Our crime specialist shares 10 great crime reads to look out for this month.

CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH

When We Fall by Aoife Clifford

As she walks along the beach with her mother, discouraged barrister Alex Tillerson wishes she wasn’t back in her childhood town of Merritt. Alex is going through a painful divorce, her mother’s health is deteriorating due to younger onset dementia, and Merritt holds no good memories. She wants to leave, but there’s nobody to go home to, and her job prospects seem bleak. All that fades into the background when her mother finds, in all that seaweed on the shore, a human leg. Looking for a distraction, and distanced enough from the town to see things more clearly – at least, when her mother isn’t involved – Alex can’t help but investigate. The leg on the beach is identified as belonging to Alex’s former art teacher Maxine, her death passed off as an accidental drowning, which Alex suspects was something more sinister. When locals notice some odd connections to the death of a young woman named Bella three years earlier, Alex can’t leave without knowing the truth. And when has a small town ever let go of its truth without a fight?

Aoife Clifford has always been an excellent storyteller: her characters, even the villains, are nuanced; her sense of place is so vivid you’ll feel the seawater in your shoes and the unnerving rustle of forest leaves in your indoor plants. As Alex inadvertently trawls through her own past in her efforts to uncover what truly happened, you too will be desperate to know the answers. A suspenseful, rattling thriller with an ending that will have you gnawing your fingernails to the bone.

NEW CRIME FICTION

All She Wants by Kelli Hawkins

Readings favourite Kelli Hawkins has returned with another domestic thriller to follow up her addictive debut, Other People’s Houses.

Lindsay desperately wants to have a family. It feels like a wonderfully close goal – then her partner leaves her. Her dream ruined and the prospect of children gone, she thinks nothing will ever work out until she meets Jack, who loves her as fully as Lindsay loves him. Now her future is back on track, and everything will be fine. Or, since this is a psychological thriller, nothing will be fine at all, as Lindsay realises there’s more to Jack’s history than she ever expected. Is the truth worth Lindsay’s happiness? And is hiding from it worth her life? A twisting, simmering mystery.

Hideout: An Alice Vega Novel by Louisa Luna

Forty years ago, during the final seconds of an elite college football game and with the eyes of a sixty-thousand-strong crowd on him, Zeb Williams could have made the kick that won the game. Instead, he grabbed the ball, ran out of the stadium – and vanished. It’s a mystery that has obsessed America for decades, and now somebody wants the truth, and they’ve hired PI Alice Vega to find it. She wants ex-cop Max Caplan to help her again, but he’s hesitant to put himself back in danger, like he always is with her. When Alice visits a small Oregon town where Zeb was seen, she finds instead a gang of white nationalists, which poses another problem to solve. But Alice figures things out, always – no matter what. Louisa Luna’s ability to make you care so much and so swiftly for Vega and Cap is second to none, and Hideout’s tense plot is an exhilarating shot of adrenaline.

The Mother by Jane Caro

When Miriam watches her daughter Ally marry handsome vet Nick, it’s a wonderful feeling: her sensitive soul of a daughter now has somebody caring to look after her. Sure, he immediately moves them far away from Miriam, which means Ally isn’t nearby when a tragedy wracks Miriam’s life. And Ally gets pregnant so soon after the wedding. And Nick has the house under surveillance. The ‘ands’ keep building, until Miriam realises: her daughter is not safe. Walkley-winner Jane Caro’s novel asks the haunting question of what a mother could be driven to if those she loves are in danger, and the answer will shake you to your core. A confronting, relentless read.

Brunswick Street Blues by Sally Bothroyd

I really can’t express how strangely delightful it is to read a book that references suburbs you spend a lot of time in, and then fills their streets with fictional crimes.

Sally Bothroyd’s Brunswick Street Blues, set in our Carlton shop’s neighbouring suburb of Fitzroy, sees part-time bartender Brick Brown doing a little investigation while working for the local council. She needs the money, of course, but mostly she wants to figure out if the Phoenix – the Brunswick Street blues bar owned by her beloved Uncle Baz – is going to be shut down by a complaint. Before she figures that out, though, she stumbles on the dead body of Melbourne’s mayor, Dickie Ruffhead, in the council archives room, so that’s a problem. Then Baz goes missing, a devastatingly attractive journalist called Mitch Mitchell turns up to ask questions, and suddenly it’s up to Brick and her local pals to save her streets – and ours – from harm. An excellent and entertaining debut.

The Twyford Code by Janice Hallett

The first crime book I’ve read written entirely in transcribed audio notes, this immensely clever mystery follows Steven Smith – ex-con, recently released from Her Majesty’s Pleasure, and using his newfound freedom to revisit a defining moment of his youth. As a teenager, the discovery of an Edith Twyford book on a bus inspires Steve’s Remedial English teacher Miss Isles to take his literacy class on an excursion to Twyford’s house – a trip from which Miss Isles never returns. But how come Steve’s memories don’t fall in line with the other kids in his class, who are now grown, and not at all interested in dredging up that day again? A sharp, smart book to stump and fascinate readers.

Those Who Perish by Emma Viskic

It’s always a good month when there’s a new Emma Viskic book out. From the first page, you’ll be hooked: there’s a race against time to the regional town of Resurrection Bay, a shootout, and a long-lost face that Caleb Zelic – deaf Melbourne private investigator and magnet for trouble – has been desperately searching for. And, friends, that’s just the first chapter.

Caleb’s missing brother Ant has apparently gone off the rails, but when Caleb finds him at an old quarantine hospital on a remote island, he’s surprised by what Ant’s doing – and the fact that his brother knows something about the shootout. Along with a seemingly less intense case involving a missing footy club mascot costume that keeps turning up in photographs far too inappropriate for a numbat, Caleb must figure out who’s behind the deaths that start destroying his community’s peace. Another top-notch thriller from a prize-winning author.

Run Rose Run by Dolly Parton and James Patterson

Dolly Parton is a powerhouse of a woman, and with this James Patterson collaboration, she can now add ’novelist’ to her extensive list of achievements.

Travelling from Texas to Nashville with nothing but a sleeping bag, AnnieLee finds herself in a saloon armed only with her voice. That weapon, of course, is all she needs to attract the attention of somebody in the industry, and soon AnnieLee is on track to stardom. But like anyone else on the run, she has secrets, and she won’t be able to escape them forever.

To get a full picture of this country music thriller, you should check out Dolly’s accompanying new album, also called Run Rose Run, written as a soundtrack for the book – unless, that is, you consider the novel an extended booklet for the album instead.

Lady Joker by Kaoru Takamura (translated by Allison Markin Powell & Marie Iida)

Having sold more than one million copies in its native Japan and considered a classic since its publication 25 years ago, this behemoth of a book has finally been translated into English.

Five men who meet at the racetrack once a week are all very different, but share one major thing in common: the world has let them down. Their solution is to conduct an elaborate heist, kidnapping the CEO of a beer company to demand money from the rich and the immoral, with the added threat of destroying their reputations. Based on the true story of Japan’s still-unsolved Glico Morinaga case, this is a complex and masterful work that looks deep into Japanese society from its most corrupt to most disenfranchised members. An elaborate, richly detailed story for anyone willing to lose themselves in 600 immersive pages (and is physically strong enough to lift it).

NEW TRUE CRIME

Mafioso by Colin McLaren

A true crime investigation into the Mafia written by an Australian seems like an unlikely match, until you realise the depths of Colin McLaren’s research: he became a mafioso for years, in what is Australia’s largest ever undercover sting. Even with that résumé, he still travelled to Italy, the heart of the Mafia’s dealings, to truly understand the history of the organisation. Full of insider knowledge of both the Mafia and the results of its crimes, this is a sprawling look into its horrific and horrifyingly lucrative global reach by somebody who lived to write about it.

Also out this month:

Dennis Lehane’s The Drop; Lucy Foley’s The Paris Apartment; Sarah Vaughan’s Reputation; Javier Cercas’ Even the Darkest Night (translated by Anne McLean, MacLehose); Robert Gold’s Twelve Secrets; Donna Leon’s Give Unto Others; Amy McCulloch’s Breathless; and Louise Welsh’s The Second Cut.