By rights, Ray Avery should be dead or in prison. He grew up in an appallingly abusive family until he was made a ward of the court at the age of nine. From there he was in and out of orphanages and foster homes, desperately trying to evade murderous bullies and paedophiles, more...

This is a beautifully constructed police procedural with so many twists and turns and subplots it’s like getting three mysteries for the price of one. DI Tom Thorne is approached by a young private detective to help her track down a man who’s supposed to be dead. Anna’s client, more...

Nothing like a good upstairs/downstairs romantic novel with a bit of mystery thrown in. Cora is a rich beautiful and spoilt young American with a ghastly nouveau riche mother who is utterly committed to getting Cora married off to a flash English aristocrat.. Together with her more...

Raphael is a 14 year old dumpsite boy. He lives a precarious life, making his living sifting through rubbish with his best friend, Gardo, with the faint hope that one day he might find something interesting. And then one unlucky-lucky day, as Raphael puts it, he does. He finds more...

Inspired by the real life stories of women like Natascha Kampusch and Elisabeth Fritzl, held captive for years in small rooms, this is the story of Jack, an intelligent, inquisitive five year old whose entire universe has been a tiny room where his mother has been kept a prisoner more...

Blokes are enormously hard to buy presents for but this one’s a corker and with Father’s Day coming up, keep it in mind as a gift for younger Dads. Marc Ellis and Charlie Haddrell have drawn up a comprehensive list of every type of New Zealand man you will find on these shores more...

Ellie, whose journalistic career once held so much promise, is on a last chance. Her drinking and her obsession with an ill fated love affair means her performance has slipped and she knows she has to deliver a cracker of a story if she’s to keep her job. Searching through her more...

I loved, loved, loved this one. It's a slim volume but it's exquisitely crafted with twists and turns and tension weaved through to make this a cracking page turner. Young Sig is alone in his family's hut - alone apart from his father’s body lying on the kitchen table. His more...

It’s tempting to see this account of life in the Mr Asia drug syndicate as a cynical attempt to cash in on the popularity of the Underbelly series - crime not having paid for Jim Shepherd. Jim was born in New Zealand and was one of this country’s most notorious criminals before more...

This is a beauty. Jake has chucked in his job at a London investment bank and is at a loose end. His colleague and friend Lucy Harrison invites him down to her family’s home for the weekend, but when he arrives it’s clear that she has an ulterior motive. Her little brother, more...