Thanks to the publisher and DMCPRMedia I have one copy of the tantalising and intriguing book The Widow of Walcha to give away. In the comments let me know who publishes this book. It’s that easy.
**Open to residents of Australia only. Winner will be randomly selected on the 3rd of June 2022. **
The Widow of Walcha: A True Crime Story of Love, Lies and a Murder In A small Country Town
Emma Partridge
Simon & Schuster Australia
ISBN: 9781760859428
Description:
The Widow of Walcha is a shocking true story about death, love and lies in the small NSW town of Walcha.
All farmer Mathew Dunbar ever wanted was to find love and have a family of his own. That’s why, just months after meeting Natasha Darcy, the much-loved grazier didn’t hesitate to sign over his multi-million-dollar estate to her.
When Mathew died in an apparent suicide soon afterwards, in a stranger-than-fiction twist, Natasha’s estranged husband – who she was once charged with trying to kill – was the first paramedic on the scene after the murder.
Journalist and author Emma Partridge travelled to the cool and misty town of Walcha in the Northern Tablelands of NSW in the months after Mathew Dunbar’s death, drawn by the town’s collective worry that Natasha was going to get away with murder. Partridge spent months researching the case, interviewing Mathew’s friends, family and Natasha herself in an attempt to uncover her sickening web of lies and crimes.
The Widow of Walcha is about one of the most extraordinary criminal trials in Australia’s history and reveals Natasha’s sickening crimes against those she claimed to love, fuelled by her obsession with money.
My View:
This story is so bizarre it reads like … a black comedy… how incredulous this is, how unbelievable the actions are in this read … I just cannot believe this actually happened, yet it did and one person is dead and a few more escaped by good luck. I shake my head as I read…how did this happen? How did this woman get away with so much before this last terrible act landed her in gaol? How does her husband (at the time the book was written, they were still married, that I do not get at all) whom she attempted to murder (setting the house on fire whilst he was in it) stay shtum? How? I just cant believe it.
Yet this is true. Follow the stories of her previous relationships, the earlier police charges, her first time in gaol, her next targets….read on as the clues are unraveled. Sit in court and hear evidence and then once the verdict has been delivered read on about the information that wasnt allowed to be shared in court, the other stories of “near misses”. I continue to shake my head in disbelief. What an incredible, true story.
I wish we could hear the Widow’s story ( I guess we do through the evidence and transcripts and interviews) but as she has not accepted responsibility I guess we will never know what was going through her mind,.. intriguing.
Big screen here this comes 🙂
Missing Presumed Dead
Simon & Schuster Australia
ISBN: 9781761104459
Description:
It was the double murder case that gripped Australia, and former Crown Prosecutor Mark Tedeschi QC is finally able to share all the shocking details.
Dorothy Davis and Kerry Whelan were both happy, healthy, affluent, middle-class women from conservative, loving families.
Such women are hardly ever among the ranks of the missing. They were not hitchhikers, or associates of drug dealers, or unhappy with their family relationships, or suffering from mental health issues. Dorothy Davis and Kerry Whelan came from different parts of Sydney, mixed in quite different circles, and led completely different lives. They had never met each other, and if they had, they would have had little in common. In fact, Dorothy Davis and Kerry Whelan had one thing in common – they both knew Bruce Allan Burrell.
The disappearance without trace of these two women caused massive police investigations and resulted in sensational trials that gripped the nation of Australia. This book explores the intricacies of those investigations and delves into the twisted, tortuous processes of the legal proceedings, while exploring the dark recesses of the mind of Bruce Burrell.
Meet the Author:
As a Barrister and a Crown Prosecutor for thirty five years, Mark Tedeschi QC has appeared in some of the most significant criminal cases in Australia. He has been the Senior Crown Prosecutor in New South Wales for fifteen years and is the President of the Australian Association of Crown Prosecutors. He has had many articles published on the law and is the author of a legal text book and the critically acclaimed biography Eugenia. He has published many articles on history, genealogy, photography, and horticulture. Kidnapped is his second work of creative non-fiction.
Giveaway:
Thanks to Simon & Schuster, the author and Dmcprmedia I have one copy of this Australian true crime expose to give away. ** Australian residents only** In the comments let me know of another true crime written by this author.
Rachel’s Review:
An incredibly gripping, insightful and compelling look behind the scenes of Australia’s longest-running homicide investigation.
I was absolutely hooked by this fascinating exploration of the horrific crimes and subsequent decades of investigations to catch the murderer that terrorised Claremont.
This meticulous probe into the high-stakes police work, bumbling mistakes, and relentless focus on innocent suspects was riveting. With broad strokes reporter Bret Christian paints a vivid picture of Claremont in the late 1990s, a world that in many ways feels so familiar and yet, in others, so far removed from my own experiences as a young woman in Perth just a decade later – testament to how much we were changed as a town when three women’s lives were cut short. Piecing together what we remember from the last 20 plus years of media coverage with all the things the public never knew, including how the case was eventually cracked, this is a considered, detailed and well-researched ode to three Perth women whose names will never be forgotten – Sarah Spiers, Jane Rimmer and Ciara Glennon.
Barrenjoey Road
Neil Mercer & Ruby Jones
ABC Books
ISBN: 9780733340468
Description:
A gripping expose of a notorious cold case 1978. An idyllic beachside community. A series of abductions and rapes. So what happened to Trudie Adams?
The disappearance of 18-year-old Trudie Adams while hitchhiking home on Sydney’s northern beaches in 1978 left her family and community devastated. When police began to investigate, the dark underbelly of the so-called ‘insular peninsula’ was exposed, where surfers ran drugs home from Bali, teenagers hitchhiked everywhere due to the lack of public transport, gangs of men prowled the beaches and the roads, and predators abducted and raped countless young women, crimes rarely reported or investigated.
Inspired by the award-winning #1 podcast and ABC TV series and containing new revelations never previously revealed, Barrenjoey Road is the gripping expose of why the case was never solved. It takes us all the way to the top, from a criminal perpetrator with a lifelong record and links to organised crime who was never formally accused, to police corruption at the highest level.
My View:
Poignant and equally baffling, this is a true crime narrative that is once again too close to home for comfort. You cannot ignore the depiction of innocence tainted with the intrusion of men’s unwanted desires/impulses on the lives of so many young women. And in this read it is not just the perpetrators who are misogynistic and vile, many of the public officers are the same. I do hope life has changed, that standards have been raised, that women’s’ concerns are now listened to and treated with respect. I am hoping for too much? I still hope. I do feel angry.
A powerful read made even more so with the inclusion of the carefree photos of the main focus of this story – Trudie Adams. Moving and sad. I wish there were answers. Hopefully the podcast, TV series and the publication of this book will tempt someone to come forward, will niggle at someone’s almost forgotten memories. Rest in peace Trudie.
#metoo
Stalking Claremont
Inside the Hunt for a Serial Killer
Bret Christian
ABC Books
Harper Collins Publishers Australia
ISBN 978073338731
RRP $32.99
Description:
The gripping true story of the notorious Claremont serial murders and the nation’s longest and most expensive investigation to catch the killer
In the space of just over a year in 1996-7, three young women disappeared from Claremont, an upmarket suburb in central Perth. When two of the young women were found murdered, Australia’s longest and most expensive investigation was established. More than twenty years later, an unlikely suspect was arrested based on forensic evidence that also linked the murders to two previous vicious rapes. Stalking Claremont, by local newsman Bret Christian, is a riveting story of young lives cut short, a city in panic, an investigation riddled with error, and a surprising twist that absolutely no one saw coming.
Author Bret Christian adds:
“It is hard to dream up a worse way to write the definitive book on the Claremont serial killings. It was always an unfolding story. At our local newspaper we had been following and reporting on the Claremont serial killer cases since 1995. After an arrest was made I gave many interviews, one to news.com.au. Almost instantly I received a call from ABC Books commissioning a book. I wrote it in three months, realising the urgency – Edwards might plead guilty or, being a very high-profile prisoner, something might happen to him in jail.
Publication had to wait three years for a trial to begin, then another 10 months for the completion of the court case. In the meantime, with new interviews and court submissions, much new information had to be woven into the original manuscript. Avoiding making the additions look stuck-on, resembling a coronavirus molecule, meant many headaches.”
Stalking Claremont presents as a detailed murder-mystery thriller, but it was written to provide the answers – to learn from the past in order to better face he future. What went wrong in the hunt for the Claremont serial killer? What was really behind the focus on the wrong people? What finally went right? Can these lessons be universally applied to other unsolved crime mysteries?
My View:
I predict a Walkley!
This is a book of powerful emotions. At first my interest was piqued as the crimes and circumstances happened in my home state, in social situations I was familiar with/was involved with …the narrative, like the crimes committed felt very personal. As I started reading, I was surprised at how quickly I was transported back to that era and how suddenly I got the “chills” and locked my open sliding door opposite my seat on the lounge where I sat reading. I felt discomfort, no I felt fear.
This uncomfortable feeling, this apprehension did not leave but was overtaken by anger when I continued to read and discover the many civil liberties that were trashed, individual’s health and lifestyles destroyed, for no concrete reasons, during this lengthy and mostly narrow sighted investigation. How did/could things go so wrong for so long? There are many questions that needed asking, an enquiry that needs to be made (if it’s not happened already/or is happening), reassurances that this sort of flawed investigating never happens again.
I continued reading, again aghast at why useful information was not made public, why first-hand useful information was ignored…then I read details of the murders that had not been released to the public…oh dear! These poor girls. Sorrow, grief…so many more emotions.
This is a book that I highly recommend you read; this excellently researched and written book is astonishing in the facts it illuminates, the wrongs it sets right by clearly announcing to the general public that the publicly persecuted persons of interest were not at all involved with the crimes, and had no physical evidence linking them to the crimes, ever, etc (where is the public apologies? Where is the compensation, though how you can compensate for this level of distress and intrusion caused to blameless individuals I do not know)? I am outraged as you may have gathered. And I hope that somehow, someone reading this book will recall a vital piece of information that will bring Sarah Spiers home. I hope Bradley Robert Edwards is never released from prison.
What a read! I don’t think a book has ever incensed me like this.
I predict awards for Bret Christian. Thank you for shining the light on this controversial investigation.
The Schoolgirl Strangler
Katherine Kovac
Echo
ISBN: 9781760686635
RRP $32.99
Description:
The shocking true story of a serial killer in 1930s Melbourne.
November, 1930. One sunny Saturday afternoon, 12-year-old Mena Griffiths was playing in the park when she was lured away by an unknown man. Hours later, her strangled body was found, mouth gagged and hands crossed over her chest, in an abandoned house. Only months later, another girl was murdered; the similarities between the cases undeniable. Crime in Melbourne had taken a shocking new turn: this was the work of a serial killer, a homicidal maniac.
Despite their best efforts, police had no experience dealing with this kind of criminal. What followed was years of bungled investigations, falsely accused men – and the tragic deaths of two more girls – before the murderer was finally caught and brought to justice.
With all the pace of a thriller, Katherine Kovacic recounts this extraordinary, chilling true story – of failed police enquiries, a killer with a Jekyll and Hyde personality, and the families shattered when four innocent lives were cruelly taken.
My View:
Katherine Kovacic is a talented writer, who, with the publishing of this work of non-fiction, has demonstrated her great skills and depth of writing and research. I enjoyed every aspect of this read- the cover art – which is perfect for the era of the crimes (in fact I will share a personal image with you that was used in a local “a stranger danger awareness” shoot back in the 1960’s.)
I love the chapters with the face/jigsaw puzzle slowly revealing the face of the accused.
The research led narrative is presented in easily digested vocabulary, and without personal intervention, I like this tyle op presentation for true crime writing. I absolutely abhor true crime where the writer thinks that their opinions are valuable in the story, in my opinion, they are not, it should be the reader who decides what they take/believe/ understand from the facts presented.
This is another great read from the talented Katherine Kovacic.
Most of the books in this category will shock your with their honesty, their rawness, their personal story of struggles and sometimes, their successes. I hope you find something here that will stimulate your mind and tug at your heart.
The Little Girl on the Ice Floe
Adélaïde Bon
Maclehose Press
Hachette Australia
Lee Kofman
Affirm Press
ISBN: 9781925584813
Dan Box
Penguin Random House Australia
Viking
ISBN: 9780143784395
The Bloody Truth About Our Periods
Hannah Witton
Wren & Rook
Hachette Australia
ISBN: 9781526361462
Bowraville
Dan Box
Penguin Random House Australia
Viking
ISBN: 9780143784395
Description:
A true crime story cannot often be believed, at least at the beginning. In Bowraville, all three of the victims were Aboriginal. All three were killed within five months, between 1990 and 1991. The same white man was linked to each, but nobody was convicted.
More than two decades later, homicide detective Gary Jubelin contacted Dan Box, asking him to pursue this serial killing. At that time, few others in the justice system seemed to know – or care – about the murders in Bowraville. Dan spoke to the families of the victims, Colleen Walker-Craig, Evelyn Greenup and Clinton Speedy-Duroux, as well as the lawyers, police officers and even the suspect involved in what had happened. His investigation, as well as the families’ own determined campaigning, forced the authorities to reconsider the killings. This account asks painful questions about what ‘justice’ means and how it is delivered, as well as describing Dan’s own shifting, uncomfortable realisation that he was a reporter who crossed the line.
Praise for the Bowraville podcast:
‘It is a gripping true crime tale and an essay on racism; a challenge to the lies Australia tells itself about its treatment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people told through the voices of three Aboriginal families who have been indisputably let down … The podcast has galvanised the public in a way that two decades of print and television reporting on the Bowraville murders have not.’ The Guardian
‘A masterful example of crime reporting which forensically details the worst of human nature, inexplicably compounded by the gross negligence of the only people who could provide justice. It’s stirred thousands, including the prime suspect, to re-engage with the case after trusting the journalist to take them to dark places.’ Walkley judges’ comments
‘Outstanding.’ Leigh Sales
‘Moving, brilliant.’ Annabel Crabb
‘If you haven’t listened to Bowraville by Dan Box, then you should.’ David Campbell
My View:
I wholeheartedly agree with the comments that the Walkey judges made about the reporting of the Bowraville murders. What more could I add?
That I was/am haunted by the stories here – the institutionalised and individual racism like none I have come across in Australia before now, my despair at the cycle of violence and alcoholism that has been normalised in some of the communities spoken of here and I feel the frustration of all those involved in trying to find justice for the two young people and the child victim in Bowraville and I thank Barry Toohey (p.214) for his outstanding explanation of “Chronic collective grief” that makes sense of so much of the pain evidenced in this read.
This is an outstanding read. All Australians would benefit from reading this book.
Unsolved Australia: Lost Boys, Gone Girls
Justine Ford
Macmillan Australia
ISBN: 9781760556747
Description:
Can you catch a killer or find a missing person?
Australia is ‘the lucky country’. But not for everyone. Unsolved Australia: Lost Boys, Gone Girls tells thirteen stories of people whose luck ran out in the most mysterious of circumstances.
It’s a journalistic deep-dive into Australia’s dark heart by one of Australia’s premier true crime writers, Justine Ford, the acclaimed bestselling author of Unsolved Australia and The Good Cop.
Why are four people missing from a Western Australian doomsday cult? Who abducted and murdered beauty queen Bronwynne Richardson on pageant night? And why is a cooked chook important evidence in the outback disappearance of Paddy Moriarty?
Key players are interviewed, evidence laid out and suspects assessed. Never-before-published information is revealed. Can you help crack the case and solve these mysteries?
Hold tight as Unsolved Australia: Lost Boys, Gone Girls takes you on a chilling yet inspiring true crime rollercoaster ride where the final destination is hope.
My View:
I applaud the fact that Justine Ford has illuminated cases that have baffled both those left behind and the police tasked with solving these mysteries. Someone, somewhere must know something that will help solve these cases and every time someone reads about one of the mysteries here, speaks to their neighbour or work colleague or the person sitting on the train next to them about this book that they are reading, more opportunities are created to tug at peoples memories or to encourage someone to come forward with that piece of information that will make a difference to the lives of so many. Has anyone come forward with useful information? Have the rewards tempted anyone to speak out? I hope so.
I found the additional information/profiles/interviews with the behind the scenes individuals – the investigator, the criminal psychologist, the forensic anthropologist /criminologist/reporter, the investigative reporter, the investigative journalist, the former police detective ( I hope I have not missed any one out) that interspaces the mysteries lifts and informs this collection of stories; simply fascinating. I could read more of this sort of interview.
There is so much sadness within these pages but there is optimism that reading this will make a difference to someone’s memory or conscience. I do hope so.
Reading, Writing and Riesling 