New Crime Fiction

Australian and New Zealand crime and thriller writing is booming globally. Neighbours that are siblings in spirit, vastly different in landscape, antipodean authors offer readers and listeners a blend of exotic and familiar, seasoned by distinctive senses of place, outlook, and humour, and roots that trace to the earliest days of our genre. Southern Cross Crime is the first comprehensive guide to modern Australian and New Zealand crime writing.

For crooked politicians and white-collar criminals looking to avoid either prison or a deadlier form of payback, there’s Exit Strategy. With just one call, they can fake your death, give you a new name and face, and launder whatever ill-gotten funds you need to establish a new life on the other side of the world. When Jordan Parrish, the brilliant founder of a medical technology start-up, made the call, he thought he had no other way out. But after his exit, he began to wonder about the circumstances that led him to make that decision: Was someone working against him?

Harry Booth ist ein Kind, gerade einmal neun, da erkrankt seine Mutter schwer an Krebs. Um die hohen Arztrechnungen begleichen zu können, greift er zu ungewöhnlichen Mitteln: Er bricht im Schutz der Nacht in die leerstehenden Häuser der Reichen ein. Harry erweist sich als ebenso klug wie talentiert, und er schätzt den Adrenalinrausch bei seinen Abenteuern. Doch versteht er sich als Dieb mit festen Regeln: niemals Aufsehen erregen, niemals lange bleiben, nur von denen nehmen, die es sich leisten können. Bis er auf Miranda Emerson trifft und über die Liebe zu ihr alle Vorsicht vergisst.

Ammalie Brinks has just lost the three keys of her life’s purpose—her husband, her job, and her role as a mom, after her son went off to college. She’s also mystified to find herself in middle age: How exactly had that happened? The terrifying idea of becoming irrelevant, invisible, of letting her life slip away Into obscurity, has her driving distracted through Nebraska with a broken plastic fork in her tangled hair.

This new edition provides extensive commentary on the literary figures, such as Baudelaire, Swinburne, J.K. Huysmans, Mallarmé, Arthur Symons and Théophile Gautier, who formed Wilde's literary circle and, in some senses, underpinned his overconfidence in the shield of Art to protect him from the sword of social morality. Returning to this contemporary account of such an infamous trial allows the modern listener a broader historical perspective. Grolleau’s words are, in fact, part of the history surrounding the immediate literary and social aftermath of Wilde’s death.

Lake Winnipesaukee in central New Hampshire is a paradise on earth. A perfect place to unwind—until a ruthless killer starts taking innocent lives. Following a horrific double homicide, the small communities surrounding the lake are wondering who the next victim will be and what the killer wants. Russian-American police officer Vanya Petrova is enraged that someone has shattered paradise on her lake community. She seems to be the central figure in this murderer's bloody rampage. Vanya suspects she's somehow acquainted with the sick man responsible for the bloodshed.

A&E doctor Kate North has been knocked out of her orbit by a personal tragedy. So when she's offered the chance to be an emergency replacement at the UN research station in Antarctica, she jumps at the chance. The previous doctor, Jean-Luc, died in a tragic accident while out on the ice. The move seems an ideal solution for Kate: no one knows about her past; no one is checking up on her. But as total darkness descends for the winter, she begins to suspect that Jean-Luc's death wasn't accidental at all. And the more questions she asks, the more dangerous it becomes for them all.

"Beschütze sie” steht auf dem Zettel, den Hannah eines Vormittags von einer Unbekannten in die Hand gedrückt bekommt. Er stammt von ihrem Ehemann Owen, der am Morgen wie jeden Tag, zur Arbeit gegangen ist. Oder? Hannah kann ihn nicht erreichen, er ist spurlos verschwunden – und von einer Sekunde auf die andere verändert sich Hannahs Leben für immer. Denn ab heute hat sie nur noch zwei Aufgaben: Die Liebe ihres Lebens wiederzufinden. Und Owens Tochter Bailey zu beschützen.

Ed Freemen, retired cop turned senior park ranger, came to Lake Hope looking for a fresh start after shooting a teenage robbery suspect armed only with a BB gun. But his dream of writing citations and leading nature walks is shattered when the mangled remains of a young woman are found on the Moonville Rail Trail. It looks like she was run over by a train, but the tracks were removed forty years ago. Freemen and his team discover the legend of a railroad worker run over by a train a hundred years before.

After graduating university, four friends - Peter, Avery, James, and Isaac - spent a golden summer working in a vineyard. Years later, Peter is brutally murdered in Martinborough. Meanwhile, north of Auckland, the long, hot summer is over and the tourists have left Matakana wine country. A tranquil atmosphere descends, and warm autumnal winds sweep across the valleys. With the harvest due, grapes sit bursting upon the manicured vines, awaiting the pick. Then a severed hand is discovered under Avery's house.

Harry Booth ist ein Kind, gerade einmal neun, da erkrankt seine Mutter schwer an Krebs. Um die hohen Arztrechnungen begleichen zu können, greift er zu ungewöhnlichen Mitteln: Er bricht im Schutz der Nacht in die leerstehenden Häuser der Reichen ein. Harry erweist sich als ebenso klug wie talentiert, und er schätzt den Adrenalinrausch bei seinen Abenteuern. Doch versteht er sich als Dieb mit festen Regeln: niemals Aufsehen erregen, niemals lange bleiben, nur von denen nehmen, die es sich leisten können. Bis er auf Miranda Emerson trifft und über die Liebe zu ihr alle Vorsicht vergisst.

Monreith, Massachusetts, was once a small community of whalers and farmers. These days it’s a well-to-do town filled with commuters drawn to its rugged coastline and country roads. A peaceful, predictable place—until popular restaurateur Laurel Thibodeau is found brutally murdered in her own home. Suspicion naturally falls on Laurel’s husband, Simon, who had gambling debts that only her life insurance policy could fix. But there are other rumors too. Among the group of six friends gathered for Alice Stone’s fortieth birthday, theories abound concerning Laurel’s death.

New Zealand, 1970. Born into the gang, Alicia longs to escape the misery of her childhood. Her dream of freedom falls apart when she’s pledged in blood to her cousin Mickey. Happiness seems further away than ever once Mickey grows into a ruthless gangster - until a chance meeting with a hotshot business executive promises Alicia a new life. Immediate reprisals plunge Alicia into a deadly war. Shot down at her wedding ceremony and fighting for life, she despairs that Mickey will ever let go. Can Alicia break free from her brutal past, or is she destined for a legacy of bloodshed?

You come home to find your wife missing - and the body of a woman you've never seen in her place. A phone in her hand starts to ring. A voice says you have 24 hours to clear your name; 24 hours to save your wife. But there's only one way to do it. You must kill someone for them. Someone you've never heard of. A complete stranger. And the clock is ticking.

Detective Ngaire Blakes is back on the case when a skeletonized murder victim is discovered - a crime that took place during the Springbok Tours of 1981. A period that pitted father against son, town against city, and police against protesters. When the victim is identified as Sam Andie, a young African American man transplanted from the States to NZ by his family, Ngaire must investigate whether racial motives were behind the death.

He may be a millionaire, but Vern Wheeler never forgot that he is a son of Maine - land of big sky, wide lakes, and the fattest salmon on the East Coast. To escape the boardroom, he buys a rundown fishing lodge in the wilds of his home state, and with his brother turns it into the most fashionable retreat in New England. After years of happy fishing, the Wheelers have no interest in selling Raven Lodge. But a local Native-American group won't take no for an answer.

Charley Glass arrived in her family’s lives like the hurricane she'd escaped. But she hadn't run far enough: the ruthless Giordano family are on her tail and want two things—her life, and the return of the property she stole from them. No matter how many bodies stack up. After years of hoping, Charley finally has the family she’s always wanted, but now she’s going to have to tell them the real reason she came looking for them. There is only one way she’s going to stay alive, and that is to employ the muscle of the notorious Glass Family.

Deputy Sheriff Nick Rogers found out small-town life meant adjusting to two things - gossips and Laney Cavanaugh. And neither was much help in solving a bridal shower murder. Some days it appeared like everyone in Whitehorse had a secret - including their new lawman. And falling for Laney wasn’t a good way to maintain a low profile. Nick might have been new to Whitehorse, but he wasn’t above getting his hands dirty.

As the leader of the Serious Crime Unit, DCI ‘Mac' McNeill is no stranger to the city's darkest secrets. But when a body marked with Celtic symbols is discovered in a run-down tower block, the case challenges even his seasoned instincts. With the victim's ties to the treacherous drug scene and a notorious crime lord complicating matters, Mac seeks the help of Dr. Clio Wray, an expert in ancient symbology. But when a second body emerges, an unsettling connection is made to Mac himself.

The stories in this collection reflect a fundamental truth about Santa Fe: history depends on who's telling it. Too often the story of this city has been told only by the conquerors and the tourism PR firms. Hear the stories that never make the glossy tour brochures: the working class and the underground, the decolonized and the ever-haunted; the Santa Fe only we know.... Conquered and reconquered, colonized and commodified, Santa Fe understands - from historical genocide to the murders of family members - the intimacy of violence.