AustLit

'My real name, no one remembers.
The truth about that summer, no one else knows.

'In the summer of 1862, a group of young artists led by the passionate and talented Edward Radcliffe descends upon Birchwood Manor in rural Oxfordshire. Their plan: to spend a secluded summer month in a haze of inspiration and creativity. But by the time their stay is over, one woman has been shot dead while another has disappeared; a priceless heirloom is missing; and Edward Radcliffe's life is in ruins.

'Over one hundred and fifty years later, Elodie Winslow, a young archivist in London, uncovers a leather satchel containing two seemingly unrelated items: a sepia photograph of an arresting-looking woman in Victorian clothing, and an artist's sketchbook containing the drawing of a twin-gabled house on the bend of a river.

'Why does Birchwood Manor feel so familiar to Elodie? And who is the beautiful woman in the photograph? Will she ever give up her secrets?

'Told by multiple voices across time, The Clockmaker's Daughter is a story of murder, mystery and thievery, of art, love and loss. And flowing through its pages like a river, is the voice of a woman who stands outside time, whose name has been forgotten by history, but who has watched it all unfold: Birdie Bell, the clockmaker's daughter.' (Source: Publisher's blurb)

'The new novel by Alexis Wright, whose previous novel Carpentaria won the Miles Franklin Award and four other major prizes including the Australian Book Industry Awards Literary Fiction Book of the Year Award. The Swan Book is set in the future, with Aboriginals still living under the Intervention in the north, in an environment fundamentally altered by climate change. It follows the life of a mute teenager called Oblivia, the victim of gang-rape by petrol-sniffing youths, from the displaced community where she lives in a hulk, in a swamp filled with rusting boats, and thousands of black swans driven from other parts of the country, to her marriage to Warren Finch, the first Aboriginal president of Australia, and her elevation to the position of First Lady, confined to a tower in a flooded and lawless southern city. The Swan Book has all the qualities which made Wright’s previous novel, Carpentaria, a prize-winning best-seller. It offers an intimate awareness of the realities facing Aboriginal people; the wild energy and humour in her writing finds hope in the bleakest situations; and the remarkable combination of storytelling elements, drawn from myth and legend and fairy tale.' (Publisher's blurb)

'What if you looked up at just the right moment and saw - out of the corner of your eye - something unexpected? What if it was something so marvellous, so extraordinary, that it transformed time and space forever? The Body in the Clouds tells the story of one extraordinary moment - a man falling from the sky, and surviving - and of three men who see it, in different ways and different times, as they stand on the same piece of land. An astronomer in the late 1700s, a bridgeworker in the 1930s, an expatriate banker returning home in the early 21st century: all three are transformed by one magical event. All are searching for the same thing: how to understand what it means to call a place home, and how be able to tell when you get there.

The Body in the Clouds is a luminous novel about the power of story: the stories that define who and where we are. And the stories we tell - and have told, and will tell - for the people we love.' (From the publisher's website.)

'Whilst living in exile on St Helena, Napoleon exerted an extraordinary influence on young Betsy Balcombe. How did she get from Napoleon's side to the Australian bush?

'Betsy Balcombe as a young woman lived with her family on St Helena. They befriended, served and were ruined by their relationship with Napoleon. To redeem the family's fortunes William Balcombe, Betsy's father, betrays Napoleon and accepts a job as the colonial treasurer of NSW, bringing his family with him. William never recovers from the ups and downs of association with Napoleon. His family however flourish in Australia and remain renowned pastoralists in Victoria.

'Tom Keneally, with his gift for bringing historical stories to life, shares this remarkable friendship and the beginning of an Australian dynasty.' (Publication summary)

'An abandoned house…

'After a particularly troubling case, Sadie Sparrow is sent on an enforced break from her job with the Metropolitan Police and retreats to her beloved grandfather’s cottage in Cornwall. There she finds herself at a loose end, until one day she stumbles upon an abandoned house surrounded by overgrown gardens and dense woods, and learns the story of a baby boy who disappeared without a trace.

'A missing child…

'June 1933, and the Edevane family’s country house, Loeanneth, is polished and gleaming, ready for the much-anticipated Midsummer Eve party. For Eleanor, the annual party has always been one of her treasured traditions, but her middle daughter, Alice, sixteen years old and with literary ambitions, is especially excited. Not only has Alice worked out the perfect twist for her novel, she’s also fallen helplessly in love with someone she shouldn’t. But by the time midnight strikes and fireworks light up the night sky, the Edevane family will have suffered a loss so great they leave Loeanneth and never return.

'An unsolved mystery…

'Seventy years later, in the attic writing room of her elegant Hampstead home, the formidable Alice Edevane, leads a life as neatly plotted as the bestselling detective novels she writes. Until a young police detective starts asking questions about her family’s past and seeking to resurrect the complex tangle of secrets Alice has spent her life trying to escape…'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'The hauntingly beautiful story of a young girl transformed by the power of kindness from award-winning author Favel Parrett.

'Running away from the mainland was supposed to make their lives better. But, for Isla and her brother, their mother's sadness and the cold, damp greyness of Hobart's stone streets seeps into everything.

'Then, one morning, Isla sees a red ship. That colour lights her day. And when a sailor from the ship befriends her mother, he shares his stories with them all - of Antarctica, his home in Denmark and life onboard. Like the snow white petrels that survive in the harshest coldest place, this lonely girl at the bottom of the world will learn that it is possible to go anywhere, be anything. But she will also find out that it is just as easy to lose it all.

'For Isla, those two long summers will change everything.

'Favel Parrett delivers an evocative and gently told story about the power fear and kindness have to change lives.' (Publication summary)

'Set in the corrupt, unforgiving world of apartheid South Africa, the sensational new novel in the Detective Emmanuel Cooper series follows Cooper as he faces a test of loyalty and friendship.

'Six days before Christmas, Cooper sits at his desk at Johannesburg’s Marshall Square station, ready for his holiday in Mozambique. A call comes in: a respectable, white couple has been beaten and left for dead in their bedroom. The couple’s teenage daughter identifies the attacker as Aaron Shabalala – the youngest son of Zulu Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala – Cooper’s best friend and a man to whom he owes his life.

'The Detective Branch isn’t interested in evidence that might contradict their star witness’s story – especially so close to the holidays. Determined to ensure justice for Aaron, Cooper, Shabalala and their trusted friend Dr Daniel Zweigman hunt down the truth. Their investigation uncovers a violent world of Sophiatown gangs, thieves and corrupt police detectives who will do anything to keep their dark world intact . . .' (Publication summary)

'A legendary ruin. An ancient mystery. Will unveiling the past transform the future.

'San Francisco, 2007. Madeline Moretti is grieving for her fiance. Nothing brings her joy any more, and Maddie's grandmother, a fiery Italian, sends her to Tuscany to heal. Here, Maddie is immersed in the mystery of a ruined villa. Destroyed centuries ago in a legendary storm on the Eve of St Agnes, it has been known ever since as the Casa al Vento - the House of the Wind.

'Tuscany, 1347. Mia hasn't spoken since her mother's death, and lives in silence with her beloved aunt. One dark night, a couple seek refuge in their villa. Used to welcoming passing pilgrims, Mia is entranced by the young bride's radiance and compassion, but mystified by her reluctance to reveal even her name. Where has she come from, and why must her presence be a secret? Centuries apart, each searching for a way to step into her future, Mia and Maddie will be haunted by the myth of the woman who walked unscathed from the ruins of the House of the Wind.' (Publication summary)

'In Let the Dead Lie, Cooper is a changed man. Forced to resign from his position of Detective Sergeant and re-classified as mixed race, he winds up powerless and alone in the tough coastal city of Durban, mixing labouring with a bit of surveillance work for his old boss, Major van Niekerk.

'Patrolling the freight yards one night, Cooper stumbles upon the body of a young white boy and, the detective in him can not, or will not, walk away. When two more bodies - this time black women - are discovered at his boarding house, he unwittingly becomes the prime suspect in a triple murder case.

'At van Niekerk's behest, Cooper's given 48 hours to clear his name and - unofficially - solve the three murders. And so, temporarily back to being a European Detective Sergeant, he launches headlong into Durban's seedy underworld, a viper's nest of prostitution, drug running and violence run by a colourful cast of characters including wannabe Indian gangsters; a mysterious figure who drives a white De Soto convertible; a Zion Gospel preacher, and the exquisite yet streetwise Lana, who also happens to be van Niekerk's mistress...'

'What has happened to Ingrid?

'Beautiful Ingrid inherits a fortune and leaves Australia, and her friends, and Ralph who loves her, to marry Gil Grey and set up home amid the New York art world. There she becomes the stepmother to Gil's teenage artist daughter Fleur, a former child prodigy, and studies ancient curse scrolls at Columbia University.

But at 9am on September 11, 2001, she has an appointment downtown. And is never seen again.

Or is she?

Searching for clues about Ingrid's life a year later, her friend Julia uncovers only further layers of mystery and deception.

Both an unputdownable mystery and a compelling meditation on the nature of art, truth, friendship and love...' (From the publisher's website.)

'In the tiny South African town of Jacob's Rest, Detective Emmanuel Cooper is sent to investigate the murder of an Afrikaner police officer, Captain Willem Pretorius.

'Cooper, an "English" South African, is viewed with suspicion by both the Boer Afrikaners and the dead man's prominent family, and his investigation is quickly taken over by Security Branch. But Cooper isn't interested in political expediency, or making friends in high places, and as he pursues his own inquiry, he discovers that Captain Pretorius had led a deadly double life.

'The more Cooper digs, the more dangerous the investigation becomes. For Cooper is a man with his own secrets, and learning the truth about Captain Pretorius just might save life... if he isn't killed first.

'In this riveting debut, Malla Nunn combines a thrilling, action-packed story with a thoughtful, complex portrayal of an unforgettable time and place and the human desires that drive us all, regardless of race, colour or creed.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Set in England between the wars, this novel tells the story of an aristocratic family, a house, a mysterious death and a way of life that vanished forever, told in flashback by a woman who witnessed it all and kept a secret for decades.

'Grace Bradley went to work at Riverton House as a servant when she was just a girl, before the First World War. For years her life was inextricably tied up with the Hartford family, most particularly the two daughters, Hannah and Emmeline. In the summer of 1924, at a glittering society party held at the house, a young poet shot himself. The only witnesses were Hannah and Emmeline and only they - and Grace - know the truth.

'In 1999, when Grace is ninety-eight years old and living out her last days in a nursing home, she is visited by a young director who is making a film about the events of that summer. She takes Grace back to Riverton House and reawakens her memories. Told in flashback, this is the story of Grace's youth during the last days of Edwardian aristocratic privilege shattered by war, of the vibrant twenties and the changes she witnessed as an entire way of life vanished forever.

'The novel is full of secrets - some revealed, others hidden forever, reminiscent of the romantic suspense of Daphne du Maurier. It is also a meditation on memory, the devastation of war and a beautifully rendered window into a fascinating time in history.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Before his death in 1609, Queen Elizabeth’s spiritual consultant, astrologer, and scientific advisor John Dee hid many of his most astonishing written works, believing that the world was not yet prepared to face the shocking truths that they revealed. For seventeen generations, his female descendants have carefully guarded the secret of his hiding place, waiting for the right moment to bring Dee’s ideas to light. That time is now. In The Rose Labyrinth, popular British author Titania Hardie masterfully blends historical fact and fiction as she introduces readers to Lucy King, a beautiful, young documentary producer based in London. With the help of a brilliant group of friends, Lucy races through London, France, and New York to decipher the clues that will eventually lead her to the hidden treasure of the Rose Labyrinth. Along the way she finds true love with Alex Stafford, the doctor who saw her through a life-threatening heart condition and transplant. A sweeping adventure for readers who loved The Da Vinci Code and The Expected One, The Rose Labyrinth is a decadent, romantic novel with a historical twist. It features a wonderful mix of literary references, from Shakespeare, to the Romantic poets, to Gabriel Garcia Marquez; the folklore and history of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and Paganism; and of course, astrology and numerology, of which Titania Hardie is an expert. As the Rose Labyrinth tells us, the world we think we know is not all that it appears to be.' (Publication summary)