Showing results by publisher "Wavesound from W. F. Howes Ltd" in Crime Fiction

John Bailey has a history of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The veteran war reporter has been kidnapped and tortured - twice. Finally he’s living something that resembles a normal life. But all that changes when a terrorist murders a woman in front of Bailey in London. The mastermind behind the attack is Mustafa al-Baghdadi - number one on the FBI’s most wanted list - and the man who tortured Bailey in Fallujah a decade ago.

Hal and his little brother have just come to live in Moorabool. They're exploring the creek near their new home when they find the body of a dog. Not just dead, but killed. Not just killed, but horribly maimed. Constable Mick Goodenough, recently demoted from his big-city job as a detective, is also new in town—and one of his dogs has gone missing. Like other pets around the town. He knows what it means when someone tortures animals to death. They're practicing. When Hal's mother starts getting late-night phone calls, Goodenough, alone among the Moorabool cops, takes her seriously.

One foggy morning on the banks of the Murray River, a body is found in a burnt-out area of grassland. The heavily tattooed victim, who has suffered two bullet wounds to the head, is identified as Freddie Jones, a bikie from Moama. Detective Sergeant Zoe Mayer is on the case, alongside her trusty service dog, Harry. Although Zoe is determined to track down the murderer, she finds herself stonewalled at every turn—by Freddie's family, his associates and even the local police. But then a second body is discovered, and soon all bets are off…

Arriving in Mole Creek in the aftermath of Pete's death, Xander discovers that his grandfather's laptop is missing. He begins to suspect that something is wrong, refusing to accept the facts as presented. With the local police not interested in investigating an apparently open-and-shut suicide, Xander sets about uncovering the truth of what happened to his grandfather.

Newly minted homicide detective Nell Buchanan returns to her home town, annoyed at being assigned a decades-old murder — a 'file and forget'. But this is no ordinary cold case, as the discovery of more bodies triggers a chain of escalating events in the present day. As Nell starts to join the pieces together, she begins to question how well she truly knows those closest to her. Could her own family be implicated in the crimes? The nearer Nell comes to uncovering the secrets of the past, the more dangerous the present becomes for her, as she battles shadowy assailants and sinister forces.

Battered war correspondent John Bailey is a man living on the edge. He’s haunted by nightmares of being kidnapped and tortured in Iraq, and he’s drinking too much to drown the memories. As he battles to get his life back together, a story breaks that will force him back into the spotlight—and into the crosshairs of a deadly international player.

Some people just work better alone. Wyatt’s one of them. He’s been getting by on nice quiet little burglaries - one-man jobs - when he gets wind of something bigger. A corporate crook, notorious Ponzi schemer, set to face court and certain jail time. He’s about to skip bail the old-fashioned way: on a luxury yacht with a million dollars in cash. Wyatt thinks it sounds like something he should get into. He’s not alone.

Magpie Beach is a quiet seaside town – full of small-town prejudices and small-town cliques. Meg, Rosemary and Lily are all outsiders. Meg and Lily because they came to Magpie Beach to escape their former lives, Rosemary because her upbringing was the subject of much local gossip and upturned noses. The three women come together as friends, partly because their homes are so close together on the outskirts of town – and partly because their neighbors treat them with such suspicion. When Jessie Else goes missing – it's easy to see why this small band of outcasts are first on the list of suspect.

When wealthy property developer Francis Tan and his family are found slain in their mansion, Cato Kwong is forced to recall a personal history that makes his investigation doubly painful. The killer is elusive and brutal, and the investigation takes Cato to Shanghai. In a world of spoilt rich kids and cyber dragons, Cato is about to discover a whole lot more about the Chinese acquisition of Australian land—about those who play the game and those who die trying.

Three brothers, one death, a fenceline stretching to the horizon. Two brothers meet at the border of their vast cattle properties under the unrelenting sun of outback Queensland. They are at the stockman's grave, a landmark so old, no one can remember who is buried there. But today, the scant shadow it casts was the last hope for their middle brother, Cameron. The Bright family's quiet existence is thrown into grief and anguish. Something had been troubling Cam. Did he lose hope and walk to his death? Because if he didn't, the isolation of the outback leaves few suspects....

Rowland Sinclair is an artist and a gentleman. In Australia's 1930s, the Sinclair name is respectable and influential, yet Rowland has a talent for scandal. He relies on the Sinclair fortune to indulge his artistic passions and friends: a poet, a painter and a brazen sculptress. Mounting tensions fuelled by the Great Depression take Australia to the brink of revolution, but Rowland Sinclair is indifferent to the politics...until a brutal murder exposes an extraordinary and treasonous conspiracy.

When Phryne Fisher is invited to Bendigo to witness the investiture of her old friend Lionel, who is being made a Bishop, her expectations of the solemn and dignified ceremony do not include a murder. Phryne is soon working with perspicacious local Constable Watson and eagle-eyed Inspector Mick Kelly to identify the perpetrator. It becomes quickly apparent the murder victim had been an overzealous deacon with a nose for trouble. Nobody seems very inclined to mourn his passing.

When charity worker Cate and website designer Rory, a married couple in their thirties, return from their European holiday, they make a nightmare discovery. Their credit cards have been cancelled, their bank account has been emptied, and their phones and internet have been cut off. Their home in the New South Wales coastal town of Kiama has been rented out as a holiday let, and their dog and pet-sitter have disappeared. Meanwhile, Cate's work colleagues have received copies of her handwritten resignation letter, posted from Paris, filled with insults and lurid allegations.

When Justice Maurice Tempest is murdered in the Glenrock State Conservation Area in Newcastle, local detective Senior Sergeant Callan O'Connor is the first on the scene. News of a second body, found in the same location days later, makes what had looked like a revenge killing into so much more.

For Broome detective Dan Clement, it seems that crime is as plentiful as wet season rain. When his sergeant is beaten up, and a woman is brutally assaulted, it seems like the same two suspects are behind both incidents. But when a woman's hand is discovered in crocodile-infested waters, things take a macabre turn. The stakes rise sky-high as Dan races against time to solve this complex and puzzling case.

Former social worker Elle Castillo is the host of a popular true-crime podcast that tackles cold cases of missing children in her hometown. After four seasons of successful investigations, Elle decides to tackle her white whale: the Countdown Killer, or TCK. Twenty years ago, TCK established a pattern of taking and ritualistically murdering girls, each a year younger than the last. No one’s ever known why - why he stopped abruptly with his 11-year-old victim, or why he followed the ritual at all.

After gunshots echo through the summer night on Mount Macedon, Detective Sergeant Zoe Mayer and her loyal service dog Harry race to the summit at first light. What they find looks like a grisly murder-suicide: an alleged fraudster named Piers Johnson, and his lawyer Antony Peterson, both dead from bullet wounds, a gun lying nearby. Something about the scene doesn't stack up.

On the eve of their wedding, Jackson discovers something he can’t forgive about his fiancee Sara. As he tries to make himself disappear so that he won’t be found by her and her violent family, he connects with international art dealer Sebastian Lee who offers him an escape route—but at what cost?

This time it's a payroll and bank run in the north of South Australia, an outpost town suddenly transformed by a pipeline construction project that brings petty crime, prostitution—and opportunity. It's a town with its own secrets and Wyatt isn't quick to trust at the best of times. But he's on the run and he can't afford to be choosy.

A fire, a missing man and his dog send Dave and his partner Bob Holden south of Perth, to investigate. Leo Perry has been missing for two days when they realize he's probably not dead. In fact he's more likely to have left his life in exchange for a new one. But why? They find CCTV footage showing them that Leo is alive, only two days earlier, but then disaster strikes. A phone call from the Meekatharra Police station changes everything that Dave and Bob already know about the case.