Current read of the Mystery/Thriller book club
WHO REALLY KILLED THE HADLER FAMILY?I just can't understand how someone like him could do something like that. Amid the worst drought to ravage Australia in a century, it hasn't rained in small country town Kiewarra for two years. Tensions in the community become unbearable when three members of the Hadler family are brutally murdered.
Everyone thinks Luke Hadler, who committed suicide after slaughtering his wife and six-year-old son, is guilty. Policeman Aaron Falk returns to the town of his youth for the funeral of his childhood best friend, and is unwillingly drawn into the investigation. As questions mount and suspicion spreads through the town, Falk is forced to confront the community that rejected him twenty years earlier.
Because Falk and Luke Hadler shared a secret, one which Luke's death threatens to unearth. And as Falk probes deeper into the killings, secrets from his past and why he left home bubble to the surface as he questions the truth of his friend's crime.
Current read of the Classics book club
Set in the mid-19th century, and written from the author's first-hand experience, North and South follows the story of the heroine's movement from the tranquil but moribund ways of southern England to the vital but turbulent north. Elizabeth Gaskell's skilful narrative uses an unusual love story to show how personal and public lives were woven together in a newly industrial society.
This is a tale of hard-won triumphs - of rational thought over prejudice and of humane care over blind deference to the market. Readers in the twenty-first century will find themselves absorbed as this Victorian novel traces the origins of problems and possibilities which are still challenging a hundred and fifty years later: the complex relationships, public and private, between men and women of different classes.
What the book club thought about it:
Next read for the Everything book club
Who knows what the storm will blow in…Casey's cabin in the wilderness is not built for a hurricane. Her roof shakes, the lights flicker, and the tree outside her front door sways ominously in the wind.
But she's a lot more worried about the girl she discovers lurking outside her kitchen window. She’s young. She’s alone.
And she’s covered in blood. The girl won't explain where she came from, or loosen her grip on the knife in her right hand. And when Casey makes a disturbing discovery in the middle of the night, things take a turn for the worse.
The girl has a dark secret. One she’ll kill to keep. And if Casey gets too close to the truth, she may not live to see the morning.
In this taut, deadly tale of endurance and desperation, Freida McFadden explores how far one girl will go to save herself – and the deadly repercussions of survival at any cost.
The Everything Book Club current read.
On the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift. In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles his fate with those of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy. So begins a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond.
The book that won Ernest Hemingway the Nobel Prize for Literature.
'It's silly not to hope. It's a sin he thought' Set in the Gulf Stream off the coast of Havana, Hemingway's magnificent fable is the tale of an old man, a young boy and a giant fish.
It stands as a unique and timeless vision of the beauty and grief of man's challenge to the elements.
What the book club thought about it:
Kazuo Ishiguro imagines the lives of a group of students growing up in a darkly skewed version of contemporary England. Narrated by Kathy, now thirty-one, Never Let Me Go dramatises her attempts to come to terms with her childhood at the seemingly idyllic Hailsham School and with the fate that has always awaited her and her closest friends in the wider world. A story of love, friendship and memory, Never Let Me Go is charged throughout with a sense of the fragility of life.
What the book club thought about it:
What to say about Tress of the Emerald Sea that isn’t just a constant stream of love and adoration.. This is one of Daan’s favorite Brandon Sanderson novels. A whimsical story about love, pirates, and most of all… cups.
This book turned Brandon from a good author, to one of my favorites. If you’re a fantasy reader and haven’t read any of Brandon Sanderson’s work, this is a good entry point to his Cosmere universe.
As a child Gifty would ask her parents to tell the story of their journey from Ghana to Alabama, seeking escape in myths of heroism and romance. When her father and brother succumb to the hard reality of immigrant life in the American South, their family of four becomes two - and the life Gifty dreamed of slips away. Years later, desperate to understand the opioid addiction that destroyed her brother's life, she turns to science for answers.
But when her mother comes to stay, Gifty soon learns that the roots of their tangled traumas reach farther than she ever thought. Tracing her family's story through continents and generations will take her deep into the dark heart of modern America. Transcendent Kingdom is a searing story of love, loss and redemption, and the myriad ways we try to rebuild our lives from the rubble of our collective pasts.
What the book club thought about it:
Romantasy book club current read
Carriwitchet is a violent, rugby-esque game played atop winged beasts. It was once Taissa Cho s whole life. She was considered her country s most promising player until her nemesis, rival player Kion Locke, destroyed her career. She was expelled from the sport in disgrace.
No team would take her. And Taissa has spent the last two years thinking of nothing but revenge.
Until a chance to redeem herself and career presents itself, offered by the very man who ruined everything in the first place. A spot on his team, the Stymphs. The catch? To garner publicity and keep Taissa as the team s secret weapon, she and Kion are forced into a fake relationship.
But Taissa and Kion only have two things in common: their love of the game and their undying hatred of each other. Yet as a mysterious illness befalls the winged creatures of the league, they are forced to work together to save their team.
With sabotage afoot, Taissa and Kion find themselves prepared for anything... except the fact that their fake-for-the-cameras relationship may be something real after all.
Tropes:
Rivals-to-lovers
Fake dating
Found family
Fantasy sports romance
Bickering MCs
The Cruel Prince meets Bridgerton in this captivating fantasy brimming with heart-pounding romance, vicious competition and beautiful, cruel fae.
Every citizen of England is granted one bargain from their immortal fae queen. High society girls are expected to bargain for qualities that will win them suitors: a rare talent for piano in exchange for one’s happiest childhood memory.
A perfect smile for one’s ability to taste. But Ivy Benton’s debut season arrives with a shocking twist: a competition to secure the heart of the Queen’s fae son, Prince Bram. A prize that could save Ivy’s family from ruin… and free her sister from the bargain that destroyed her.
Yet every glittering fae deal has a rotting heart, and at the centre of this contest is a dark plot that could destroy everything.
What the book club thought about it:
Sir Una Everlasting was Dominion's greatest hero: the orphaned girl who became a knight, who died for queen and country. Her legend lives on in songs and stories, in children's books and recruiting posters - but her life as it truly happened has been forgotten.
Centuries later, Owen Mallory - failed soldier, struggling scholar - falls in love with the tale of Una Everlasting.
Her story takes him to war, to the archives, and then into the past itself. Una and Owen are tangled together in time, bound to retell the same story over and over again, no matter what it costs. But that story always ends the same way.
If they want to rewrite Una's legend, and finally tell a different story, they'll have to rewrite history itself - and change their lives in the process .
What the book club thought about it:
Florence Day is a ghost-writer with one big problem. She’s supposed to be penning swoon-worthy novels for a famous romance author but, after a bad break-up, Florence no longer believes in love. And when her strict (but undeniably hot) new editor, Benji Andor, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye.
When tragedy strikes and Florence has to head home, the last thing she expects to see is a ghost at her front door. Not just any ghost, however, but the stern form of her still very hot – yet now unquestionably dead – new editor. As sparks start to fly between them, Florence tells herself she can’t be falling for a ghost – even an infuriatingly sexy one.
But can Benji help Florence to realise love isn’t dead, after all? If you fell in love with Funny Story, This Spells Love and The Hating Game, this laugh-out-loud romance will sweep you away.
What the book club thought about it:
Hiding from a cruel kingdom that believes Sirens are monstrous, blood-hungry creatures. Hiding from a king and his captain who viciously hunt her kind. Hiding from her own alluring abilities.
By keeping herself from the sea, Imogen's bloodlust is dulled, and her black wings remain hidden beneath her skin. When a neighbouring king comes to visit, Imogen can no longer hide. He knows precisely what she is, and he believes she is a lost Siren heiress who can save both their kingdoms from an even greater monster.
But Imogen's magic threatens to violently reveal itself, and the two form a blood bond that protects them both. They flee the kingdom together, traversing waters teeming with the undead. As the lines between duty to their people and desire for each other begin to blur, Imogen worries her own ancestral powers may not be enough to kill what hunts her-the only way to defeat a monster may be to become one herself.
A deadly prison. A forbidden romance. A fight for survival.
THERE S ONLY ONE RULE IN ENDLOCK: OBEY OR DIE.
In Dividium, all crimes are punishable by life in prison.
A prison that s a life sentence in more ways than one. Where the wealthy can hunt the inmates for sport.
Raven s mission is simple: infiltrate the infamous and deadly Endlock Prison to save her brother.
There s just one problem: Raven has a target on her back. Her reputation as the most ruthless bounty hunter in Dividium precedes her, and the inmates she s sent to Endlock want their revenge.
So when the prison guard she s sworn to hate becomes her only chance to survive, Raven has no choice but to trust the one person she shouldn t
What the book club thought about it:
(Hardback)
Forbidden romance. Werewolves. Kilts.
This sizzling bestselling sensation has the internet OBSESSED. 🐺'I want to mark you as mine. And I can think of countless ways I would do it. Countless ill-advised, highly pleasurable ways I would do it.’
When war erupts between humans and werewolves, a princess finds herself torn between duty and desire. On the eve of her wedding, Princess Aurora catches the eye of a powerful alpha, Callum. Believing she’s the key to ending a brutal war, Callum kidnaps Aurora, whisking her away to the rugged lands north of the border.
There, a forbidden attraction starts to grow. Just as Aurora learns not all Wolves are bad, Callum discovers that she is in danger from those closest to him. With monsters on both sides and a bloodthirsty war raging, will their story end in love or tragedy? And will Aurora ever get home? Does she even want to?
What the book club thought about it:
Not for everyone, but definitely will make you feel things. If you read books because of comfort, then this is not for you, sorry. If you like to explore art through words, then stay for a treat. Artfully written, very meta, and it will leave you with a “WTF!!??” feeling that will linger for a couple weeks at least. Hate it or love it, you will have to read it to find out.
What the book club thought of it:
Honestly, no words are good enough to describe this masterpiece of a book. But heed my words, DO NOT READ IN PUBLIC unless you are comfortable with crying your eyes out in front of people.
The Names tells the story of Bear, Julian and Gordon. They are the same, but different. Each name tells the story of what destiny awaits you, depending on the name you are given.
What the book club thought about it:
This book is a trip. A trip the Japanese occupation of Manchuria, a trip to the Cultural Revolution, and a trip to the present day to explore the effects of intergenerational trauma, the legacy of colonialism and inescapability of fate in stunningly rendered folklore.
What the book club thought about it:
One of the best books I’ve ever read in my life. In simple words: People are becoming trees. But the background talks about how society has driven us to be so tired, so done, that the best option is to change our very essence, transform our DNA to be able to become one with nature once again.
What the book club thought of this book:
This book reads as a novel but is, in fact, a real life story.
It explores all they ways a woman can be oppressed, harassed, diminished, erased. It deals with morality and justice, what actions are good or bad, depending if you are a man or a woman. A must read for the feminist struggle.
The Coin is a weird book. It will definitely make you feel uncomfortable. A perfect book for a book club, as it ignites great conversations.
From the point of view of a rich Palestinian woman living in New York, The Coin will drag you through her psyche. This book is a conversation between Her and the reader. weird, uncomfortable and amazingly written.
On the island of Zakynthos, nothing is more powerful than Desire—love itself, bottled and sold to the highest bidder by Leandros, a power-hungry descendent of the god Eros. Eirene and her beloved twin sister, Phoebe, have always managed to escape Desire’s thrall. Until Leandros’ wife dies mysteriously and he sets his sights on Phoebe.
Determined to keep her sister safe, Eirene strikes a bargain with Leandros: if she can complete the four elaborate tasks he sets her, he will find another bride. But it soon becomes clear that the tasks are part of something bigger; something related to Desire and Lamia, the strange, neglected daughter Leandros keeps locked away. Lamia knows her father hides her for her own protection, though as she and Eirene grow closer, she finds herself longing for the outside world.
But the price of freedom is high, and with something deadly—something hungry—stalking the night, that price must be paid in blood
A rediscovered queer classic: the subversive, blazingly beautiful oddball romance between an ageing trans woman and a young revolutionary by a Latin American icon
It is spring 1986 and Santiago's streets are aflame with protests against the dictator Augusto Pinochet. From her lavishly decorated hovel, the Queen of the Corner embroiders linen for the wealthy, dreams of romance and listens to boleros to drown out the rioting and gunshots. When handsome young macho Carlos waltzes into her life, the ageing queer swiftly agrees to help with his clandestine activities.
LONGLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2026High in the Accursed Mountains, in a village ruled by the ancient laws of the Kanun, Bekija escapes an arranged marriage by becoming a sworn virgin, renouncing her womanhood to live as a man. Her decision sets off a brutal chain of events, destroying her family and separating her from the one she loves the most. Years later, as Bekija - now Matija - tells their story to a visiting journalist, long-buried truths come to light, along with the realization of all that might have been.
Earth as we know it has ended: The apocalypse is being televised!
Carl, and his ex’s cat, Princess Donut, embark on a life-of-death adventure, while being part of an alien show.
This book is addictive, fun and a social commentary. With lovable characters and a compelling story, Matt Dinniman really hit all the spots we needed in these current times.
What the Fantasy/Sci-fi Book Club thought of this book:
“Totally worth the hype! Carl is such a likeable character, and Princess Donut is amazing too. The world-building is fun and not too complicated. Story-wise, you'll be hooked from the start. You discover the dungeon and the plot of the story alongside Carl and Donut. Some questions get answered in the book, but some won't, which made for a lively book club discussion. The book is even a real page-turner in parts. Couldn't put it down. Also love the humor. Would recommend it to everyone!” - Review by Marieke
Ana’s favorite Fantasy series, The name of the wind tells the story of Kvote, a prodigy orphan, that is on a mission to uncover the truth about his parents murder at the hands of the Chandra.
Full of adventure, introspection and whimsical characters, Patrick Rothfuss uses beautiful prose to create a world like no other.
An unfinished trilogy? yes, but still the most beautifully written fantasy book out there. Worth every second spent reading it, and re-reading it.
This is what the book club thought of this book:
Will of the Many has a very classic fantasy trope: a young man’s, Vis, kingdom gets taken over by the Republic and he wants to avenge his family, and homeland. Vis becomes an orphan and hides in a part of the Republic far away from his homeland and memories, only to be taken in by one of the Senators.
Even with the classic tropes used in the book, James Islington is doing things in such a different way, that the whole book kept me at the edge of my seat. Twists and turns at every corner. I was so enamored by this story that it was very hard to put down. Normally a book like this takes me ~4 weeks to finish. I was done in a week. A month later I was still constantly thinking about it!
If you are a fantasy fan reader, READ THIS BOOK IMMEDIATELY!
What our book club thought about it:
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