Live life to the fullest – girls just wanna have fun. Never let a man come between you. Share all your secrets. For twin sisters Isabel and Verity, the sisterhood rules were shattered when Verity had an affair with Izzy’s husband. Unforgivable, right? Devastated by her sister’s betrayal, Izzy casts Verity into social Siberia.
But when their mother goes missing, Verity and Izzy are forced to come together again to find her. And then the estranged sisters’ problems only get bigger. Their mother has a new younger lover and where there’s a will… he’d clearly like to be in it.
Can they stop their mother making a dreadful mistake? And in doing so find a way to bury the pain of the past? Full of laugh-out-loud humour and devastating pathos, Kathy Lette’s brilliant new novel takes us on a roller-coaster ride which proves that from pain comes healing, from honesty comes forgiveness, and that nothing is more important than your sisters.
Helen Pitt For decades, the young and the young at heart have loved the Luna Park face and its promise of laughs and thrills – and a whiff of danger. Helen Pitt has uncovered Australia’s intriguing Luna Park story. It’s filled with con men and criminals, crooked cops, failed politicians and movie moguls. Like the circuses, from which amusement parks evolved, this is a tale with elephants, performing snakes and many ringmasters.
The story starts in late 19th-century America, and follows the eight fun parks that opened—and closed—across Australia. The most famous of them all, Sydney’s Luna Park, has a history that’s truly a roller-coaster ride like its trademark Big Dipper, which was shipped piece by piece from South Australia for its 1935 opening.
From the engineering feats of its construction in the dark days of the Depression to the tragic deaths of six boys and a father in the 1979 Ghost Train fire – one of Sydney’s most heartbreaking unsolved mysteries – and despite financial disasters, legal battles and closures, Luna Park survives, glittering by the water.
Debbbie Whitmont Could the conviction of Vietnamese refugee Phuong Ngo for the 1994 assassination of Cabramatta MP John Newman be one of Australia’s greatest miscarriages of justice? ‘I think that every now and again our wonderful system cocks up and this was one of those times.’ Former ALP Senator Graham Richardson.
Cabramatta was embroiled in a heroin epidemic, gang wars and demands to deport Vietnamese gangsters when local member John Newman was gunned down in the driveway of his home. Newman’s murder was billed as Australia’s first political assassination and the killer was identified within hours as the politically ambitious Vietnamese refugee and Deputy Mayor, Phuong Ngo.
Ngo was accused of killing Newman to take his seat in parliament and sentenced to die in gaol. But there have always been questions about his conviction. Why did it take seven years and three trials to find Phuong Ngo guilty? Why was so much evidence and the names of so many witnesses kept secret? How could Ngo be the murder mastermind when both of the men accused of shooting Newman were acquitted? Why is the killer still at large? And why do some of the day’s most senior politicians say they never believed Phuong Ngo was guilty?
For the first time, Phuong Ngo tells his story and unpicks one of the country’s longest and most secretive investigations in The Man Who Couldn’t Wait.
Mary Beard What does the face of power look like? Who gets commemorated in art and why? And how do we react to statues of politicians we deplore? In this book–against a background of today’s “sculpture wars”–Mary Beard tells the story of how for more than two millennia portraits of the rich, powerful, and famous in the western world have been shaped by the image of Roman emperors, especially the “twelve Caesars,” from the ruthless Julius Caesar to the fly-torturing Domitian.
Twelve Caesars asks why these murderous autocrats have loomed so large in art from antiquity and the Renaissance to today, when hapless leaders are still caricatured as Nero’s fiddling while Rome burns.
Patricia Dunmore It is late in the evening when a fully-loaded Dreamliner begins its final approach to Auckland airport after a long flight from Hong Kong. Passengers are getting ready to land, air traffic controllers are about to hand the plane over to the local tower, when suddenly the plane vanishes from the radar. No May Day was issued; everything seemed perfectly normal. But the plane, carrying 214 passengers and crew, has vanished.
The authorities have no idea why or a clue to where it is. Deep fog is rolling across the Waitakere Ranges and neither the coastguard nor LandSAR know where to search. Even the Chief Air Accident Adviser is stumped. Detective Sergeant Maki Hohepa is part of the Police Disaster Response Unit tasked with unravelling this mystery.
But nothing is as it seems. There are unidentified passengers, missing luggage and body parts that lead to a shocking discovery. Is this sabotage by a foreign nation or was it pilot suicide? Could it be drugs-related, or is it something altogether more sinister?
Michael Wolff The author of Fire and Fury delivers a breathtaking insider account of the 2024 Trump campaign—undoubtedly the wildest, most unpredictable campaign in U.S. history, including multiple criminal trials, two assassination attempts, and a sudden switch of opponents.
All or Nothing takes readers on a journey accompanying Donald Trump on his return to power as only Michael Wolff, the foremost chronicler of the Trump era, can do it. As Trump cruelly and swiftly dispatches his opponents, heaps fire and fury on the prosecutors and judges who are pursuing him, and mocks and belittles anyone in his way, including the president of the United States, this becomes not just another election but perhaps, both sides say, the last election. The stakes could not be clearer: either the establishment destroys Donald Trump, or he destroys the establishment.
What soon emerges is a split-screen reality: on one side, a picture that could not be worse for Trump: an inescapable, perhaps mortal legal quagmire; on the other side, an entirely positive political outlook: overwhelming support within his party, ever-rising polling numbers, and lackluster opposition. Through personal access to Trump’s inner circle, Wolff details a behind-the-scenes, revealing landscape of Trumpworld and its unlikely cast of primary players as well as the candidate himself, the most successful figure in American politics since, arguably, Roosevelt, but who might easily seem to be raving mad.
Threading a needle between tragedy and farce, the fate of the nation, the liberal ideal, and democracy itself, All or Nothing paints a gobsmacking portrait of a man whose behavior is so unimaginable, so uncontrolled, so unmindful of cause and effect, that it defeats all the structures and logic of civic life. And yet here in one of the most remarkable comebacks in American political history, Trump is victorious. This is not just a story about politics: It is a vivid exposé of the demons, discord, and anarchy—the fire, fury, and future—of American life under Trump.
Erica James Once a grand country house, Hope Hall is now beautiful luxury apartments and when Cassie and Nina become new neighbours, they soon become firm friends. But as perfect as life in the Cambridgeshire countryside seems, both have heartaches of their own.
Cassie is blissfully in love with Ben, but shadows from her first marriage loom large, threatening her happiness. Nina, a widow, must confront a painful decision that will shatter her mother-in-law’s dreams.
Into their lives comes Venetia, a lively seventy-nine-year-old with a penchant for secrets – one of which is close to her heart, concealed in her handbag… As Venetia recalls her own bittersweet history with Hope Hall, the bonds between the three women are forged, revealing the strength found in friendship and the courage to confront the past.
Nora Roberts He showed up at Arden Bowie’s debut author appearance with a copy of her novel and an eager smile. He showered her with compliments and got her autograph. Then he came to her next event. And the one after that. Dustin was just an aspiring writer who wanted advice, Arden reassured herself. But after giving in to one of his incessant invitations and chatting with him over coffee, she discovered that ignoring her inner alarm bell had been a terrible mistake…
An introvert at heart, Arden had long craved solitude―but now, after a harrowing assault, she finds herself hiding behind locked doors and startling at every sound. And her relief at his imprisonment is tempered by anxiety when Dustin’s wealthy mother helps to get him a paltry five-year sentence at a psychiatric facility.
Arden decides to write a new story for herself, moving to a tiny Oregon town and befriending Gideon, an ex-LAPD detective. But while she learns to thrive, Dustin remains his delusional, twisted self, as fixated as ever and now seething with anger. He still believes Arden’s purpose on earth is to serve and please him. And his job is to protect her. But who will protect her from him?
John Connolly In Maine’s rural Kennebec River Valley, the body of a young man who ran away from a “troubled teens” school has been found in the water, apparently drowned after breaking his leg. Meanwhile, a teenage girl, not connected to the school, has gone missing and only one man will be up to the task of solving the two linked disappearances.
Mali Cornish A razor-sharp psychological suspense thriller for fans of Gillian Flynn about the family secrets that bind us – and break us. When Elspeth returns from New York to her hometown of Geelong, it’s not for a holiday – it’s because her mother, Simone, has vanished without a trace. Elspeth moves in with her sister, Aoife, and old wounds reopen as they circle around their father’s death years earlier. But Elspeth’s own behaviour soon unsettles those around her. She’s jittery, secretive – and the police begin to wonder if she’s hiding something more than grief.
Desperate to prove her innocence, Elspeth teams up with Steve, a local crime reporter, to hunt for the truth. Their search leads them to Simone’s unfinished memoir, which includes letters that expose long-buried betrayals and dangerous secrets. But as the investigation tightens, so does the net around Elspeth. Is she an investigator, a daughter, or something more dangerous? Because in a family built on lies and betrayal, digging too deep can be deadly.
