Australian Fiction Mysteries

On the eve of the global lockdown, Don Barlow opens the door of his old beachside cottage to find a pretty girl with pink-tipped hair, claiming to have nowhere to go. He allows her entry, and so begins a mystery set in unprecedented times: with the virus raging outside their home, the girl cannot be asked to leave, but what does he risk by having her stay?

It's a blindingly hot summer. International visitors surge into Sydney's Darling Harbour. Two-year-old Tommy is sailing his toy boat in the park there with his mother Phoebe. Tommy vanishes into thin air. The following winter, taunting notes written as nursery rhymes begin arriving at his parents' home. Little Boy Blue, where did you go? Who led you away? Only I know.

Shortly after 9.30 in the morning, a young man walks into Surf City, Bondi’s newest shopping complex. He’s wearing a dark grey hoodie - and a bomb around his neck. Just a few minutes later, he is locked in a shop on the upper floor. And trapped with him are four innocent bystanders. For police chaplain Paul Doherty, called to the scene by Senior Sergeant Boehm, it’s a story that will end as tragically as it began. For this is clearly no ordinary siege. The boy, known as Ali Khan, seems as frightened as his hostages and has yet to utter a single word.

I know all about being afraid of the dark. Like my uncle, in my thirties I found my way into my own dark forest, face-to-face with the big bad wolf. He was so close to me the whole time, I could taste the blood on his breath. Meeting him felt like a fairytale. I fact, I met him at a bar called the Wolf's Lair. A sensational trial for an historic serial murder. A missing woman with a trail of secrets. A top lawyer famous for defending notorious criminals. A retired homicide cop hunting for the truth.

When a simple mix-up leaves their father Joe’s estate to Eden, their long-absent mother, Clare and Aaron decide it’s finally time to track Eden down. But it’s been over thirty years since she left their remote outback mining town, and they’ve never heard from her again. Aaron is dealing with a new marriage that’s currently trapped in immigration limbo, and his teenage daughter Cady is clearly going through a personal crisis of her own.

Photographer Isla Wilson is thrilled she's landed her dream job, but the clients who hired her are getting stranger by the day. It sounded so perfect—a month's assignment at the lush Scottish Highlands property of architect Alban McGregor, and his wife, Jessica. But in the woods, there's a playhouse with a chilling history. Two years ago, the McGregors' daughter Elodie was abducted and then died in that playhouse. The townspeople insist her abductor had to be a stranger in their town. Alban refuses to knock the playhouse down, even keeping a picture of it on his wall.

Who is Audrey Hoedemaker? It's a question her sister Maureen has heard more times than she can count, and she doesn't know what the short answer would be. Little sister, troubled teen, backpacker, musical theatre coach, con artist, childcare worker. Murderer. A tragic, traumatic childhood casts a long shadow on the Hoedemaker sisters. Maureen has worked hard to move beyond the violence of the past and build a good, honest life for herself. Audrey, however, just can't seem to do the same, careening from one state of chaos to another.

Stan Weir is mourning a tragic loss when he meets a mysterious nine-year-old girl, who claims to be the reincarnated spirit of his late wife. Marcy Keef is a single mother trying to make ends meet when her daughter Erin starts describing ‘past life memories’. Neither wants to believe Erin, but as violent secrets are revealed, the truth becomes harder to deny.

Jackie and Pete King have lived in Dunmore for years, running one of the two local pubs in the sleepy little town. Money has been tight after the bushfires, and it’s about to get tighter if they can’t find a way to pay their suppliers to keep their business going and keep the bank from foreclosing on their property. So when Jackie receives a mysterious phone call offering them $100,000 to let someone bury a body on their land, the answer isn’t as simple as they thought it would be.

Stacey and Laney are twins—mirror images of each other—and yet they’re as different as the sun and the moon. Stacey works hard at school, determined to get out of their small town. Laney skips school and sneaks out of the house to meet her boyfriend. But when Laney disappears one night, Stacey can’t believe she’s just run off without telling her. As the days pass and Laney doesn’t return, Stacey starts dreaming of her twin. The dreams are dark and terrifying, difficult to understand and hard to shake, but at least they tell Stacey one key thing—Laney is alive.

Elise Glyk is a disgraced athlete. Her brother, Callum, is a well-liked teacher who has gone missing. In Elise’s search for her brother, they both become captured in a remote, abandoned farm. Their captor hates Callum, and refuses to explain why, but she has little interest in Elise. So she offers a gruesome bargain: she'll let Elise go - if Elise kills Callum. That way, Elise can't talk to the police, not without getting arrested for murder.

As the third wave of the virus hits, all inhabitants of Melbourne are given until 8pm to get to their homes. Wherever they are when the curfew hits, they must live for four weeks and stay within a 5km radius. When Lou’s son Samuel doesn’t arrive home by nightfall she begins to panic. He doesn’t answer his phone. He doesn’t message. His social media channels are inactive. Lou is out of her mind with worry, but she can’t go to the police, because she has secrets of her own. Secrets that Samuel just can’t find out about. Lou must find her son herself and bring him home.

Lenny has always known that his wife, Claire, is the love of his life. But somehow his marriage is in shambles, he’s struggling with the kids, and a string of anonymous text messages are tormenting him, insisting that Claire is a liar. Claire knows Lenny is a good man, but there’s a lot she hasn’t told him about her past. Now she’s terrified that the horrors that haunt her are about to put her entire family in danger. Strange new neighbours, insidious clients and schoolyard scandal begin to fracture Claire and Lenny’s happy families façade.

Adam Turner works the mid-dawn shift at his local radio station. From 12am to 6am, it’s his job to fill the airtime with old songs, inane chatter, and the occasional talkback caller. It’s a long way from his prime-time slot from over a decade ago, when he was a star in the making. Now there’s no producers, no billboards, no stakes, and not many listeners. His frequent callers are drunk students headed home from a night out, or long-range truck drivers. He is completely alone in the studio from midnight until dawn every night. And then one night at 12:45am, he gets a different kind of call.

Corinne Gray is a woman whose life is falling apart. When probationary detective Kyle Nazarian unexpectedly knocks on her door on a rainy morning, she knows why. He wants to talk about her son, Ben. This is her chance to finally explain how her sweet-natured child – who loved history and dreamed of swimming for Olympic Gold – grew up to do the unthinkable. What really happened to Ben? And could anyone have prevented it?

Emma and Ariella, neighbours in one of Sydney’s most exclusive suburbs, appear to have it all—perfect homes, perfect husbands, perfect lives. But they both know dark secrets lurk beneath the surface and shallow waters can’t hide Ariella’s. Now she has been found murdered. Her daughter filmed the killing. Not knowing what she’s filmed, Emma’s daughter Kiki innocently uploads footage of Ariella’s brutal death. Emma fears the worst—the killer will know what she and Kiki have seen. Their safe suburban lives no longer exist.

Eva Kavinsky wakes in a dark cellar, with no memory of how she got here. Imprisoned with her, seemingly at random, are four men. The only way out is the trapdoor in the ceiling – and it's locked. The single clue about what brings them all here is a cryptic message sprayed onto one wall. Connect the dots. Repent. A camera fixed high above reach is livestreaming this whole nightmare to the world. What confessions are they meant to make to their unseen audience?

Inside the vehicle at fault, Jennifer Ashby survives with barely a scratch. In the wreckage of the second, the occupants are not so lucky. Jennifer’s good character helps her escape jail, but she is traumatised. Desperate for a change, and with her marriage buckling under the stress, she convinces her husband Jon to move to the beautiful but wild Daintree region, far away from family and friends. As Jon spends long hours at his new job and Jennifer makes plans to absolve her lingering guilt, cracks begin to form in their idyllic new life. Will the shadow of their past continue to haunt them?

To their followers, influencer couple Jess and Nick Brooks are beyond aspirational—they’re proof that you can have it all. They can dance and cook and surf, and somehow, they’re still madly in love despite juggling two young boys, Oliver and Archie. When a brand deal lands the family a free trip to an idyllic Balinese luxury resort, their dream holiday becomes a nightmare when Archie goes missing from the Kids Club. As the hunt for Archie begins, the loving and wholesome family that the Brooks present to their millions of followers starts to unravel.

On winter solstice, the birds disappeared, and the mist arrived. The inhabitants of Nebulah quickly learn not to venture out after dark. But it is hard to stay indoors: Cabin fever sets in, and the mist can be beguiling too. Eventually only six remain. Like the rest of the townspeople, Pete has nowhere else to go. After he rescues a stranded psychic from a terrible fate, he’s given a warning: He will be dead by solstice unless he leaves town - soon.