and secrets, and she has a nose for when a
  • story doesn't quite ring true.
    Drawn from the therapy room to the crime scene, Pat begins to notice what others appear to overlook.
    At her side is her best friend Prichard - a home-brewer of fearsome, stomach-turning concoctions, an excellent cook, and a man who seems to get along with everyone. Which makes him useful for infiltrating village life.
    As Pat and Prichard look beneath the village's thin veneer of normality - one that barely conceals its appetites - they discover a killer hiding in plain sight.
Shrink Solves Murder(Crime & mystery)Philippa Perry$34.99
  • A dead judge. A silent defendant. And a courtroom full of liars. When Leila Reynolds is handed her first murder case, she’s shocked at how high-profile it is: the murder of a well-respected, well-known judge. This shouldn’t be the kind of case she’s leading; it’s way beyond her expertise. But the defendant, Jack Millman, is clear. He wants her, and only her.
    To make things worse, he’s refusing to talk. How is she supposed to prove herself on what appears to be an unwinnable case?
    Losing is not an option. She must find the most persuasive argument. Trials aren’t won
  • by convincing judges or fellow barristers – they’re all about convincing a jury.
    Suddenly, Leila finds herself fighting not only to keep Jack out of prison, but also to keep her own secrets buried.
    It’s true what they say – there are two sides to every story.
    Guilty or not guilty? You decide . . .
Dissection of a Murder (Crime & mystery) Jo Murray $34.99
  • It's 1983 and Becks can't wait to get the hell out of Cincinnati. But for now she has work to do- her programmer uncle, the only person who understood her, has left her a half-finished game to complete.
    The game will outlast Becks by centuries and shape the lives of a scientist, an astronaut and a pirate captain in ways she cannot imagine. It will connect these four pioneering women across centuries, vast oceans and far-distant planets and introduce them to a remarkable robot destined to gather together this disparate crew.
Homebound (Modern & contemporary fiction) Portia Elan $34.99
  • 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.
The Graduate(Political / legal thriller)Rebecca Lim$34.99
  • 1960s Adelaide: The Langley family - Olive, Len and their two daughters, twenty-year-old Cathy and ten-year-old Evelyn - live a peaceful suburban life, although Grandma Langley turns up each Sunday lunch like a bad fairy to castigate them for their dubious morals.
    Cathy, training to be a teacher, thinks women have it tough. No sex until marriage, then no work, child after child and the sacrifice of their desires to church, husband and family. Cathy is determined not to marry right away. Once married, it's all over. A life no longer her own. Young Evelyn wants to be a fairy princess ... until she sees for herself the price women pay for such dreams.
  • When the new contraceptive pill arrives women can suddenly sense freedom. But powerful forces are aligned against women's reproductive choice and a fight begins. A fight that takes on their own doctors, the might of the Catholic church, and the outdated morality of previous generations.
The Marriage Trap(Fiction & related items)Victoria Purman$32.99
  • Sergeant 'Hex' Rexford is the detective who caught the infamous serial killer Dr. Witcherton. Now, with a series of gruesome murders unfolding inside Coast Sanctuary - a hospital for the criminally insane - Witcherton claims to know who's behind them. Hex takes the case, determined to uncover the truth, even as his own body is failing him.
    Beth Thompson is desperate to keep her children safe. Her violent ex is stalking her, her son's behaviour is growing strange, and his beloved teddy bear, Theo, might be more than just a toy. When an elderly woman offers Beth a remote cottage, it feels like a chance to breathe - but safety is an illusion.
  • Meanwhile, true crime podcasters Eve and Zane are chasing the story of the murders. But as Eve edges closer to the truth, the danger closes in.
    As past and present collide, and the body count rises, the threads connecting them all begin to tighten - and something terrifying is watching from the dark.
Dark Sanctuary (Crime & mystery) Sarah Barrie $32.99
  • At the heart of Maya Caruso's sharp, tender, insightful and wickedly ironic novel is Silvia Junior: a 42-year-old Italo-Australian workaholic who's nailed career success but flunked personal fulfilment. Romance? She ghosted it sometime after her divorce.
    Enter her mother, Silvia Senior: a widowed Italian matriarch with opinions laced with old-school patriarchy and a Rolodex of gossip-hungry nonnas. She's made it her full-time job to remind Junior that she's alone, unmarried and probably infertile. Their relationship is equal parts love, loathing and mutual dependency - a tangle of guilt, meatballs and inherited trauma.
  • When an old friend resurfaces, Junior's carefully collapsed world starts to expand. There's flirting, there's dancing, there's actual joy. Shockingly, Senior gets swept up in the action too, dipping a cautious toe into the world of dating.
    But as both women step out of their comfort zones, life pushes back. Chaos ensues, feelings get messy, and not even a solid plate of lasagne can fix everything.
Silvia (Modern & contemporary fiction) Maya Caruso $34.99
  • Phyllida Banks is adored in the tiny village of Brookbank, nestled in the Southern Highlands outside Sydney. Admired for her curiosity and wisdom, her antiquarian bookshop is the hub of the community.
    So, when Phyllida is suddenly gone, leaving her granddaughter, Lottie, a letter requesting she 'Find Francis', friends and neighbours rally as Lottie grapples with her grandmother's inexplicable actions and her enigmatic past.
    Uncovering a fortune of unknown origin, Lottie discovers a trail that leads to Cambridgeshire, England, and another village bookshop with eerie similarities to
  • their own.
    As the decades unravel, she stumbles upon the key to a mystery that has baffled police for fifty years. Several people have gone to great lengths to keep the past buried, and it seems Phyllida is at the heart of everything.
The Bookshop of Buried Pasts (Modern & contemporary fiction) Sarah Clutton $34.99
  • 1704- Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk has been abandoned by his own shipmates on a remote, uninhabited island. With little hope of rescue, and wild goats and cats as his only companions, he is forced to confront not only the urgent challenges of survival, but also the troubled, unsavoury past that has brought him here. What kind of man is deliberately stranded by his crew, to face near-certain death? On the island, he must use his grit, tenacity and ingenuity to survive. As his isolation deepens, Selkirk's experience takes an extraordinary and often blackly comic turn, for the island's consolations
  • prove as unexpected as its trials. The longer he is stranded, the more Selkirk wonders if he will ever escape the island, and in what ways he will be changed if he does.
    A tale of adventure and endurance, isolation and friendship, despair and hope, this gripping, singular novel asks who we are and who we become when everything else is stripped away.
Cast Away (Historical fiction) Francesca De Tores $32.99
  • Australia, 1901. Just twenty years old and the daughter of struggling bush farmers, Miles Franklin pulls off the impossible-publishing My Brilliant Career, a fiery, fearless debut that takes the English-speaking world by storm. She hides behind a male pseudonym, but when her true identity is revealed, the backlash is swift and brutal.
    Alone, broke, and undaunted, Miles sails for America. What follows is a wild, inspiring journey: years of activism, deep friendships, exhilarating love affairs, and an unshakable belief in the power of words. From the suffrage movement in Chicago to the cultural salons of Europe, she never stops writing, never stops fighting.
  • Eventually, she returns to Australia - to critics who had written her off - and delivers a dazzling comeback.Today, her name is synonymous with Australia's most prestigious literary awards: the Miles Franklin Award and the Stella Prize. But behind the legend was a woman fiercely devoted to her freedom, her craft, and her ideals.
The Very Secretive And Passionate Stella Miles Franklin(Modern & contemporary fiction)Alexandra Lapierre$34.99
  • Recovering from a bad break-up, Abbey travels with her two tiddas to Hawai'i where personal challenges, laughter and new love await. Paradise beckons in this heartwarming and contemporary novel from bestselling author Anita Heiss.
    Abbey’s ready for a holiday. Between her growing business, her recently failed relationship and her energetic grandkids, she needs to get away. So when her tiddas suggest they take their yearly girls’ trip international and hit Hawai'i, Abbey says yes faster than you can say aloha.
    Before Abbey, Stevie and Caitlin head to paradise, they make a pact: they will do
  • nothing but indulge in mai tais and sunsets – oh, and run a half marathon. It’ll be just what Abbey needs, and she’s determined to put herself first for once.
    Then Abbey meets Kaleo, a man who makes her heart race, and things get complicated. This was supposed to be a fun, drama-free holiday, but will the call of holiday romance be too much to pass by? And what happens when reality comes knocking?
The Paradise Pact(Adult & contemporary romance)Anita Heiss$34.99
  • In a reeling world of fraudsters and hypnotists, sleep talkers and estranged twins, false alibis and second chances, Rusty Wilson is beset on all sides by mysteries. Why was his childhood decided by a throw of dice, why has his wife confessed to a lover, and why do his parents no longer wish to see him?
    When Rusty loses his job to an AI system, Edwina, the mercurial friend of his youth, finds him a new role as an oracle to the young. But how can he advise anyone on what it means to be human when artificial consciousness appears within reach? If it's all just one more con, it's not clear who's scamming who. Besides, should any of it
  • matter to Rusty, when all he wants is for those he loves to love him back?
    What holds a life together when everything is coming apart?
A Rising of The Lights (Modern & contemporary fiction) Steve Toltz $34.99
  • When five very different women join a gym run by the magnetic Lars and his elusive wife Priya, they are convinced they've found more than a fitness regime. Within its glass walls, wrapped around the branches of a ginkgo tree, they discover kinship, camaraderie and the promise of transformation.
    But as the group's devotion deepens, the lines between empowerment and obedience begin to blur. Lars's ideas - once enthralling - grow darker, more coercive, and the women's sense of self starts to erode beneath the weight of his influence.
    Watching from the margins, Priya begins to
  • see what the others cannot. Long accustomed to silence, she must decide whether to remain in her husband's shadow or intervene - despite the cost.
Other People's Bodies (Modern & contemporary fiction) Megan Reed $32.99
  • What is a happily ever after really worth?
    Naomi was living the quintessential love story.
    Boy meets girl. They fall in love, get married, buy a dream house, start a family...
    Then-he kicks her out, hires the city's best divorce lawyers, drains their accounts, and takes up with a 20-something.
    It's a brutal end to the story. Naomi should accept defeat- move into a dingy apartment, get back into the workforce, and piece together the shattered remains of her life.
  • Except, why should she?
    Instead, Naomi fixates on her husband's new girlfriend. What begins as cynical curiosity soon twists into obsession-and then into something far darker. As Naomi uncovers secrets she never imagined, she realizes her own life may be in danger.
    But if it keeps her perfect family intact, isn't it worth it?
The Divorce (Thriller / suspense) Freida McFadden $34.99
  • Etta is sixty-eight years old. Happy, healthy and an active participant in her world, she's gathered her family together for an unforgettable weekend.
    Tick.
    At 5am that Saturday morning, Etta wakes her daughter, her granddaughter, her son and her daughter-in-law up to lead everyone down to the beach. To 'Etta's Hollow', where a roaring fire has already been lit. Drowsy but delighted - the sun is just starting to rise for a glorious dawn - Etta's family bask in the beauty of the moment. A memory to be cherished forever.
  • Tick.
    Until twenty minutes later, when Etta announces to her assembled beloveds something as shocking as it is alarming. 'I have brought you all down to the beach this morning to tell you something important. You see, the thing is, today is my last day alive.'
    Boom.
    Over the next twenty-four hours, Etta and her family are about to have the most surprising, affecting and life-affirming day of all their lives.
Enough (Adult & contemporary romance) Dawn French $34.99
  • The Findlay family history has long been steeped in secrets, tragedy and dark rumours of madness. Generations of its women have been haunted by a dangerous luring melody and an insatiable longing for the sea.
    It's 1923 and Isla Findlay lives with her parents on the edge of the ocean in Tasmania, in a rambling mansion full of whispers of this cursed legacy. When Isla discovers her estranged aunt is finally coming home, long-repressed memories of the selkie stories of her childhood start to resurface, along with disturbing dreams of seals and an eerie song that Isla starts to hear even in her waking hours.
  • As the line between what's real and imagined starts to blur, Isla and her aunt and mother must reckon with long-held secrets and ghosts who have not been properly laid to rest. The closer they get to the truths of the past, the louder they hear the seductive call of the ocean. Does it sing of freedom, or only more tragedy?
Daughters of the Tide (Myth & legend told as fiction) Arianne James $32.99
  • A powerful, electric reclaiming of the most famed, white-washed woman in Greek mythology
    Blessed by the gods with unparalleled beauty, Andromeda lives a life of ease within her Aethiopian palace walls. Content with her sanctuary, the young princess has no concerns other than the royal expectations her parents have for her - until a single, fateful proclamation changes everything.
    When the queen defies the gods with a blasphemous claim, Poseidon, fearsome God of the Seas, delivers a deadly ultimatum that puts the queen's life in Andromeda's hands. Poseidon sends his loyal servant, the
  • shape-shifting Ceto, to seal the princess's fate.
    But Ceto is not just a servant. With a sharp tongue and hardened heart, she has little interest in the princess's appearance - and even less in the games of gods. Yet an undeniable tension begins to bloom between them, and both quickly realise Andromeda's beauty is not only a gift, but a weapon to wield. As Poseidon's judgement draws ever closer, the two women find themselves pulled into something far more passionate - and dangerous - than either could have predicted...
Andromeda(Myth & legend told as fiction)E. S. McLeod$34.99
  • he's lived by the rules. Now she's breaking them . . .
    For more than eighty years, Joy Bridport has followed the rules - devoted wife, loving mother, steadfast neighbor in her small town. But when her best friend Hazel is given only months to live, Joy is forced to confront the truth- Hazel has lived fully, while she has only played it safe.Determined to change, Joy vows to live boldly in the time she and Hazel have left together. What begins as small rebellions soon snowballs into petty crimes, and Joy must decide whether she can embrace the freedom of 'Bad Joy' without losing the life and legacy she's built.
Good Joy Bad Joy (Modern & contemporary fiction) Mikki Brammer $34.99
  • Someone will die here this morning, at this suburban train station. It will happen in the next five minutes when the 7:06 to London Victoria arrives.
    Take note of their positions. The child, the mother, the businessman, the old woman and the gambler.
    One of them will die despite your attachment to them. There is probably one you want to get rid of. You don’t have to admit who. But perhaps you should ask yourself why.
    The train has stopped.
    Someone is dead.
  • Was it who you chose?
    It wasn’t your fault …
    So why, dear reader, do you feel so guilty?
Five(Thriller / suspense)Ilona Bannister$32.99
  • A world at war. A prophecy that will shake the stars. A love that transcends it all.
    Elegy Ahn did not ask for destiny to find her.
    She is happy with her life as a soldier, defending her small country from the Talusar, a powerful nation that worships a deadly Fever. A fever that blesses half of its victims with mysterious gifts.
    But then she's summoned to hear a prophecy-her, and the most ruthless of Talusar generals, Rava Vidar. Brought face-to-face, they learn that one of them will lead their people to victory over the other . . . but they don't know which. And at the center of
  • both of their fates: a man. A man that, Elegy is told, she will fall in love with.
    In just one day, Elegy's old life-her job, her purpose, and her future-is over. She and Rava are destined to collide, with the fate of their nations hanging in the balance. And when they do, only one will be left standing.
    Elegy intends to make sure it's her.
Seek The Traitor's Son (Modern & contemporary fiction) Veronica Roth $34.99
  • Even beauty has a dark sideIt's a stunning summer evening in the Lake District. The day has been hot and long, and tourists are only just leaving Rydal Water. One solitary rowing boat remains; face-down in the reeds. Underneath is the body of a young woman.
    DI Kelly Porter heads to the scene but when she arrives she gets another call. A suspected suicide at a health and fitness conference nearby. Two deaths in one day is never a good sign.
    Neither case is as open and shut as Kelly had hoped. Both victims had links to the wellness industry. Both had secrets ready to
  • be shared. And it seems they paid the ultimate price for them
Curel Truth (Crime & mystery) Rachel Lynch $32.99
  • Sydney, 2001. Now in her forties, Maggie Reid has built a good life for herself, surrounded by good people. She has an adorable but needy dog and a new relationship. She has tried hard to leave her painful past behind her, but when her beloved brother Lucas calls with news of their adopted mother's death, he also delivers a bombshell about Maggie's birth mother.So begins an uncertain, bumpy journey to trace her mother's identity, a quest that brings fresh heartbreak but also unexpected joy. Maggie's spent her whole life leaving, but now, for the first time, will she feel like staying?
Margaret, Are You Leaving?(Modern & contemporary fiction)Dianne Yarwood$34.99
  • Two teenage girls. One murdered classmate.And a modern-day witch trial that will divide the nation.When 18-year-old Christian Shaw is found dead in an Edinburgh park, the city reels - and the shock only deepens when police charge her best friends, Eliza Lawson and Isobel Smyth, with her murder.As social media explodes and headlines scream for justice, rumours of bullying spiral into something darker: whispers of rituals, obsession, and a teenage pact gone wrong.Matthew Phillips, a respected heart surgeon, is reluctantly called for jury duty on the case. But as the trial unfolds - and the girls reveal a chilling defence no one saw coming - he begins to question everything: the motives,
  • the evidence, even his own judgement.Who's telling the truth? Who can be trusted?And what really happened to Christian Shaw?Let the Witch Trial begin . . .
Witch Trial(Thriller / suspense)Harriet Tyce$34.99
  • By Command of The Queen, you are hereby directed to be present at –
    There's a lot to get done ahead of the Queen's Coronation, and even more so when your livelihood is at stake.
    Lucy Jones is Junior Wardrobe Assistant to the Queen, but dreams of being a singer. Caroline Brimstone loves her role as the Queen's Assistant Dresser, but behind closed doors, she fights for a better life for herself and her daughter. And Miranda Miller, an undercover journalist in the coronation office's planning committee, needs an inside scoop to keep her job – the only thing she has left.
  • They are all running away from their own demons but in order to succeed, they must shed their shame, trust themselves and reclaim their lives.
    As Queen Elizabeth II takes the throne, will these three women be able to take their rightful places in the world?
The Palace Women (Historical fiction) Jennifer Ryan $34.99
  • Forty-nine-year-old Grace Miller is the ultimate good girl. Good wife, good mother, good role model. She has to be, she’s been married to a notable evangelical Christian pastor for nearly thirty years.
    But when Grace’s marriage implodes very publicly, she realises she’s spent her entire life putting other people’s needs first – and she’s had enough. Determined to shake things up, Grace writes a ‘f*ck-it’ list of fifty bad decisions to complete before she turns fifty. But just as she starts to reclaim herself, her family throws her some unexpected curve balls that threaten to derail the plan.
Disgraceful (Modern & contemporary fiction) Rachel Fox McLeod $34.99
  • At a glitzy gala in the ballroom of the Hotel Ritz, young American tourist Maisy Bell meets an intriguing man and accepts his charming offer to take her on a day trip.
    But when Maisy doesn't return to the Ritz the following day, alarm bells ring and Maisy's aunt Clementine tries to file a missing person's report. The Paris police laugh the request away. Plenty of tourists 'disappear', having lost themselves in foolish flings. After all, summer in Paris is the perfect time for lovers. Then Clementine Bell receives a ransom note ...
    Enter investigative reporter Charlie James. As she follows Maisy Bell's designer
  • footsteps around Paris, Charlie is plunged into a heady world of diamonds, haute couture, opera, bohemian wine bars and extravagant soirees in grand country châteaux, before being pulled into the sordid underworld.
    Glamorous and fearless, glass of champagne in hand, this is Charlie James at her best.
Murder in Paris (Historical fiction) Kirsty Manning $34.99
  • After a violent confrontation with the man next door, Dove paints a daring question on the front wall of her Sunshine Coast hinterland farm- 'What would you do if you had a whole day on earth free of men?'
    When tourists and local women answer by writing their pent-up frustrations, fears and confessions, it strikes a nerve with the local blokes. With nowhere to hide from exposed secrets and shameful legacies, tensions boil up, just as the town hits the headlines over a missing teen.As media scrutiny grows and Dove faces anonymous threats, she fears her secret romance might harbour its own hidden dangers.
Dove(Crime & mystery)Georgia Harper$34.99
  • The arrival of a hotshot New York composer brings a rare touch of glamour and excitement to the peaceful country town of Fig Tree River. For Leonie, Madison, Sarita and Chrissie, four women involved in the local musical theatre, it's a welcome distraction from the pressures of daily life.
    Then a lottery ticket, bought together on impulse, changes everything.
    The winnings, shared between the four friends, are all they ever hoped for . . . and all they ever feared, bringing dreams, dilemmas and disaster.
    When their new lives start to fall apart, will
  • the women have the strength to find the song inside their hearts once more?
River Song (Modern & contemporary fiction) Di Morrissey $34.99
  • When her husband departs, her adventure begins...1933. In the tiny outback town of Bittamilla, Winifred Peters buries her husband after decades of dutiful silence, surrounded by her thankless grown-up children.On discovering a surprise inheritance, Winifred makes a sudden decision to leave town, and when she encounters a young wife taking refuge from her husband, the two women board a train to bustling Sydney.The city brings unexpected adventures, new friends and the chance to finally find their voices. But when the past catches up with them, will they be able to hold on to their fiercely won freedom?
Winifred Peters is Not Sorry For Her Loss (Australia) Louise Duffy $34.99
  • Parents behaving badly...a tragic accident...or murder? What isn't in doubt is that someone is dead.Madeline is a force to be reckoned with: witty, noisy and passionate. She remembers everything and forgives no one.
    Celeste is the kind of beautiful woman who makes the world stop and stare. But perfection is often an illusion.
    Jane is a single mum with a mysterious past who carries a sadness beyond her years.
    These three women, all with children starting at the same school, are about to tell the little lies that can turn lethal...
Big Little Lies (Fiction & related items) Liane Moriarty $32.99
  • When Audrey and Fraser tumble into a love story for the ages, theirs is an epic, unbreakable bond - until one tragic moment up-ends everything.
    Facing the unimaginable, wrestling with guilt, they're left haunted by 'what-ifs'.
    Would their lives still have imploded if they'd done one little thing differently? Where would they be if events had unfolded the other way around?
Start At The End (Modern & contemporary fiction) Emma Grey $34.99
  • Disciplined and pragmatic, Mary Roberts feels she's got her life under control. She's recently moved to Hobart, she's nearing the end of her training as an emergency doctor, and she keeps a tight handle on the wellbeing of her mother and her sister back home in Sydney.
    But when it comes to her long-term boyfriend, Felix, Mary's always had a blind spot. That is until she finds another woman's G-string in their bed ...
    In need of a temporary escape, Mary signs up to help run a wilderness expedition medicine course. She soon discovers that rock climbing, plunging into freezing cold
  • water, and working in the close company of a grumpy yet disconcertingly magnetic retrieval doctor is pushing her way out of her comfort zone.
    Suddenly, everything she thought she knew about herself is starting to unravel. The question is, what will the fallout be? A breakdown in her relationship with her sister? Her mother's brittle mental health reaching the point of catastrophe? Or - most dangerous of all - could Mary Roberts finally be ready to fall in love?
Flowers In July (Adult & contemporary romance) Anna Maynard $34.99
  • When Detective Sergeant Anastasia Brown is sent to investigate a grizzly murder in a small New South Wales town, she welcomes the chance to run from heartbreak and humiliation. But she quickly discovers that this is no ordinary murder. The body of a popular doctor has been found on the mountain, chained and burned, with arcane ­symbols carved into the soles of his feet – and the boy who found him swears he saw a ghost lingering in the trees.

    Is this a clever killer with a flair for the macabre? Or the work of an elusive Wiccan coven that worships on the mountain? Or, even stranger, are the local murmurs of the
  • mountain being haunted more than just folklore? 

    As the investigation grows ever murkier, Ana realises that everyone in town has a secret … and some are deadly.
Devil Mountain (Crime & mystery) Inessa Jackson $34.99
  • In a remote valley in Idaho in 1981, a man, a woman and three children stop running to wash the blood from their hands and bodies. They are the few survivors of a terrible tragedy. Their only choice now is, somehow, to become a family.
    Five years earlier, Opal and her husband James arrive in the small mining community of Silver Valley, drawn by promises of fortune and independence. There they meet Baron Rowe, the charismatic visionary who controls the community with an iron fist. Baron's son Denny has spent his life trying, and failing, to live up to Baron's expectations, and to protect his little sister Maude from their father's excesses.
  • Soon, a tragic accident will change all their lives. And five years later, change will come again at the barrel of a gun ...
Dirt Pickers (Modern & contemporary fiction) Edie May Hand $34.99
  • Acting on a confidential tip, Detective Sergeant Stilwell and his deputies watch a plane land in the middle of the night and drop a duffel bag of drugs at a remote airstrip in the mountains. But their sting quickly goes sideways. While Stilwell chases the fleeing pick-up man, shots are fired on the runway and the plane takes off unharmed.
    An internal inquiry puts Stilwell on the bench until he is cleared of responsibility, but there's no way he's going to sit on his hands-instead, risking his already shaky standing, he begins a secret investigation.
    After discovering a piece of key evidence in
  • lost and found, Stilwell follows the lead all the way to the LAPD's Open-Unsolved Unit and Detective Renée Ballard in Los Angeles. But they soon realise they are on the trail of a criminal who revels in taunting the authorities.
    This case is wider than anyone ever imagined-and more dangerous than they had foreseen.
Ironwood(Crime & mystery)Michael Connelly$34.99
  • Beautiful young women are disappearing by the dozen.
    A celebration is cut short when a concerned father crashes Detective Inspector Lindsay Boxer's party. His daughter is missing - and she's not the only one.
    DI Lindsay Boxer has been tracking a chilling pattern- a Jane Doe washed ashore, a body in Golden Gate Park, a string of missing women across San Francisco. Someone is hunting the city's most vulnerable, and the count keeps rising.
    When Lindsay reaches out to Interpol, their warning is stark- these cases are nearly
  • impossible to solve, and the women are almost never found alive.
26 Beauties (Thriller / suspense) James Patterson $34.99
  • Eleanor Dash can never catch a break. Not only has she had to solve two real-life murder plots in the past year, but both times it was when she was meant to be on vacation. Now she's finally got a ticket to a relaxing weekend - an all-inclusive resort at the Bahamas where she's speaking at a conference for murder mystery writers - but she arrives to find a body on the floor of her hotel room. Because of course she does.
    With plenty of familiar faces at the resort, any one of them could have been the intended target or the culprit behind it all. Was it Oliver Forrest, Eleanor's dashing boyfriend who's in danger of getting dropped by his publisher because his sales are
  • dwindling? Or Connor Smith, Eleanor's infuriating ex-lover-turned-bestselling-rom-com-author with a sordid past of his own? Or her sister Harper, whose own stilted writing career has been a sore point for years as Eleanor's has soared? Perhaps it's one of the other writers also in attendance, as friends, frenemies and foes from Eleanor's past all seem to be invited to the island.
    Surrounded by mystery writers who know all too well the many ways to craft the perfect crime, Eleanor is determined to get to the bottom of the mystery and do whatever it takes to get out of this weekend alive . . .
This Weekedend Doesn't End Well For Anyone(Crime & mystery)Catherine Mack$34.99
  • Out of money and with little to show for his art school education, John-Calum Macleod takes the ferry home to the island of Harris to find that not much has changed except for him. In the windswept croft where he grew up, Cal resumes his old life, caught between the two poles of his childhood: his father John, a sheep farmer, weaver, and pillar of their local Presbyterian church, and his Glaswegian grandmother Ella, who has kept a faltering peace with her son-in-law for decades.
    While Cal wonders if any lonely men might be found on the barren hillsides of home, John is dismayed by his son's long hair and how he seems unwilling to be Saved. As the
  • seasons pass, everything is poised to change as the threads holding together the fragile community become increasingly entangled.
John of John (Modern & contemporary fiction) Douglas Stuart $34.99
  • Seven years after escaping their rural hometown, the boys – Charlie, Zeke and Hammer – are back, though not as we left them.
    Charlie's fighting spirit has faded as he's struggled to make it as a punk musician in Perth. The opening of a new gay bar by Curtis and Ahmed, an older gay couple who have become Charlie's mentors, offers him a different way to make his mark – but the bar's opponents have other ideas.
    Zeke is lost. He knows what he stands against – the closeted life and conventional success his strict Italian parents demanded of him – but doesn't know what he stands
  • for. He surprises himself by joining a gay footy team: is it the mistake his friends think it is, or will playing footy finally give him what he's always wanted?
    Hammer has it all – fame and fortune as a star football player – or so he thinks. He's still closeted, and can't stand the AFL stuffing diversity initiatives like Pride Round down everyone's throats, especially his. But when he opens his mouth, he ignites a furore that throws all the boys' lives into chaos.
    Unapologetic and unforgettable, this is the story of three boys finding their way back to each other, and finding their own ways to become men.
Yeah The Boys (Modern & contemporary fiction) Holden Sheppard $34.99
  • When Elizabeth finds a dead body on a park bench – her own – she knows it’s a sign that she needs to make some big changes in her life.
    Staff at her retirement home are too busy to listen when she tries to get their attention, but she is persuaded she must leave its suffocating routine without further delay. In opening the door and walking away, Elizabeth makes an audacious decision – something she had forgotten she could do – in search of a better future and a connection to her past.
    Elizabeth’s daughter, Lara, drowning in her own roles and schedules, experiences a
  • stunning trifecta of tipping points following her mother’s escape. Along with her troubled teenage daughter, Evie, Lara is forced into taking responsibility for herself and facing change. Having discovered how easy it is to get lost, all three soon realise how important it is to be found again.
Simply Beside Herself(Modern & contemporary fiction)Judith Katherine$34.99
  • 1552, Paris: Against a backdrop of turmoil, suspicion, and paranoia, the printing press is quickly spreading new ideas across Europe, threatening the power of church and state and unleashing a wave of book burning and heretic hunting. When frightened ex-nun Lysbette Angiers arrives one day at Charlotte Guillard’s famous printing shop with her manuscript, neither woman knows just how far the powerful elite will go to prevent the spread of Lysbette’s audacious ideas.
    1952, New York: Milly Bennett, lonely and unmoored, is a seemingly ordinary housewife with a secretive past. Balancing the day-to-day boredom of keeping house and struggling to find her way with the
  • mothers at her children’s school, she finds her life taking an unexpected turn as conspiracies spread amidst the paranoid clamors of McCarthy’s America. When a relic from her past presents her with a 400-year-old manuscript to decipher, she is reluctantly pulled into a vortex of danger that threatens to shatter her world.
    From the risky backstreets of sixteenth-century Paris to the unpredictable suburbs of mid-twentieth century New York, the stakes couldn’t be higher when, 400 years apart, Milly, Lysbette, and Charlotte each face a reality where the spread of ideas are feared and every effort is made to suppress them.
Book of Forbidden Words (Historical fiction)Louise Fein$34.99
  • On Tasmania's wild and remote Maria Island, eighteen-year-old Min is trying to break free from her controlling, overly protective father, the island's head ranger. Her unlikely ally is Werner, an eccentric, homeless biologist who has always taught her to care for the imperilled natural world around her - even as it sets them against Piers, her father, who has his own plans. When Lucie, a journalist haunted by her family's role in the thylacine's extinction, arrives from London to investigate the island's Tasmanian devil conservation project, she is drawn into the island's rare beauty and mysteries, discovering a community grappling with the tension between progress and preservation, care and control. After a tempestuous storm
  • sees a stranger wash ashore, a chain of events is set in motion that ends in a shocking and mysterious death, only weeks later.
Every Wild Soul (Modern & contemporary fiction) Katherine Johnson $34.99
  • One summer night in 1930, Judge Joseph Crater steps into a New York City cab and is never heard from again. Behind this great man are three women, each with her own tale to tell: Stella, his fashionable wife, the picture of propriety; Maria, their steadfast maid, indebted to the judge; and Ritzi, his showgirl mistress, willing to seize any chance to break out of the chorus line.
The Wife, The Maid and the Mistress (Historical mysteries) Ariel Lawhon $34.99
  • Tracey Read is well and truly trapped. A globetrotting engineer in her thirties, as adept at fixing failing projects as she is at avoiding commitment, she's now paralysed after a major accident and warehoused in an aged care facility she nicknames The Last Resort. For the first time in her life Tracey can't just get up and go - not unless she channels her former self and stages a breakout.
    Forced to interact with others who live and work in the 'home', Tracey overcomes her own prejudices to find pockets of kindness and community, and with each small moment of independence she claws back, she begins to recognise herself again.
  • But as her analytical brain comes back online, Tracey notices something darker going on. When her suspicions are ignored by the people in charge, it's left to her to speak up, a tricky proposition given her voice disappeared on the day of the accident and no one knows if it's coming back.
    Underestimated, ignored, and facing the biggest challenge of her life, can Tracey expose the wrongdoing happening behind closed doors? And if she does, will she become the engine of her own story, or put everything at risk?
Things I Cannot Say (Modern & contemporary fiction) Geraldine Mellet $34.99
  • When Elspeth returns from New York to her hometown of Geelong, it's not for a holiday - it's because her mother has vanished.
    While her sister, Aoife, and Elspeth wait for news, they circle around their father's death years earlier, reopening old wounds. But Elspeth's own behaviour soon unsettles those around her, and the police begin to wonder if she's hiding something.
    Elspeth teams up with a local crime reporter to search for the truth, leading to the discovery of her mother's unfinished memoir. It includes letters that expose long-buried betrayals and shocking secrets. As the investigation tightens, so does the net
  • around Elspeth. Is she an investigator, a grieving daughter, or someone more dangerous?
    In a family built on lies, digging too deep can be deadly.
The Missing Mother (Thriller / suspense) Mali Cornish $34.99
  • After suffering a loss, Janine and her husband, Kamal, need a fresh start. They leave their family and everything they know in Manchester and move to Bamblethorpe, a picturesque Lancashire village where they expect nothing but peace and quiet. It’ll be just what Janine, a thriller writer, needs to work on her next manuscript.
    But the peace of their new village life is disrupted when longtime local Alexa Clarke goes missing. Did she leave her husband, like some people suspect? Or is there credibility to the rumours that something more nefarious has happened to Alexa?
    Frozen by writer’s block, Janine stumbles
  • into investigating Alexa’s disappearance, and the more she discovers about Alexa’s life, the more complicated things become. Nothing is as it seems, and Janine begins to realise that there are disturbing parallels between Alexa’s life and her own.
    What starts as curious procrastination quickly spirals into a tangled web of secrets, lies and a truth Janine may not be ready to face … if she survives.
The Secrets of Strangers (Thriller / suspense) Jess Kitching $34.99
  • A 32-year-old sex worker has just killed extremist political hopeful Meat Neck. Holed up in an off-the-grid cabin in the woods, she now has only two days, her wits and a high-speed internet connection to save her own life.
    Her best bet is to reach out to the wildly popular feminist investigative podcast Justice for Bimbos. In a hastily-typed series of emails, the newly-minted "Murder Bimbo" explains how she was recruited and then trained by a cabal of code-named US agents to take out Meat Neck.
    But, when she starts a new set of emails, this time addressed to her ex-girlfriend, we
  • begin to realize that Murder Bimbo might not be the unsuspecting cog she claims to be.
    In a time where 'truth' is more flexible than ever before - who really is Murder Bimbo? And what will she do next?
Murder Bimbo (Political / legal thriller) Rebecca Novack $34.99
  • Welcome to Shellwater Bay, where the sea is calm, the scenery idyllic ... and three women are quietly planning a revolution.
    Joany appears to have the perfect life, but behind closed doors, she's hiding a dangerous secret. Heather thinks her marriage is rock-solid until her husband demands a divorce. Steph is raising kids with a man who thinks 'helping out' means calling his mother.
    Bonded at their gym by sweat and fury, the women swap stories about the silent bargains they've made to keep the peace in their relationships.
  • But peace has its price. And when the simmering rage starts to bubble over, these new friends decide a crime or two is in order ...
The Angry Wives Club (Modern & contemporary fiction) Gabbie Stroud $34.99
  • Hana has nothing but she's hopeful. She's fifteen years old. She lives in a tiny apartment in a suburb of Tokyo with her young mother, a hostess at a local dive bar. They have no money, no security. Then Kimiko appears.
    Kimiko is older, a bright light in Hana's dark world. Together they set up Lemon, a bar that caters to hostesses and their marks, small-time crooks, men with low morals and deep pockets, and anyone down on their luck. Suddenly Hana has a job she loves, friends to share her days with, and the glittering promise of money. She feels like a normal girl. She feels invincible.
  • But in the seedy streets of Setagaya, nothing is as it seems. Soon all of Hana's hope, her optimism, and her drive, will be tested to the limt . . .
    Twenty years later, Kimiko is on trial. Now Hana must wrestle with her own actions, and face their devastating consequences.
Sisters in Yellow (Modern & contemporary fiction) Mieko Kawakami $34.99
Need2Read 2024