Davitt Awards winners 2017
Congratulations to the 2017 winners of the Davitt Awards for the best crime books by Australian women!
Adult novels
The Dry by Jane Harper
Jane Harper’s debut novel follows federal police officer Aaron Falk as he returns to his rural hometown to investigate an apparent murder-suicide, that might be more than it seems. The Dry was one of our top 10 best crime books of last year, and you can read why our staff loved it here.
Debut
Ghost Girls by Cath Ferla
It’s winter in Sydney and one of Sophie Sandilands’s English language students has just committed suicide. When it is revealed that the dead woman on the pavement has stolen another’s identity, Sophie is unable to resist the investigative instincts that run in her blood and drawn into the mystery. As she comes works to unravel a sinister operation that is trawling the foreign student market for its victims, it soon becomes clear that someone has been watching Sophie herself.
Young Adult novels
Frankie by Shivaun Plozza
Frankie Vega is angry. Just ask the guy whose nose she broke. Or the cop investigating the burglary she witnesses. Or her cheating ex-boyfriend. Or her aunt who’s tired of giving second chances. When a kid shows up claiming to be Frankie’s half brother, it reminds her of a past she doesn’t want to remember, but when that same kid goes missing, she knows she has to find him – even though she can’t stand the only person willing to help…
Children’s novels
Wormwood Mire by Judith Rossell
This is the second Stella Montgomery Intrigue book from Judith Rossell – a thrilling Victorian-fantasy-adventure series for ages 9 and up. After young orphan Stella Montgomery returns from her first adventure, sodden yet exhilarated, her aunts are furious. They send her off to the old family home at Wormwood Mire and a governess. Thankfully, there might just be another adventure lurking in the overgrown grounds of this mouldering (possibly haunted) house.
Non-fiction books
Look What You Made Me Do by Megan Norris
One Australian woman is hospitalised every three hours and two more lose their lives each week as a result of family violence. But for some women there is a punishment more enduring than injury or their own death. This timely book examines the evil done by vengeful fathers who kill their own flesh and blood in order to punish wives who have chosen to end abusive relationships. In its pages, author Megan Norris focuses on seven different but equally harrowing cases of ‘spousal revenge’.
