I was born in the worldâs most isolated capital city â Perth, Western Australia. Ever since my family packed up and drove across the vast Nullarbor Plain to relocate to South Australia, Iâve been fascinated by our eerie, wide-open spaces. Thereâs no doubt that family folklore fed into this. My Finnish mother arrived as a ten-year-old, recalling that when she first felt the heat, she thought: âThis is hell.â My father and his family arrived from the Netherlands. I love my country, but this continent presents dangers in its arid isolation â all captivating to a storyteller.
From chapter one, my heart was in my throat as I prayed that old Frank and his granddaughter Allie would come out of this story alive⌠Frank owns a remote Australian roadhouse and heâs used to living alone. I loved reading about his silent routine and the way he moves about his premises without even turning a light on. Thereâs nothing outside his windows but scrub and rusted farming equipment.
While the isolated setting may seem tranquil, tension instantly oozes from the pages. Suspicious visitors soon arrive, and from then on, the action is relentless!
Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide - an electrifying, heartpounding, truly unputdownable thriller - a bestselling debut from talented newcomer, Gabriel Bergmoser.
'A truly terrifying, breathlessly exciting novel. It gut punches you in the first few pages and doesn't let you recover until the final, thrilling climax. An extraordinary book.' M W Craven
'An original and high-octane read, it makes Deliverance look like Picnic at Hanging Rock.' The Times/Sunday Times Crime Club
Frank is a service station owner on a little-used highway who just wants a quiet life. His granddaughter has been sent to stay with him to fix herâŚ
The Island achieved an incredible feat by inducing two competing thoughts in my mind: this couldnât possibly happen, and this could possibly happen!
A family of four is on an Australian driving holiday and is unexpectedly allowed entry onto a privately owned Dutch Island. This isolated setting soon makes them vulnerable and reliant on others. I loved following the charactersâ journeys as they grappled with how to protect themselves and their loved ones. Theyâre "ordinary everyday people" who are forced to take actionâand thereâs plenty of it!
As with most of the best thrillers, there are multiple points of view that ratchet up the tension.
The Bedfordshire Warlock is a speculative fiction novel that explores the concept of reincarnation with respect to the inheritance of supernatural powers and a quest to increase those powers to the level of god-like abilities.
The main character, Dorian Leeves, is the reincarnation of a 300-year-old warlock murdered during oneâŚ
When you live on a remote cattle station, you need to plan ahead to survive. Thereâs no supermarket around the corner, no emergency services, no telecommunications. I loved the intricate details of this isolated lifestyle related in The Lost Man, delivering the best of fiction by transporting me out of my own every day.
In this precarious setting, a farming family experiences a mysterious death and immediately begins investigating. Thereâs a long list of potential suspects and much foreshadowing.
Two brothers meet in the remote Australian outback when the third brother is found dead, in this stunning new standalone novel from Jane Harper
Brothers Nathan and Bub Bright meet for the first time in months at the remote fence line separating their cattle ranches in the lonely outback.
Their third brother, Cameron, lies dead at their feet.
In an isolated belt of Australia, their homes a three-hour drive apart, the brothers were one anotherâs nearest neighbors. Cameron was the middle child, the one who ran the family homestead. But something made him head outâŚ
This book has a spellbinding setting and twisting plot that I adored. Itâs set inside a luxury lodge in the Alps, cut off by snow. I love snow books and moviesâbeing Australian, itâs so foreign to me, and itâs ideal for the locked room trope.
This novel is told via two POVs: one young woman who works at the ski lodge and one whoâs on a tech company work retreat. I admired the way Ware crafts two sympathetic yet suspicious characters. Thereâs so many puzzles to work out and scrumptious red herrings.
This instant New York Times bestseller and âclaustrophobic spine-tinglerâ (People) from Ruth Ware follows a group of employees trapped on a snow-covered mountain.
Getting snowed in at a luxurious, rustic ski chalet high in the French Alps doesnât sound like the worst problem in the world. Especially when thereâs a breathtaking vista, a full-service chef and housekeeper, a cozy fire to keep you warm, and others to keep you company. Unless that company happens to be eight coworkersâŚeach with something to gain, something to lose, and something to hide.
When the cofounder of Snoop, a trendy London-based tech start-up, organizesâŚ
Delve into this internationally best-selling series, now complete! A fast paced laugh-out-loud mix of Urban Fantasy and Mystery.
I can tell when youâre lying. Every. Single. Time. Iâm Jinx, a PI hired to find a missing university student, I hope to find her propped up at a barâyet my gutâŚ
Ever since I read this haunting book, I havenât been able to shake the memory. Its Ozark Mountain setting is incredibly well-rendered, mostly via trailer-dwelling characters scrabbling to survive. In this community, vulnerable girls have gone missing, and young Lucy Dane is trying to work out why.
There are entrancing, regular tales of hunting, gathering, and cooking (one character has a popular recipe for squirrel dumplings). This made the story feel so authentic and tangible, lending even more fear and credence to the disturbing crimes that take place.
'It is a long time since I have read a debut as impressive as Laura McHugh's The Weight of Blood. It is a chilling portrait of a small town in the Ozarks where violent men are protected and young women vanish.' Joan Smith, The Sunday Times
People still whisper about Lucy Dane's mother who vanished years ago from the town of Henbane, deep in the Ozark mountains.
When one of Lucy's friends is found murdered, Lucy feels haunted by the two lost women: by the mother she never knew, and the friend she couldn't protect.
It follows four young people on a terrifying road trip across Australia: two local university students and two international backpackers. They anticipate the quintessential outback experience â heat and sunny skies but instead, theyâre caught in the middle of a torrential storm. Meanwhile at The Pindarry, a remote hotel, publican Andrea is sandbagging in preparation for the floods. Her husband Matt is called away to help with a neighbouring property, leaving Andrea and their toddler son alone. As night falls, a biker arrives, seeking shelter from the deluge.
Eventually, all parties convene on the isolated Pindarry, but not everybody will leave.
Forty-six-year-old Madeline Fairbanks has no use for ideas like âseparation of the racesâ or âmen as the superior sex.â There are many in her dying Southern Appalachian town who are upset by her socially progressive views, but for yearsâpartly due to her late husbandâs still-powerful influence, and partly due toâŚ
The Blue Prussian is a spellbinding story told by Blake OâBrien, a beautiful, young executive with a globetrotting career. Blake returns to her native Manhattan from San Francisco after escapingâor so she thinksâher marriage to a dashing man who turned out to be a prince of darkness. She had beenâŚ