AustLit

''This is about three deaths. Actually more, if you go back far enough. I say deaths but perhaps all of them were murders. It's a grey area. Murder, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. So let's just call them deaths and say I was involved. This story could be told a hundred different ways.'

'For Penelope Sheppard, university offers an escape from her troubled past. Running from a life weighed down with scandal and tragedy, Pen sees this as the ideal place to reinvent herself among perfect strangers. Life in her new halls of residence feels like a wonderland of sex, drugs, and maybe even love. But all too soon Pen realises you never can run far or fast enough. And when Pen's secrets are revealed, the consequences are deadly...Little by little, through Pen's flawed narration and tantalising diary entries, secrets, truths and lies come to light and a dangerous dilemma unfolds, twisting and turning until the very last page.' (Publication summary)

'Inspired by a real person, In the Margins is the story of spirited book-collector Frances Wolfreston—the woman who uniquely preserved the earliest part of Shakespeare’s legacy.  

'England, 1647. As civil war gives way to an uneasy peace and Puritanism becomes the letter of the law, Frances Wolfreston, a rector's wife, is charged with enforcing religious compliance by informing on her parishioners. This awful task triggers memories of her mother, Alice, who inspired Frances’ love of books and secretly practised Catholicism at great risk. Conflicted, she doesn’t report a reclusive and mysterious midwife to delay her going to gaol.

'As Frances takes increasingly bold steps to help the women and children of the parish, she attracts the ire of a patron of the church who questions why Frances collects books that she charges are entertainment. When her mother is gaoled for religious crimes, the secrets Frances hides from her husband begin to surface, and she is faced with an impossible choice: comply with the strict dictates of the new laws, or risk everything to free the women she cares for. 

'In this tender and powerful work of imagination, the life of a remarkable woman who wrote and lived in the margins in a time where women's voices went unheard is restored to history. Beautifully written and deeply moving, In the Margins is a testament to the way literature can illuminate our inner lives and set us free when the world around us is covered in darkness.' (Publication summary)

'Your future is not guaranteed. And isn’t that fucking freeing? If you found out you had less time to live than the average bear, how might you spend it?

'That’s a question comedian Michelle Brasier has been asking herself since her dad died of cancer, then her brother, and she was told there’s a high chance she’ll get it too. She’s only young (oh my god so young, and such great skin) but she has been through a lot and it’s taught her to live each day like it’s her last – because it just might be.

'From teenage fumblings in the back of a car in Wagga Wagga (teen pregnancy capital of Australia), to performing with Aunty Donna and her own sell-out comedy shows, Michelle invites you into the highs (seeing Jason Momoa drinking a Guinness next a classic car in SoHo) and the lows (getting dumped ¾ of the way through Pirates of the Caribbean).

'It’s an examination of the tiny things and the big things – how much it hurts to be a woman and a person, and how funny it is to try and get into shapewear and how funerals are silly. It’s self help for those of us who hate self help. A bit of a laugh and a bit of a cry. Balance. Yoga in the morning, whisky in the evening.

'Heartbreaking and hilarious, My Brother’s Ashes are in a Sandwich Bag moves between grief and joy, reminding us that life’s too short to be taken seriously. ' (Publication summary)

'From poet Courtney Peppernell comes the story of a very long winter, a month of dark and unforgiving Sundays, that will make you question your strength and the purpose of living. 

'Bestselling poet and author of the acclaimed Pillow Thoughts series, Courtney Peppernell returns with a story of uncovering the light that resides deep within us all, should we only be brave enough to search the darkness to find it. A Month of Sundays is a tribute to surviving a long winter and a promise that, despite the darkness, the light will undoubtedly return.' (Publication summary)

'Where did she come from? And how far will she go?

'Five years ago, Kate’s partner, Max, abandoned her for his pregnant lover. The affair has long since crumbled, but Kate has become fixated with Vee, her ‘replacement’. In a bid to find out what compelled Max to leave, she moves to Bridgewell, which stands in the shadow of St Catherine's Chapel, where Vee is now raising her four-year-old daughter, Iona. 

'Warm and trusting, Vee is juggling work, single parenthood and a controlling ex-partner, Max, with whom she is still secretly sexually involved. Glad of Kate’s friendship, she nevertheless wonders what has brought this glamorous, but brittle woman to such a quiet corner of middle England.

'When Vee meets charismatic artist, Tom, she is hopeful of establishing her first meaningful attachment since Max. But Kate has her own plans...

'Against a backdrop of ancient ghosts, mystical forces and long-buried tragedy, Vee unwittingly yields to Kate’s cruel agenda, until the past and present collide with devastating consequences.'  (Publication summary)

'A murder. A disappearance. A sinister network.

 'Steels Creek is an idyllic retreat in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. It’s a place where everyone knows their neighbours and no one locks their doors. Investigative journalist Lars Nilsson has moved to the settlement for a quiet life, leaving behind a public fall from grace and the crime reporting he was once feted for. 

'But when a body is found floating in a nearby waterhole and hours later his best friend’s daughter is reported missing, Lars is compelled to investigate, putting him back in the crosshairs of police. What he finds may not only destroy his tight-knit community but also the life he has worked so hard to rebuild.

''Fast-paced and thrilling, The Community is also about fatherhood, family ties and redemption, told through the eyes of a man struggling to make peace with his past. ' (Publication summary)

'My father tells it because he made it up.  A little bedtime story of my origin. They are not really my parents, the people who I call Mum and Dad. Those are not my siblings, the kids who I know as my brother and sisters. 

'I am not really human. 

'I am an alien from another planet in a far distant constellation. 

'Jessica Knight grew up on a dairy farm in rural Victoria, her crib next door to where all the cows were milked. It’s a loving Mormon household, a God-fearing home. While they don’t have very much, it’s their values and good humour that allows them to laugh at what scares them. 

'All young Jessica wants is to be good and make her parents and her Heavenly Father happy. She cleans the house and helps out with her siblings; all the while being subjected to intensive medical tests and major surgeries. Doctors consider her a puzzle and a medical mystery. 

'But what if you decide you want to be open about your fears?

'This is the story of how one young woman learned to move on from the life she was expected to have, embraced what she was scared of, and looked to her future with an open heart and mind.

'Maybe you don't need heaven, maybe you just need to find yourself.' (Publication summary)

'It’s never too late to reinvent your life

'Audrey Lamont has happily devoted herself to family life for the best part of 40 years, but lately she’s become aware that she lost herself somewhere between 'I do' and the weekly shop.

'Worse, her academic husband Simon has found time for romance – just not with Audrey. Feeling invisible to everyone, even herself, she flees to her aunt’s home in rural France.

'While waiting for her sudden absence to spark a change of heart in Simon, Audrey finds solace in the charms of the French countryside and the company of her aged aunt and a cast of eccentric Bretons.

'But soon Audrey discovers going AWOL might do more than save her marriage, it might change her life …'  (Publication summary)

'It was a beautiful evening. The wind gathered speed, lifting the frangipanis from the grove behind him, pink and yellow petals defying gravity. Beyond the trees, hidden by the foliage and rows of towering palm trees, the detention centre slept fitfully in the heavy summer heat. The palms blocked the ocean gust that now swirled around him, filling his lungs with the taste of temple flowers and salt. It reminded him of home. He took a deep breath, stepped off the escarpment and felt the red sand rush up towards him.

'Arriving in Australia seeking asylum, Fina dedicates herself to aiding the refugees who are held in Port Camden, a remote island outpost. Over time she settles into a life within a community of like-minded people, finding a new family, far from her original home. After she speaks out for those being detained, Fina becomes the focus of a media storm that leads to her arrest, and the threat of deportation.

'When a security officer dies under suspicious circumstances, Lucky, a special investigator, arrives to uncover the truth. The mystery is tied to Fina’s fate—and the secrets she reveals will divide the town and the nation.

'Safe Haven is about displacement and seeking refuge—but ultimately it is a story about finding home—and the lengths you’ll go to find safety and love.'  (Publication summary)

'Sometimes you must shine a light on the dark places to see what was always there​.

'‘Nancy won’t be coming home.’

'And there it is: that pip of a moment. That instant. That fraction of a second. That weightless stillness at the very top of a ball’s bounce, between its going up and falling down.

'My brother and I held hands, suspended somewhere in between the life we’d led as Nancy’s children, and the one we were destined to live thereafter.

'Winter Robins is a happy enough child, growing up in the north of England, with parents who love her and the constant companion of a twin brother, but a cold wind blows through when her mother dies. Her father turns to the bottle, her grandmother struggles to cope, and she and her brother are sent to live in Western Australia with family their mother had never mentioned.

'Although Winter quickly settles in Australia and comes to love her life and the people in it, she notices strange happenings in the shadows of her new home. When a news story prompts her to look back as her past, she begins to wonder whether things were as idyllic as she had thought at the time.

'As she uncovers secret after secret, she realises a much darker narrative may have been – and perhaps still is – playing out ...'  (Publication summary)

'The end of the affair is just the beginning

'A rich and provocative debut for fans of Lily King and Emily Maguire

'Mardi McKee, prodigal daughter, arrives at her father’s home in Lithgow, Australia, after drifting overseas for eighteen months. Her previous life is a memory. Her mother has died, she is divorced and is estranged from her former lover, Ian. Mardi had left Ian, at dawn before he awoke, with no explanation, only months after ending her marriage.

'Ian’s teenage sister, Claudia, has also arrived, escaping her childhood home for Ian’s. Spiky, lovable, lost, Claudia forges an intense friendship with Mardi. But Mardi finds that repairing her relationship with Ian is not so easily done. Mardi is hiding something and Ian is having none of her quest for forgiveness, not until she answers why she vanished without a trace.

'Set between country New South Wales, inner Sydney, and Europe, Ordinary Human Love follows Mardi as she discovers that the greatest love she will ever feel is for the man she left. In this powerful and complex debut, Melissa Goode interrogates what makes a life worthwhile, and has created a vivid, intricate portrait of the relationships that shape and connect us, and the all-consuming nature of desire.' (Publication summary)

'Ilene, a working class mother, is struggling to survive and desperate to reconnect with her children, Jack and Lonnie, in the aftermath of a near fatal tragedy.

'But her children vanish, setting off a chain reaction within the community.

'Suspended detective Omar helps out with the investigation, uncovering disquieting clues, but he keeps getting pulled away by a dangerous cold case.

'Benji, a recovering addict, finds peace by breeding lorikeets and caring for his mother, only to have his clean life upended by a stranger’s menacing threat.

'Nera, a city lawyer grieving on a country farm, wants to find out who killed one of her animals and is faced with increasingly strange and unsettling answers.

'In this gripping tale of human frailty and the otherworldly, each of the characters must confront the mystery of what really happened to Jack and Lonnie.'  (Publication summary)

'For everything there is an appointed time,
 even a time for every affair under the heavens.

'After thirteen years it’s time for Mac to return home to face a past he’s been running from. A past his best friend Dave has been unable to escape.

'It was 1990, their final year of school and with an INXS soundtrack, life was moving on. Bus stops, homework and football were giving way to pay slips and beer, to first cars and first loves. 

'Until one night changed it all.

'As the story of that evening unravels, so too do the binds that cross generations of family. The pride of fathers. The love of mothers and a sister. The love of a mate; the prejudices that run deep. Testing them, and the strong social ties that small towns have, Mac searches for honesty and for the precious words never said, while Dave fights for his story to be heard. 

'Before it’s too late, can these once-close friends and their town still divided by tragedy find a time for peace?'  (Publication summary)

'London, 1908. It’s the dawn of a new century and change is in the air.

'When 17-year-old Beatrice Taylor stumbles across the offices of the infamous Pankhursts and the Women’s Social and Political Union she begins to realise her future may not be the one she wants.

'Her friend Catherine Dawson is too pragmatic to get caught up in the women’s suffrage movement. Despite Oxford refusing to award women degrees she is determined to keep apace with her twin brother and pursue a career in science.

'Meanwhile, Ida Bennett, recently promoted to head wardress of DX wing at Holloway Prison, has her work cut out for her. The suffragette inmates are refusing to be treated like criminals—and Ida's not having any of it.

'This is the story of three women whose lives become entwined—with the burgeoning women’s movement and with each other. Like Fire-Hearted Suns shows how much things have changed for women—and how much they stay the same.'  (Publication summary)

'So many people had reason to hate her, but did anyone have reason to kill her?

'Everyone dies famous in a country town, but glamorous Vanessa Walton was a shining star. A celebrity since she was a child, Vanessa is back on the front page for all the wrong reasons; after a terrible storm she has been found dead at the bottom of her stairs.

'At first her death seems to be a simple accident, but anonymous letters are discovered that suggest otherwise – and when 16-year-old Jasmine Landridge claims it is murder, she suddenly disappears. As the police begin to investigate, secrets are exposed and friendships unravel. 

'What happens to a community when murders and abductions sit alongside petty workmates, teenage tribulations and longstanding friendships? It will take a town to solve this crime, but what will be broken in the effort to piece together the truth?' (Publication summary) 

'She needs to write the ending ... before she meets hers.

'Theo has one dream – to become a bestselling author. Determined to make her mark in the literary world, she heads to the US on a whim to stay with her brother Gus and focus on her writing. But her plans take an unexpected turn when she befriends a famous author, Dan Murdoch, at a local bar – and then he turns up dead. Suddenly, Theo finds herself as the prime suspect.

'As Theo grapples with the shocking turn of events, she realizes that Dan may not have been the person he seemed to be, and there is something sinister going on in the world of publishing. Desperate to clear her name and uncover the truth, Theo sets out on a quest to find out who killed Dan and why.

'As she digs deeper, Theo uncovers a web of deceit, conspiracy, and hidden motives, with clues leading her to a shadowy online platform called The Shield. With her own life in danger, Theo must unravel the mystery before she becomes the next victim.' (Publication summary)

'How long can you run from a lie, if that lie is what your life is founded on?

'In a near future all identity information is encoded in digital language. Nations know where everyone is, all the time. Not everyone agrees with this constant surveillance, and when the system is hijacked and shut down, all global borders are closed. The world is no longer connected, and there is no back-up plan to establish belonging, ownership or trade.

'Scarlet Friday, whose job is to correct historical record, is stranded on the wrong side of the globe. Befriended by a stranger, she grabs an old, faded history book and writes her own version over the top—a record of the Great Undoing on the run.

'But in deciding what truth to tell Scarlet must face her own history. How do we navigate identity when it is all a lie? She must reckon with her past before she can imagine her future.' (Publication summary)

'He’ll do anything to improve your stay. Except keep your secrets.

'I suppose it would be fitting to explain that I am talking into a dictaphone and the lovely Helen will be typing out my story for you to read. She will have a certain amount of creative control—sorting out moments when I get a bit tongue-tied or slightly muddled—but I have told her to leave in as much as possible, so as not to miss any of the important bits. This is my account of the Cavengreen Hotel murder, best we get that bit in early on.

'The peaceful setting of Cavengreen Hotel has been shattered by a shocking murder. Hector Harrow, the hotel's concierge, has been accused and is determined to clear his name.

'Hector enlists the aid of Helen, a retired publisher, to document the shocking crime that has unfolded, with the intention of publishing a truthful account.

'Amid interruptions from a nosy journalist and the egotistical antics of the hotel's new owner, American Dave, Helen works tirelessly to keep Hector focused on finishing his book.

'As suspicions fall on different guests and one makes a shocking confession, Hector must navigate a web of secrets to uncover the truth.' (Publication summary)

A captivating literary journey that delves into the intertwined lives of a town, its people, and a region shaped by revolution and war.

'The war broke out and she decided to call her dad.
Weeks and weeks we do not speak, and the weeks become months and then they are so many years.
She imagines herself starting this story.
She imagines how she will tell this story later to someone else.
We hadn't spoken for years but then the war broke out...

'As conflict plays out across an unnamed region, its inhabitants deal with the fallout. Families are torn apart and brought together. A divide grows between those on either side of the war, compromises are struck as the toll of violence impacts near and far. We learn about those who are left behind and those who choose to leave in a great scattering. As the stories of those affected play out they weave together to show the whole of a society in the most extreme of circumstances. Even after the last shot is fired, their world will never recover.

'From the acclaimed author of The House of Youssef, Australiana and The Lovers comes a powerful new novel that asks again if it’s possible to ever measure the personal cost of war.' (Publication summary)

''Since I was a child, I’ve been interested in dead bodies. When I was eight years old, I dug up the remains of my pet budgie Zazbut. He had been buried for about eight weeks in a patch of grass outside our house in Dasmarinas, a fortified village in Manila, in the Philippines.

'‘The first exhumation was the beginning of my intrigue with death, which has persisted. As a journalist, I’ve written about graveyards, funerals and death doulas. I always visit the local cemetery wherever I am in the world. But one thing that has largely been hidden from me in this death trip is the dead body.'

'This is the story of how Jackie Dent’s grandparents — Ruby and Julie — gave their bodies to science when they died. No one in her family seems to know why, or what really happened with their bodies afterwards. Were they avid science buffs? Was it to save on cremation costs? How do scientists tackle the practicalities and ethics of dealing with the bodies of dead loved ones and cutting them up for research?

'Weaving the personal with the history of medical cadaver research, Jackie Dent explores the practicalities and ethics of whole-body dissection — all the while looking for answers as to what happened to her grandparents.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.