BOOK HAUL: THE BEST NEW TITLES FOR 2025, SO FAR!

There is still almost month to go until the end of 2024, but already the books are beginning to pile up for 2025! I will be doing a post on my most anticipated titles for 2025 in the New Year, but here are seven of the more promising 2025 releases that I have received already.

Ronni Salt’s Gunnawah, (Hachette, 1 January 2025), is shaping up to be one of the major Australian debuts of 2025.

Set in the Riverina in 1974, it is an engrossing mixture of crime, historical reflection and a coming of age story. The publisher has provided the following information:

“It’s 1974 in the Riverina.

When nineteen-year-old farmgirl Adelaide Hoffman applies for a cadetship at the Gunnawah Gazette, she sees it as her ticket out of a life too small for her. The paper’s owner, Valdene Bullark, seeing something of the girl she once was in young Adelaide, puts her straight to work.

What starts as a routine assignment covering an irrigation project soon puts Adelaide on the trail of a much bigger story. Water is money in farming communities, and when Adelaide starts asking questions, it’s like she’s poked a bull ant’s nest. Someone will do whatever it takes to stop Adelaide and Val finding out how far the river of corruption and crime runs.

Shady deals. Vested interests. A labyrinth of lies. It seems everyone in Gunnawah has a secret to keep. And too many are already dead quiet.”

The pseudonymous, rural-based Ronni Salt is well known for her political commentary as a citizen journalist on Twitter, and Gunnawah is a nicely written crime story with a subtle overlay of social commentary. I am about a third of the way through it and enjoying it so far. It is a bit of a slow burn, but Ronni’s depiction of small town Riverina in the 1970s seems to be spot-on and there is plenty of mystery around what is happening. Fans of Australian rural crime should certainly put this on their ‘to read’ list!

Gunnawah is released in Australia on 1 January 2025. It is released in the United Kingdom in June 2025. Thanks to the publisher and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book. I will be reviewing it over the next few weeks.

Australian based Ashley Kalagian Blunt made a strong impression with her first novel Dark Mode, and she has now followed it up with the intriguing Cold Truth, (Ultimo, February 2025).

Set in Canada, where I think Ashley grew up, Cold Truth draws on her experience as an influencer to produce another atmospheric tech-noir thriller.

The publisher has provided the following information:

“When you can fake anything, how do you know what’s real?

Harlow Close has made a career as an influencer uncovering the secrets of Winnipeg, dubbed ‘North America’s strangest city’. The region is renowned for its sub-zero temperatures, dropping to minus 40 degrees – sometimes for months at a time. Yet, it’s not just the frigid winters and geographic seclusion that render Winnipeg peculiar.

When Harlow’s father mysteriously disappears amid a brutal cold snap, suspicions of foul play arise. It’s not like Scott to miss phone calls – and he’s been even more cautious since that time he was catfished by a romance scammer. Unhappy with the pace of the police investigation, Harlow launches her own search, enlisting her sister Blaise’s reluctant help.

As Harlow struggles to uncover what happened to her father, she’s forced to question everything and everyone around her – including herself.”

Cold Truth is released in Australia and the United Kingdom in February 2025. Thanks to the publisher and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book.

Ultimo Press have been quietly establishing a really strong list of Australian crime writers, including Iain Ryan and Sulari Gentill, and were behind some good debut novels in 2024.

In addition to Cold Truth above, Ultimo have another good international crime thriller by an Australian author in the form of Unfinished Business, (Ultimo Press, 1 January 2025), by Shankari Chandran

The publisher has provided the following information:

“Sri Lanka, 2009. Decades of civil war and bloodshed are being brought to an end at last – by any means necessary. In the capital, Colombo, tenacious journalist Ameena Fernando is murdered, execution-style, on a busy street near her home, with no witnesses.

With pressure growing to find Ameena’s killer, CIA agent Ellie Harper is sent to seek justice for the journalist’s death, with strict instructions: find something, but not too much. It’s her first time returning to the island after her last mission went tragically awry four years prior, and Ellie has more than one ghost to lay to rest. Amid the international scheming and jostling for stakes in post-war Sri Lanka, Ellie follows the trail of secrets on a mission to uncover a truth worth killing for.”

Shankari’s Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens won the prestigious 2023 Miles Franklin Literary Award, and it will be very interesting to see her take on the international thriller. Spy thrillers set in Sri Lanka are very rare and Unfinished Business is high on my ‘to read’ list.

Unfinished Business is released in Australia on 1 January 2025. Release in the United Kingdom and the United States seems to be limited to an Audible edition in February 2025. Thanks to the publisher and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book.

Heading up the British releases is Making A Killing, (Hemlock Press, 13 February 2025), by Cara Hunter.

Cara’s last novel, Murder In The Family, was a masterful mystery told totally through emails, phone texts, newspaper reports and podcast transcripts. It was not the first novel to use such devices, but it is the best one that I have come across. It really engaged the reader’s mind, and emotions, and built to an unexpected resolution. Now with Making A Killing, Cara returns to her series about DCI Frawley, but also includes the extracts and reports that made Murder In The Family so good.

The publisher has provided the following details:

“In 2016, eight-year-old Daisy Mason vanished from her Oxford home.

Her disappearance made the national press and the final culprit shocked everyone. DCI Adam Fawley remembers the case well, he arrested Daisy’s mother for murder himself.

But Daisy’s body was never found.

Now, forensic evidence at a current murder scene calls the whole case into question. DCI Adam Fawley and the team are brought back in to investigate. And they all have one question on their minds.

What really happened to Daisy Mason?”

I am relatively new to Cara’s novels, but have been very impressed with the ones I have read. Making A Killing seems set to repeat the success of her earlier books.

Making A Killing is released in the United Kingdom on 13 February 2025, with the Australian release date being a couple of weeks later on 5 March 2025. Thanks to Harper Collins and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book.

Hannah Richell’s The Search Party marked a successful move into the suspense genre from her earlier family focused dramas. One Dark Night, (Simon & Schuster, 1 January 2025), continues that transition.

“He murdered her at the folly on their wedding day, left her body for the crows. They say she haunts the woods now, a girl in a white dress …

Everyone in the small Somerset town of Thorncombe knows the tales of the haunted woods where the birds don’t sing and a girl in a white dress roams, luring people to their deaths. But when a girl in white is found dead the morning after Halloween, her body carefully arranged at the bottom of an old stone folly, the community is thrown into turmoil.

With a teenage daughter of his own, police detective Ben Chase knows how high the stakes are. Was the girl the victim of a party prank gone wrong, or does her death represent something more sinister and ritualistic?

As the investigation unfolds and the noose tightens around Chase’s own family, the only thing anyone can be sure of is that no one is safe until this violent killer is caught.”

Sporting a more traditional police detective plot than her last book, One Dark Night seems set to continues Hannah’s growth in the genre. Renown for her ability to accurately capture modern family and friendship dynamics, One Dark Night promises to be a good summer beach read here in Australia. It also has a really good ‘drone’ style cover!

One Dark Night is released in Australia on 1 January 2025. Release in the United Kingdom, where Hannah currently lives, is not until June 2025. Thanks to the publisher and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book.

Good killers and ethical dilemmas seem to be in vogue at the moment, such as the forthcoming A Serial Killer’s Guide To Marriage, and Jenny Morris’s An Ethical Guide To Murder (Simon & Schuster, 15 January 2025), seems to fall fully into that category.

Jenny’s high concept crime novel revolves around the idea of what would you do, if could decide who lives and who dies?

“Thea has a secret. She can tell how long someone has left to live just by touching them.
Not only that, but she can transfer life from one person to another – something she finds out the hard way when her best friend Ruth suffers a fatal head injury on a night out. Desperate to save her, Thea touches the arm of the man responsible when he comes to check if Ruth is all right. As Ruth recovers, the man quietly slumps to the ground, dead.

Thea realises that she has a godlike power: but despite deciding to use her ability for good, she can’t help but sometimes use it for her own benefit. Boss annoying her at work? She can take some life from them and give it as a tip to her masseuse for a great job.

Creating an ‘Ethical Guide to Murder’ helps Thea to focus her new-found skills. But as she embarks on her mission to punish the wicked and give the deserving more time, she finds that it isn’t as simple as she first thought. How can she really know who deserves to die, and can she figure out her own rules before Ruth’s borrowed time runs out?”

It sounds like an intriguing concept. Jenny is a psychology researcher working in ethics and behaviour, and it will be interesting to see if she can convert the theory into an enjoyable novel.

An Ethical Guide To Murder is released in Australia on 15 January 2025 and in the United Kingdom on 16 January 2025. Thanks to the publisher and the Canberra Weekly for an early physical copy of the book.

Joseph Finder is a veteran of the international thriller scene and a really nice guy to meet.

His latest novel The Oligarch’s Daughter, (Head of Zeus, 28 January 2025), is another thrilling tale combining crooked business dealings and corruption, with a chase through the forest plot.

Told through dual timelines, The Oligarch’s Daughter follows the escapades of Paul Brightman as he tries to regain control of his life.

“Paul is a man on the run, living under an assumed name in a small New England town with a million-dollar bounty on his head. When his security is breached, Paul is forced to flee into the New Hampshire wilderness to evade the Russian operatives who can seemingly predict his every move.

Six years ago, Paul was a rising star on Wall Street who fell in love with a beautiful photographer named Tatyana—unaware that her father was a Russian oligarch and the object of considerable interest from several U.S. intelligence agencies. Now, to save his own life, Paul must unravel a decades-old conspiracy that extends to the highest reaches of the government.”

I am about halfway through this one and finding it very entertaining. There are some slowish places during the earlier timeline, but the chase through the wilderness more than makes up for it. Finder is very good at combining big business and criminal activity, and his book really hooks you in. Another top read from a master of the genre.

The Oligarch’s Daughter is released in Australia on Kindle on 28 January 2025 and in the United States on the same day by a different publisher, Harper. Thanks to the US publisher and NetGalley for an early copy of the book.

In addition to the above, I have already read new 2025 titles by two of my favourite authors, Deon Meyer and John Lawton, and recently received a copy of Catherine Jinks’ latest crime thriller, Panic. So at this early stage, 2025 is already shaping up to be another good ‘reading’ year.

Which of the above titles appeal the most to you?