Rae Cairns

Rae Cairns is a former youth worker, actor and singer who has turned to a life of crime…writing. She is fascinated with how ordinary people manage when faced with extraordinary circumstances so she writes crime with heart; thriller and suspense novels that explore the lengths everyday characters will go to when all they love is put at risk.

Her debut novel, The Good Mother, was shortlisted for BEST DEBUT CRIME FICTION in the 2021 NED KELLY AWARDS. It draws on her background as a youth worker mentoring disadvantaged youth, many of them children of the paramilitaries, in Northern Ireland during the final years of the Troubles.

Rae has also co-managed a crisis refuge for street children, worked as Program Director for the Sydney Olympic Youth C

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Veronica Lando

Veronica Lando is an Australian author who won the 2021 Banjo Prize for her then unpublished crime fiction manuscript, The Whispering. She brings a fresh twist to the genre and has been described as an unmissable new voice on the Australian crime fiction scene.

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Mercedes Mercier

Mercedes Mercier writes 'just-one-more-page' crime with twisting plots and relatable characters. As well as writing books, Mercedes works in the criminal justice system, providing her unique insight into the world of prisons, crime and offenders.

After a brush with death, Mercedes decided to throw herself into life. She lived overseas, become a black belt in Karate, skydived, and volunteered with animals.

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Kelli Hawkins

Kelli Hawkins writes reports for a private investigator, as well as working on novels for adults and children. She lives in Newcastle with her two teenagers. Over the years she’s travelled whenever possible and worked all kinds of jobs. Kelli’s been a political journalist, a graphic designer, a mystery shopper – even a staple remover. When she’s not writing she’s planning a holiday – or dreaming of one. Or reading, of course.

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Michelle Prak

Coming in April 2025: BARREN CAPE.

Michelle Prak's debut thriller THE RUSH was published by Simon & Schuster ANZ; Crooked Lane Books (US); and by HarperCollins France, as LE DELUGE. It's a road trip thrill ride that takes place over two frantic days.

THE RUSH was voted into Better Reading's annual Top 100 reads (2024), and longlisted in the Sisters of Crime Australia Davitt Awards.

Also a short story writer, Michelle was runner-up in the Furphy Literary Prize, 2021.
Between 2019 and 2020, Michelle self-published three women's contemporary novels. Now she's turned to the thriller genre and hopes fans will follow along.

Long before Michelle began writing professionally she was a reader and continues to share on Goodreads.

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Christian White

Christian White is an Australian author and screenwriter. His debut novel, The Nowhere Child, won the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for an Unpublished Manuscript. He co-created the television series Carnivores, currently in development with Matchbox Pictures and Heyday TV, and co-wrote Relic, a psychological horror feature film to be produced by Carver Films (The Snowtown Murders, Partisan).

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B.M. Carroll

Librarian Note: B.M. Carroll also writes under the name Ber Carroll.
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Michael Trant

Michael Trant is a WA country boy just beginning his new life as an author, following a wide range of careers from marine draftsman to farmer, and pastoralist to FIFO pot-washer. Michael is now based in Perth, having grown up on the family farm at Eneabba, before moving to Geraldton then out to Yalgoo. His debut novel Ridgeview Station was inspired by his time on Gabyon Station, and he highly recommends a visit for those curious about life on a sheep station.

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Sarah Bailey

Sarah Bailey is a Melbourne-based writer with a background in advertising and communications. She has three sons and is currently the Managing Director of the Melbourne and Sydney offices of advertising agency VMLY&R. Her internationally award-winning Gemma Woodstock series includes The Dark Lake, published in 2017 and winner of the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction and the Davitt Award for Best Debut, followed by Into the Night in 2018, and Where the Dead Go in 2019. Body of Lies is the fourth book in the series. Sarah has also published the bestselling The Housemate and Audible original Final Act in 2021.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Glenna Thomson

After a successful career in overseas aid, and as a senior executive with a global food company, Glenna and her husband spent almost twenty years living and working on their 500-acre cattle property in rural in north-east Victoria. During that time, they also owned and operated a commercial blueberry orchard. Glenna’s time in the country enables her to write authentically about life in the city as well as in remote locations. She and her husband now live in Melbourne. Glenna is also the author of Blueberry and Stella and Margie.
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Petronella McGovern

Petronella McGovern writes psychological thrillers focusing on everyday characters and contemporary issues.

Petronella is fascinated by what makes us tick, the lies we tell, and the secrets we keep. She is the best-selling author of Six Minutes, The Good Teacher, The Liars and The Last Trace. Her books have been nominated in the Ned Kelly Awards, the Davitt Awards and the Australian Independent Bookseller Awards. The Liars was selected in the Top 100 Big W/Better Reading list for 2023.

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Candice Fox

Candice Fox is the middle child of a large, eccentric family from Sydney's western suburbs composed of half-, adopted and pseudo siblings. The daughter of a parole officer and an enthusiastic foster-carer, Candice spent her childhood listening around corners to tales of violence, madness and evil as her father relayed his work stories to her mother and older brothers.

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Darcy Tindale

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Fleur McDonald

After growing up on a farm near Orroroo in South Australia, Fleur McDonald’s first job was jillarooing in the outback. She has been involved in agriculture all her life, including helping manage a 8000-acre station for twenty years. Today Fleur and her energetic kelpie, Jack, live in Esperance, Western Australia,

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Fleur chats about her daily writing life on her blog http://fleurmcdonald.com,
Facebook - Fleur McDonald Author
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Fiona Lowe

Multi published, Fiona is very excited about her 2023 release, The Money Club a novel about wealth, trust & betrayal. Previously published with Berkley and currently with Harper Collins Australia, (HQ Fiction) Fiona's been the recipient of a RITA and two RuBY awards. Families and communities intrigue her and she loves creating characters you could meet on the street and enjoys putting them in unique situations where morals and values can blur and she begs the reader to ask themselves, 'What would you do?'
For a free novella, sign up to Fiona's newsletter at http://www.fionalowe.com
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Joan Sauers

Born in New York and working in film and television in NY, London and Los Angeles, Sauers has lived in Australia for the last twenty-five years. She is the author of twelve books including Mothers & Daughters, Ageing Disgracefully, and Sex Lives of Australian Women. She is a consultant and lecturer in screenwriting in Australia, Europe and Morocco, and lives in Sydney with her talented cat, Blossom.
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Jo Dixon

Jo writes stories full of imperfect characters dealing with unsettling situations, and making fatal mistakes. There is intrigue and mystery, the moodiness and underlying threat of the wild environment, and provocative twists and turns.

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Robert Jeffreys

Robert Jeffreys has worked as an actor, teacher, builder, labourer, cleaner, real estate agent, personal security agent and playwright of the professionally produced stage plays Cox Four, Covert, The Simple Truth, and The Messenger. ABC Radio National featured his radio plays, Covert, which received an AWGIE award, and Bodily Harm. He has also published a poetry anthology, Frame of Mind. Robert's debut novel, Man at the Window, is the first in the Detective Cardilini series, set in 1960s Western Australia.
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Kelli Hawkins

Kelli Hawkins writes reports for a private investigator, as well as working on novels for adults and children. She lives in Newcastle with her two teenagers. Over the years she’s travelled whenever possible and worked all kinds of jobs. Kelli’s been a political journalist, a graphic designer, a mystery shopper – even a staple remover. When she’s not writing she’s planning a holiday – or dreaming of one. Or reading, of course.

She writes under the name Kelli Hawkins for her adult novels, and Kelli Anne Hawkins for her children’s books.
Buy books on Amazon
Mercedes Mercier

Mercedes Mercier writes 'just-one-more-page' crime with twisting plots and relatable characters. As well as writing books, Mercedes works in the criminal justice system, providing her unique insight into the world of prisons, crime and offenders.

After a brush with death, Mercedes decided to throw herself into life. She lived overseas, become a black belt in Karate, skydived, and volunteered with animals.

When she doesn't have her nose in her laptop and her mind in a story, she loves to read, travel, try new restaurants, and listen to podcasts (true crime of course).
Buy books on Amazon