DOWNUNDER CRIME UPDATE, JUNE 2025: NEWS, REVIEWS AND PREVIEWS
Welcome to the June 2025 update of things happening in Australian and New Zealand crime fiction. There are a couple of reviews, previews of forthcoming books and some news.
Firstly some short reviews of three new books.
REVIEWS
Joan Sauers debut novel Echo Lake was at the cosy end of the crime fiction spectrum and her second novel Whisky Valley, (Allen & Unwin, 3 June 2025), provides more of the same.
Whisky Valley opens with Rose McHugh, curious historian-turned-detective, still recovering from the incidents at the end of the first book. She is suffering severe anxiety and is finding it hard to go back to a normal life. However, she is buoyed by a visit from her son Sam and her sister for along weekend of classical music, featuring her son’s best friend from high school. It should be a happy time, but when the violinist goes missing, along with his priceless violin, Rose has to apply her investigative skills again to save her son.
This is an enjoyable mystery that delights in its vivid descriptions of the southern highlands locations and its various inhabitants. The story unfolds at a moderate pace with plenty of clues, red herrings, and cups of tea and scones. Incidental historical detail adds to the book’s pleasure, and Rose’s personal journey of overcoming trauma and anxiety gives it a bit more substance.
A must read for fans of cosy murder mysteries with nicely evoked locations and a good plot.
Whisky Valley was released in Australia on 3 June 2025 and on Kindle in the United Kingdom on the same day.
Neil A White’s Best Left Buried, (Echo, 3 June 2025), is the second book in his series about journalist Matt Latham.
Latham, a foreign correspondent and part-time spy for Australia’s Secret Intelligence Service, is drawn into a web of secrets when he agrees to ghostwrite the memoir of his friend, former ambassador Bryant Callahan, who is on track to become Texas’ next Senator. Once in Texas, Latham begins to question Callahan’s previous connection to some nasty CIA operations as well as his dysfunctional relationship with his much younger wife Aleja, a former Miss Cuba. In his pursuit of the truth, and to help Aleja, Latham heads to Cuba where he finds himself in trouble and on the run from powerful forces determined to keep the past buried.
This is a solid follow-up to the first Latham novel, Shadow Lives. White is a good plotter and Best Left Buried is a well-constructed thriller that moves at a decent pace and is supported by an interesting storyline. The dual timeline works well and the book’s background information is nicely conveyed. In all, a good political thriller that nicely expands the breadth of Australian action fiction.
Best Left Buried was released in Australia on 3 June 2025.
Melaleuca, (HQ, 30 May 2025), by Angie Faye Martin is shaping up as being one of the major Australian crime debuts of 2025.
Set in a small Queensland outback town in 2000, it follows Indigenous policewoman Renee Taylor as she struggles with prejudice and murder in her hometown. In typical crime fiction fashion, the high-flying Brisbane detective has only reluctantly returned to her remote hometown in order to care for her sick mother. Seconded to the local sleepy police station Renee is expecting dull, routine work, but the murder of a young woman on the banks of the local creek changes all that. Leading the investigation, Renee uncovers a perplexing connection to the disappearance of two young women thirty years earlier.
Melaleuca is an impressive piece of work. The opening section is well set up and once the investigation is underway, Angie introduces a second timeline set back in 1965 dealing with the two indigenous women, Caroline and Bessie, who disappeared. This earlier section is mainly told from Caroline’s perspective and chronicles her life as a worker for a relatively wealthy pastoralist and her interactions with the broader community. Her life is hard and the discrimination is more blatant than it is in 2000.
Gradually the two timelines come together and the book delivers a number of surprises as it moves reasonably quickly to the startling conclusion.
The strength of Melaleuca lies in its evocative depiction of the two different time periods in a small country town and how it has changed, or not changed, over the two times. The Indigenous perspective is a welcomed change from the usual ‘white’ view, and Angie explores key themes around racism, institutionalised corruption and the effects of colonisation. Also delicately weaved throughout is Renee’s struggle with her identity and where she belongs. Some of the procedural aspects of the book strain credibility, but not enough to detract from the enjoyment.
A powerful and important addition to Australian crime writing.
Melaleuca was released in Australia on 30 May 2025.
NEWS
It seems to be the season for author tours at the moment. There are a lot of good Australian authors who are working their way around promoting books at present, including Dervla McTiernan, Michelle Prak, Dinuka McKenzie and Ashley Kalagian Blunt, to name a few. If you get the chance, I would encourage you to go along and listen to, and meet, an author, it is always a fun and interesting occasion.
Canberra has been lucky enough to have visits from Dervla and Ian Rankin this year, and coming soon is Michael Robotham who will at the ANU on 2 July at 6pm talking about his excellent new book The White Crow. Michael will be in conversation with Chris Hammer, who is always very entertaining.
On the television front, a new series based on Jane Harper’s The Survivors is being shown on Netflix and is worthwhile watching. As is the series based on the second Chris Hammer book, Silver, on Stan.
PREVIEWS
There is a flood of new Australian crime fiction coming to bookstores over the next few months. Between now and the beginning of September, there are new books by Matthew Spencer (Broke Road), Emma Babbington (The Neighbours), P. A. Thomas (The Sunbaker), Margaret Hickey (An Ill Wind) and Patricia Wolf (Nemesis), to name a few.
However, there are five books I would particularly like to highlight this time.
Benjamin Stevenson has enjoyed great success with his humorous, classic crime homages featuring amateur detective and author Ernest Cunningham, and he seems set to stick that successful formula with his new book, Everyone In This Bank Is A Thief (Penguin, 30 September 2025).
The publisher has provided the following information:
“Ten suspects. Ten heists. A puzzle only Ernest Cunningham can solve.
I’ve spent the last few years solving murders. But a bank heist is a new one, even for me. I’ve never been a hostage before.
The doors are chained shut. No one in or out. Which means that when someone in the bank is murdered, hostages become suspects.
THE BANK ROBBER
THE MANAGER
THE SECURITY GUARD
THE KID
THE FILM PRODUCER
THE PRIEST
THE RECEPTIONIST
THE PATIENT
THE CARER
ME
Turns out, more than one person planned to rob the bank today. You can steal more from a bank than just money.Who is stealing what? And are they willing to kill for it?”
The first three Ernest Cunningham books have trod a very entertaining and careful path between pastiche, humour and genuine mystery, and it will be interesting to see if Stevenson can maintain it one more time. I am looking forward to it.
Everyone In This Bank Is A Thief will be released in Australia on 30 September 2025. It will be released in the United Kingdom in early 2026.
Gabriel Bergmoser is one of my favourite authors and I am really looking forward to his new thrill-fest, High Rise (Harper Collins, 29 July 2025).
The publishers have provided the following details:
“After a year of searching, rogue ex-cop Jack Carlin has finally found his estranged daughter, Morgan, holed up in the top floor of a rundown, grimy high-rise building. The trouble is, Jack’s unconventional policing and information-gathering methods in the past has made him some serious enemies. And what Jack doesn’t know as he heads into the building, intent on saving his daughter, is firstly, that Morgan doesn’t want to be saved – particularly not by him – and secondly, that the entire criminal underworld in the city are on their way too. There’s a bounty on his head, and they’re after his blood – and they don’t mind if Morgan is collateral damage.
As bounty hunters and gang members converge on the building, father and daughter are thrown into a desperate fight for survival through fifteen storeys of deadly enemies – with only each other to rely on. Think: Die Hard meets The Raid, but the funnier, grittier Australian version. Fast, furious and ferocious, this is thriller writing at its nail-biting, unputdownable best.”
Few authors can write pedal-to-the-metal thrillers as well as Bergmoser and I am sure that High Rise will be highly entertaining. It will also be good to be re-introduced to Jack Carlin who featured in the Audible Original novella The Consequence and had a small role in the ‘Maggie’ thriller The Inheritance.
High Rise will be released in August 2025 in Australia.
Fans of good, gritty, authentic outback crime can look forward to the new novel from Michael Brissenden, Dust (Affirm Press, 26 August 2025). I have already started reading it, and it is a good yarn so far, with interesting plotting and sharply observed details.
The publishers have provided the following:
“Lake Herrod, a once-thriving community, now lies in the shadow of a nearly dry lake. The town, like the water, is evaporating and its residents are left clinging to what little remains.
When Aaron Love discovers a fresh corpse near the cracked lakebed – along with evidence his missing father is alive and linked to a web of organised crime – he is thrust into a world of deception, injustice and betrayal. With the town on the brink of collapse, Aaron and a haunted detective, Martyn Kravets, uncover a web of conspiracy that reaches far beyond the small community.
Dust is a dark, gripping thriller that explores the complexities of identity, a search for truth, and the unyielding forces of corruption in a world where lives are lived on the fringe and nothing is as it seems.”
Dust will be released in Australia on 26 August 2025.
Also coming in late August is an intriguing Kiwi crime story, The Vanishing Place by Zoë Rankin (Moa Press, 26 August 2025). I think that this is Zoë’s first novel, and I am very keen to read it.
The publishers have provided the following details:
“On the remote West Coast of the South Island (New Zealand), vast forests stretch out between mountain ranges and rugged beaches. There, in the small town of Koraha, not a lot happens – until a young girl with blood on her hands walks out of the bush and into the local store, collapsing to the floor.
She can’t – or won’t – speak to anyone. It’s the town’s sole policeman who recognises her face. She looks exactly like a local girl who disappeared twenty years ago. She has the same red hair. The same green eyes.
What horrors has she left behind in the bush? Who will come looking for her? And what secrets are about to come to light?
A twisty and daring thriller about how those close to you can be even more dangerous than the deadliest wilderness.”
Kiwi noir is very much in vogue at the moment and there have been some very strong debuts in recent years, including those by Michael Bennett, Geoff Parkes and Gavin Strawhan. I am hoping that Zoë’s book will catapult her into this group.
The Vanishing Place is released in Australia on 26 August 2025, by Hachette, and in the United Kingdom on 23 October 2025 by Viper.
One of the interesting recent trends is the number of Australian authors who are producing short audio novels for Audible, some of which eventually make their way into written form. In recent years we have seen great Audible Original stories by Gabriel Bergmoser, J. P. Pomare, Benjamin Stevenson and the very good The Sisters by Dervla McTiernan, to name a few. We now have a promising looking audio story by Ashley Kalagian Blunt, who impressed earlier this year with her book Cold Truth. Like Follow Die, (Audible, 2 June 2025), features narration by an impressive team of nine narrators, including Claudia Karvan and Laurence Boxhall. I have already downloaded it and will be listening to it soon.
The publishers have provided the following details:
“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?
Desperate for justice, Corinne has poured herself into uncovering the sinister figures behind her son’s actions and the shadowy online communities that prey on vulnerable young people. Kyle, meanwhile, is grappling with his own personal crisis both at home and at work. Torn between his duties and a growing sympathy for Corinne, Kyle must decide how far he’s willing to go to help her.”
Here is a link to my review of Cold Truth: https://murdermayhemandlongdogs.com/downunder-crime-update-february-2025-reviews-and-previews/
So plenty of good Down Under crime for you to get into. Which ones appeal the most?