New Zealand Detective

When Big Wig moves to the beach, Big Trouble comes with him. Doubtless Bay’s resident private investigator has a dilemma on her hands. With the arrival of a new police detective in her small, beachside town, Summer O’Dare has a decision to make: Let him think she’s merely a little kooky or open up the doors to her skeleton-harbouring closet and invite him in. Trust, though, has to be earned. And Detective Douche is walking on the wrong side of that equation. Three days in and he’s already dating the realtor next door; Summer’s high school nemesis. A fast-paced cozy mystery set in ...

Paul Worthington just confessed to a murder that never happened. Magdalene Lynton died 40 years ago: a vivacious teenager who fell victim to a grotesque, accidental drowning. The coroner's office issued a verdict of death by misadventure and filed her case. The farming commune she'd lived within, splintered apart. Her body was left behind in a small, private cemetery encircled by acres of fallow ground. Until Paul Worthington confessed to her murder.

A stoner, an Instagram model, a Czech oligarch, and a missing unicorn. Nick Fox and Kate O'Hare have their work cut out for them in their weirdest, wildest adventure yet in this New York Times bestseller by Janet and Peter Evanovich. Straight arrow FBI Agent Kate O'Hare always plays by the...

From the Barry Award nominee and Ngaio Marsh Award winner of Better the Blood, a new thriller bringing danger ever closer to Hana Westerman. When Detective Inspector Jaye Hamilton stops at an Auckland liquor store for a bottle of champagne, it is supposed to be celebratory: his daughter Addison...

Penrose and Pyke’s hopes of a quieter life are dashed by a spate of baffling burglaries and a persuasive charlatan promoting a miracle cure. Dunedin society is up in arms as their valuables vanish without a trace from locked homes. Although the trail leads to an apparent dead end, private detective Charlie Penrose Pyke catches the scent of a shadowy figure lurking behind the scenes. Meanwhile, Grace Penrose Pyke’s curiosity leaves her in a precarious position with life-changing consequences, after she is drawn into an investigation of dubious medical devices. Their combined talents will...

Penrose and Pyke are under siege. A mischievous gossip, a series of robberies, and now a callous murder and a looming epidemic. How much worse can it get? When a shopkeeper is killed during a robbery, Detective Charlie Pyke is desperate to track down the killer for reasons close to his heart. If only it was that simple. A tell-all article in the local ladies’ journal threatens both his investigation and his private life. Charlie needs Grace Penrose to stand by him, but she has her hands full preventing a deadly outbreak of measles. The rash of clues only starts to make sense when they ...

Penrose and Pyke must put aside their own problems in a race against the clock to rescue a kidnapped infant. When private detective Charlie Penrose Pyke is asked to investigate the kidnapping of a child, his instinct is to refuse. As their first wedding anniversary approaches, Charlie fears for the fragile state of his wife, Grace, for whom this heart-breaking case could be the final straw. But how can he let the desperate parents down, when they have struggled for years to conceive only to have their baby snatched away? Besides, Charlie is their only hope, because the ransom note threatens...

A crime-based adventure set in Middle Earth territory in New Zealand’s Southern Alps. Young Kiwi drifter Arch Quaid thinks he has landed the contract of his life when he’s hired to cull deer on a high country property in the South Island of New Zealand. He quickly changes his mind when he discovers he’s the hunted, not the hunter. Caught up in the middle of it all is his new love Janine, a beautiful Maori girl, who will likely be the killer’s next target if Arch doesn’t overcome the most daunting of odds. HIGH COUNTRY CONTRACT is a thrilling, fast-paced read brought to you by ...

Set in the small coastal towns of Ohope Beach and Whakatane on New Zealand's North Island, Groundswell is the story of an American detective, JULIAN BRAXTON, and his wife, PARVATI, who think they have found the perfect life in a tropical paradise... until a series of suspicious deaths take place and Julian starts nosing around. The more he learns, the more he realizes that no one can be trusted. As he is pulled deeper into the case, he finds himself embroiled in a vicious, complicated world involving international drug cartels and Maori land rights disputes. And he gradually realizes that ...

"The cows moved away from him as he stepped into the mud. The stench of manure and wet soil wafted over the area as Hamid saw something lying on the ground before him. Pushing one beast away from the site, Hamid saw a foot and a black gumboot sticking out from the mud. There was a mound of dirt around the boot, and as Hamid pulled on the boot, it came away. Ted Lassiter's red wool sock stood out against the brown mud. Hamid pulled out his phone and called the police." Detective Inspector Linden McCoy is called out to investigate a series of murders in the farming communities around the ...

Penrose and Pyke go together like fire and kerosene in this first-in-series Victorian era mystery. Trouble’s brewing in the Devil’s Half Acre. A death in an alleyway, a tragic accident in a factory, rumours of a murderer loose on the streets. It’s enough to give a genteel lady a fit of the vapours. Fortunately, Grace Penrose isn’t one to swoon at the sight of blood. All she wants is the chance to become the first female doctor in the colony. Instead, she must confront the harsh realities of the city’s most notorious sweatshop. When the police prove reluctant to investigate the ...

When time breaks, only friendship can put it back together. Lincoln the dreamer, Willow the fearless, Jaxon the warrior, and Ezra the genius never expected to become heroes. But when a mysterious rift hurls them from the 21st century into 1866, they land in Arrowtown's roaring gold rush where danger waits at every turn. Greedy fortune hunters stalk the rivers. Secrets hide beneath the mountains. And one wrong choice could trap them in the past forever. Their only guide? Shihou, a dragon older than empires, with secrets of his own. To return home, the four friends must crack riddles that ...

Whispers of misconduct swirl around Grace Penrose, when a prominent surgeon has a fatal seizure on their moonlit stroll together. Grace and the victim are on opposing sides of a feud over hospital services for women. How could she refuse his invitation to resolve their differences in private? When he dies despite her attempts to save him, and his unusual symptoms further implicate her, it’s not only her personal and professional reputation at risk. As the case becomes ever more baffling, the only thing Grace needs more than Charlie Pyke’s sleuthing skills is his uncanny knack of ...

A child's bones, a lost girl, a mind adrift - sometimes what is lost comes back to haunt you...from an award-winning author comes a contemporary gothic tale of guilt, grief and redemption. In the village of Kiln Creek in the Victorian Highlands, a ghost gum falls in a storm. Tangled in its roots...

This prizewinning debut from New Zealand novelist Tom Baragwanath is both a nail-biting thrill-ride and a beautifully written, acutely observed portrait of a community. How far would you go to keep your family safe? Lorraine Henry is generally content to keep her head down and get on with her...

Penrose and Pyke’s wedding dream turns to ashes when the local women’s refuge goes up in flames. Grace Penrose is used to protesters at Lavender House, but she never expected them to set the refuge on fire, especially not on her wedding day. And her mother’s carefully orchestrated wedding plan definitely did not include Charlie Pyke disappearing into an inferno. The discovery of a woman’s body in the smouldering ruins rouses Grace and Charlie’s detective instincts. With marital bliss on their minds, an investigation is the last thing they need. But how can they ignore a murder, ...

Penrose & Pyke venture to the edge of madness when they reunite to investigate two tragic deaths and an old mystery. The last words of a frightened woman may be a vital clue to the disappearance of an old friend, if they aren’t the ravings of delusional lunatic. Detective Constable Charlie Pyke is desperate to find out. But is he desperate enough to risk the life of his sleuthing partner, medical student Grace Penrose? More to the point, can he stop her? The answers lie behind the locked doors of an asylum for wealthy young women of delicate sensibilities, where high walls and dark ...

Penrose & Pyke are flung into an explosive new mystery during the campaign for women’s suffrage. Politicians are worried that women voters will oust them, liquor barons are terrified that women will favour prohibition, and the man in the street fears his wife will no longer be content with home and hearth. Just how far will they go to stop women from getting the vote? Medical student Grace Penrose and Detective Constable Charlie Pyke are about to find out. The ‘Penrose & Pyke Mysteries’ are a series of heart-warming, pulse-racing historical mysteries, set during a remarkable period of...

Violent death stalks two hemispheres. Kayne and Nick must search the globe for criminals with intentions far beyond murder and mayhem. In a land of breathtaking beauty, Kayne Sorenson and Nick Sechi must uncover the answers to puzzles that open a gateway of chaos with only the strength and wisdom of ancient people to safeguard the forces of good. In Aotearoa, “the land of the long white cloud,” where the people and the land are woven together, who merits the protection of the ancestral gods? The game is on for our heroes and their allies in a place of ineffable beauty and alluring ...

Penrose & Pyke have until Christmas Eve to save the orphans’ home, by unravelling a tangle of tinsel and trickery. Private detective Charlie Pyke was looking forward to spending a quiet Christmas with his fiancée, Grace Penrose. Instead, Charlie and Grace must stop a dubious deal, find a sneak thief and foil a mischievous brother, with the help of a pair of inquisitive orphans and the spirit of a dear departed grandmother. If they can decipher the clues and make it through the dessert course, they just might survive their first family Christmas together. Tinsel and Trickery is a half-...