Fiona McIntosh Detective Superintendent Jack Hawksworth of Scotland Yard has headed up three major serial operations and in each of these cases it seems he has lost a part of himself. He is burnt out and taken a shift sideways for a while, taking on a low-profile role of desk investigator out of London that’s looking into whether a global crime scam exists.
But when a number of young women start returning home ill and dying after travels in Europe, Jack uncovers a shocking black-market operation, with links that lead him all the way to a crime syndicate in South Australia …
Annie Seaton A gem-fossicking discovery echoes through time and leads to a dangerous journey through the red dust outback. A gripping mystery from Australian author Annie Seaton. Gemma Hayden has returned to her hometown of Alice Springs for a new job as a primary school teacher. It’s been six years since her family broke apart following the disappearance of her twin brother. And the scars still run deep.
Hard on the heels of her homecoming, Saul Pearce, the man she once loved, is reposted from Parks and Wildlife in Darwin back to Alice. When an old car wreck is uncovered, washed down the river to Ruby Gap, Saul investigates only to find that the wreck belonged to Ethan, Gemma’s twin – and there’s a coded note for her in the glovebox.
Joining forces, they trek through the rugged outback, piecing together clues that not only bring them to the attention of a criminal organisation, but lead them to uncover an even older puzzle … One now lost to the history books.
With targets on their backs, will they unearth the truth in time?
Michelle Gable Inspired by a real-life female spy, a WWII-set novel about a woman challenging convention and boundaries to help win a war, no matter the cost. 1944, Rome. Newlywed Niki Novotná is recruited by a new American spy agency to establish a secret branch in Italy’s capital. One of the OSS’s few female operatives abroad and multilingual, she’s tasked with crafting fake stories and distributing propaganda to lower the morale of enemy soldiers.
Despite limited resources, Niki and a scrappy team of artists, forgers and others—now nicknamed The Lipstick Bureau—find success, forming a bond amid the cobble-stoned streets and storied villas of the newly liberated city. But her work is also a way to escape devastating truths about the family she left behind in Czechoslovakia and a future with her controlling American husband.
As the war drags on and the pressure intensifies, Niki begins to question the rules she’s been instructed to follow, and a colleague unexpectedly captures her heart. But one step out of line, one mistake, could mean life or death…
Jo Dixon You should leave the past in the past … or should you? A vividly told, jaw-droppingly twisty and wholly engaging story about the consequences of discovering the truth. For readers of Sally Hepworth, Nicola Moriarty and Adele Parks. Olivia is hiding from vicious media and online scrutiny in a remote Tasmanian house when an unknown man knocks on her door, seeking Pippa, a woman who once lived there. His father, Jeremy, has died, leaving behind a letter for the unknown woman. Olivia wants to help, but can she risk revealing her own sordid past and exposure to the world once more?
Thirty years earlier, bohemian wild-child Pippa and her best friend Jeremy spend a perfect summer in the house. Pippa falls deeply in love with local boy Leo, and they begin to plan a life of adventure together, much to the displeasure of his conservative and controlling family. One night Leo leaves the house to confront his parents … and is never seen again.
As Olivia is drawn into solving the mystery, the unexpected and tragic story of Pippa, Jeremy and Leo is slowly uncovered. At the same time, a path to reclaiming her own life opens, if only she has the courage to take it.
Darry Fraser Widow Marcella Ross won’t let anything – or anyone – stop her from discovering the truth behind a deadly family mystery … Mystery and romance collide in this compulsive historical adventure from a bestselling Australian author.
1898, South Australia
At the gateway to the Flinders Ranges lies Kanyaka Station, once a thriving sheep and cattle property, now abandoned and in ruins. But a discovery in her late mother’s papers draws recently widowed Marcella Ross out to its remote landscape in search of clues to the disappearance of her Uncle Luca, an Italian immigrant whose fate seems to have been bound up in that of his mysterious partner – also long-since vanished. When Marcella is nearly run over by a handsome stranger, she discovers he too is entangled in the secrets of the past. When tragedy and obsession threaten Marcella’s fragile independence, how far will she have to go to unlock the secrets of Kanyaka – or solve the puzzle of her own future?
1955
After learning that they are unlikely to have children, Frances and Joe MacDonald have taken the unusual step of buying a caravan and travelling together through the outback. They stop and camp at Kanyaka Station, where Fran becomes mesmerised by the past. Family lore holds that an ancestor met an untimely end amid the desolate ruins. But what truly happened, and to whom, at the isolated station? As fate alters the course of her life, Fran’s footsteps echo another woman’s from so long ago …
As the mystery unravels, will these two women have the chance to take control of their own destinies?
Ian Rankin For the first time in the US, this timeless cat-and-mouse classic from the Edgar Award-winning “genius” examines political tensions in an era of espionage. In Europe, the Americans are pulling out their troops in a tide of isolationism. Britain, torn between loyalties to America and the continent, is caught in the middle.
Across the pond, a space shuttle crashes on landing, killing all but one of the crew on board: A British citizen named Mike Dreyfuss, who will become vilified by the US press and protesters. Halfway across the world, at English ground control headquarters, Martin Hepton watches with dismay as they lose contact with the most advanced satellite in Europe. When a colleague who suspects something strange disappears, Hepton realizes there is much more at stake than anyone knows — and many more people on his trail than he can possibly evade . . .
Ali Carter Pet portraitist Susie Mahl has to use all her artistic know-how to get to the bottom of a fiendish Scottish mystery. Struggling with long-buried family secrets and her own recent heartbreak, artist and pet portraitist Susie Mahl hopes her brief sojourn as an art tutor at a Scottish country house will prove a distraction.
But Susie soon realises she has bigger problems than teaching her eclectic mix of students to draw a Highland cow. Beneath the beautiful landscapes of the Scottish Highlands and the grandeur of the Auchen Laggan Tosh estate lie hidden secrets. Can Susie work out what exactly is going on before it’s too late? And can anyone be trusted?
Dawn French Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock . . . midnight. The old millennium turns into the new.
In the same hospital, two very different women give birth to two very similar daughters.
Hope leaves with a beautiful baby girl. Anna leaves with empty arms.
Seventeen years later, the gods who keep watch over broken-hearted mothers wreak mighty revenge, and the truth starts rolling, terrible and deep, toward them all. The power of mother-love will be tested to its limits.
Edith Fairchild, deserted by her feckless husband Benedict eight years before, has established the thriving Spindrift artists’ community by the sea and found deep and lasting love with Pascal. They have accepted that they cannot marry, but when Benedict returns unexpectedly to Spindrift House, all Edith and Pascal’s secret hopes and dreams of a joyous life together are overturned.
Benedict’s arrival shatters the peaceful and creative atmosphere of the close-knit community. When Edith will not allow him back into her bed, the conflict escalates and he sets in motion a chain of tragic events that reverberate down the years and threatens the happiness of the community forever . . .
Josephine Cox Florence Stanville is a woman with a past. When she moves to Guisethorpe on the east coast of England, the townsfolk are intrigued by the glamorous and mysterious stranger, with her flame-red hair and abrupt manners.
Florence doesn’t care about the gossips – she’s drawn to the peaceful seaside town by the pull of her childhood, when she lived for a brief but happy time with her beloved late mother. The riddle of those days remains and now Florence can only snatch at half-remembered memories and shadowy figures in her dreams.
As Florence is reluctantly drawn into the lives of her new neighbours, the layers of her own life are revealed, though it’s clear not everyone wishes her well. Far from finding peace, Florence has found instead turmoil and secrets. Can she put the pieces of her past together, or will it remain a closed book forever…?
