GRIPPING READS

Snuggle up this winter with four can’t-put-down thrillers from great Australian and international writers in our Reads of the Month.

THE ANNIVERSARY

Stephanie Bishop is an award-winning writer, critic and author of three novels. Her latest, The Anniversary, weaves a dark and compulsive story about writing and desire. Novelist JB Blackwood is on a cruise with her husband, Patrick, to celebrate their wedding anniversary. Her one-time professor, Patrick is much older than JB. A maverick when they met, he seemed somehow ageless and while he was once a successful film director, JB’s rising success as a major literary talent is beginning to overshadow him. A few days into their trip, a storm hits and Patrick falls overboard. As the search for his body begins, the truth about the circumstances of his death and marriage begin to spill out…

ELEVEN LIARS

Described by James Patterson as a “one of a kind”, author Robert Gold has penned another crime thriller with Eleven Liars. Following on from one of 2022’s biggest crime thriller debuts, this novel returns journalist Ben Harper to a small town after a body is discovered in a burnt-out community centre. As the flames took hold, Ben happened to be walking past and helped the person inside escape – a person who fled the scene before they could be identified. Now the small town of Haddley is abuzz with rumours. Was this an accident or arson? And when the identity of the victim is revealed, Ben is confronted with a crime terrifyingly close to home…

DEATH OF A BOOK SELLER

London-based writer, literary podcast co-host and former bookstore manager Alice Slater knows a thing or two about crime books. In her debut novel, Death Of A Book Seller, Roach is a bookseller, loner and true crime obsessive – and not interested in making friends. She has all the company she needs in her serial-killer books, murder podcasts and pet snail, Bleep. Until Laura joins the bookshop, that is. Smelling of roses, with her cute literary tote bags and beautiful poetry, she’s everyone’s new favourite bookseller. But as Roach’s curiosity blooms into obsession, it becomes clear that she is prepared to infiltrate Laura’s life at any cost…

HOME BEFORE NIGHT

In his sixth novel, award-winning author J.P. Pomare tells the compelling tale of a mother searching for her missing son. As the third wave of COVID hits Melbourne, everyone is given until 8pm to get home and stay within five kilometres of it for the next four weeks. When Lou’s son, Samuel, doesn’t arrive home by nightfall, she begins to panic. He doesn’t answer his phone. He doesn’t message. Lou is out of her mind with worry, but she can’t go to the police because she has secrets of her own – ones her son can’t know. So Lou must find her son herself and bring him home…