Welcome to Litsy!

Will definitely hold your interest, but I hated the ending. Falk heads to his hometown for the funeral of his high school best and his family. Luke is believed to be a murder suicide, but Falk finds discrepancies. Cooperation from townsfolk is scarce. They all believe Falk murdered his girlfriend when they were in school and the real murderer was never found.

I've listened to these Aaron Falk books all in the wrong order but I don't think it matters.
Steve Shanahan's narration is to Jane Harper as Kimberley Farr's is to Elizabeth Strout.
It's a dark enough tale from the get-go, but you knew that already. (I guessed the "who" but not the "why".)

Tore through this police procedure set in a dying, drought-plagued Australian farm town. I thought the author did a good job immersing you in the setting and the characters‘ lives and motivations. Well-plotted with good suspense and a satisfying resolution. Thank you @TheAromaofBooks for sending me this gift! #bookspin

#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain

I was looking to see if a new Jane Harper might be in the works and found she hasn't updated social media since May 10. Google didn't give me any info newer than this either. Have any of you heard anything about her that I've missed?

#schoolspirit
#fieldtrip
@Eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks
Stumbled across this in a recent road trip, Beulah Victoria

I got this in a charity for £1 awhile ago. I bought it because my mum raved about it, but I don't get the fuss... It was just ok! A good wee murder mystery, but nothing special 🤷

Not sure how I ended up with this on my kindle as I rarely choose a murder mystery but I‘m very glad it did . Good plot , likeable and unlikeable characters ! Some very descriptive passages that made the environment come alive . There is no void in my life since finishing it but I really enjoyed it .

It‘s here! Thank you soo much for this generous #clearmyshelvesgiveaway @ImperfectCJ !! I love getting book mail! This made my day! Thank you! 🥰🙌❤️

I enjoyed it. It‘s a little too long, but worth the read.

This was pretty good! A teeny bit too long, but a good, easy read. And I even guessed the “bad guy” too, which I never do 😝 (23)
⭐️: 3.75/5

A fun Litsy challenge from @WildAlaskaBibliophile

1. Tag a favorite mystery you‘ve read. ✅
2. What is your favorite way to prepare eggs? I have my husband scramble them 😎

#nationaleggmonthchallenge

Det. Aaron Falk returns to his small hometown in Australia to attend the funerals of his childhood friend, Luke, and Luke‘s wife and young son. It‘s thought that Luke killed his family and then himself. The town is experiencing a 2-year drought, putting everyone on edge. Falk teams up with the local detective to find out what really happened, and in the process, dregs up another murder case from 20 years ago - one that drove Falk out of town. 👇🏻

Here are my picks for this month…very excited to get to them both! 😃
#bookspin #doublespin #bookspinbingo

This was highly recommended by a friend.

I immediately downloaded the second book, so it's safe to say I enjoyed it 😄

A family is murdered in his hometown, and detective Falk weeds through old memories and new clues in order to solve the mystery.

The drought plagued setting is just as much a character as any of the people.

Yay! I finally had the time to finish this one. It was a good mystery. I do admit that I was often confused distinguishing the present with the flashback scenes. However, it had me guessing who the murderer was.
3.5 @TheAromaofBooks

#authoramonth @Soubhiville #bookspinbingo #4 @TheAromaofBooks

Halfway through and really enjoying the world building in this who-dunnit thriller set in rural Australia during a severe drought - adding an environmental element to the “why” in addition to cinematic setting. Apparently there‘s a film version starring Eric Bana 😍 - may need to find when I‘m done.

I don‘t think I‘ll get to another Harper book this month but I‘d def continue this series. 🇦🇺 #AuthorAMonth

Finished my #aam today. What an incredibly compelling mystery. The descriptions of Australia in the midst of an intense drought was.... Damn, so horrifying. The mystery was depressing AF and the characters were complicated. I highly enjoyed this and might actually continue the series 🤣🤣

@Soubhiville #janeharper #thedry #authoramonth

After being driven away from Kiewerra, Australia 20 years earlier under suspicious circumstances, Det. Aaron Falk arrives back in his hometown during the worst drought in the century to attend the funeral of his boyhood friend Luke, his wife, and his son. Many in this scorching town believe Luke murdered his wife and son and then himself; it's up to Falk and local Sgt. Raco to find out what truly happened while Falk faces his past.
#AuthorAMonth

Next up on #kindle

Aaron Falk‘s childhood best friend Luke apparently killed his family and himself. Falk, the smalltown outcast for years, is now a Melbourne white collar crime investigator and wrangled into helping the town cop to investigate whether Luke really was the culprit. The ending isn‘t at all what you‘d expect—but entirely logical once you know everyone in town a bit better. This one was hard to put down. #authoramonth #Australia #readingOceania

I‘m grateful to #AAM and #bookspin for pushing me to finally read Jane Harper. She‘s been on my radar for years, but something in her book blurbs always left me wondering if she would actually be my style. It turns out I really enjoyed her dry humor, and thought Falk and the cast of surrounding characters were compelling. I did work out the major plot points ahead of the book, which never happens for me! But I‘m interested to read book 2.

#weekendreads
@rachelsbrittain

Found another great author through #AuthorAMonth

Book one in the series. Very enjoyable. Well written characters and an interesting mystery.

#AuthorAMonth #BookSpinBingo #SeriesLove2024
@Soubhiville @TheAromaofBooks @Andrew65 @TheSpineView

March #AuthorAMonth #ReadAway2024 #SeriesLove2024 This is the second Jane Harper book I‘ve read this week. It is the first book in the Aaron Falk series. The relationships are well written and the solutions to both mysteries come as a revelation. Two Jane Harper mysteries down, with three, hopefully more, to go.

Not at all the ending I was predicting! This was a great thriller. The audiobook made it hard to know which moments were recounting of the past versus current day, but you usually could figure it out after a few sentences.

#authoramonth @Soubhiville

It wasn't as though the farm hadn't seen death before, and the blowflies didn't discriminate. #firstlinefridays @ShyBookOwl

I tried reading the tagged book while also reading Harper‘s The Lost Man but it was too confusing. Both have main characters who are snubbed in town for something they allegedly did years ago, & there now was murder, deep in the heart of #Australia. To top it off, they are slightly linked. I‘ve decided to finish this one first. I just learned the “who done it,” and dang was I ever surprised! Did anyone else figure it out before the big reveal? ⬇️

Another new to me author thanks to #authoramonth and one I will definitely read more from. I flew through this book. It was the perfect plane read for the journey home. I was fully transported away from my cramped seat to drought ridden Australia as I worried more about Aaron Falk than I did about the mystery he was roped into trying to solve.

I‘ve discovered the reason not to read two books by the same author at the same time. One is slow and drags, but still interesting. The other, however, is my pick when deciding which one to read. So it‘s hard to be motivated to read the other one. I won‘t tell which is which, but I‘d be interested to learn if anyone else has a favorite between these two.

I‘ve picked my next ebook, and I hope it‘s different enough from Harper‘s The Lost Man, which I‘m also reading right now, so I don‘t confuse the two.

#authoramonth #Australia #readingOceania
@Soubhiville @BarbaraBB @Librarybelle

#readyourkindle
#readyourshelf
@CBee

Yay for another month--though this year is flying by! 💚☘️💚

This is just a straightforward mystery. It's good but 🤷. People kept recommending this to me when it came out and I now have no idea why. But good mystery.

#AuthorAMonth @Soubhiville

#BookSpinBingo @TheAromaofBooks

#LitsyCrafters @Catsandbooks Better to show you, right?

A coworker asked if I knew how to sew. I showed him this.

Thank you so much for sending me this book, @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks ! What a great story! It's twisty and thrilling and mysterious but also has complex, well-drawn characters. I just downloaded the second book in the series from Libby!

Photo is of California rather than Australia, but I think it represents the title well.

Started off a bit slow, but really picked it up at the end.

I haven't had any time to read today, but I did have time to open a package from @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks (many thanks!) and I ate a lot, went on two walks, and played games with my family.

The Dry is remarkably well written. The prose is taut and evocative, a step above Liane Moriarty in my view (though it would certainly appeal to readers who like her books). I will concede, though, that most of the plot twists were very predictable. Full review: https://keepingupwiththepenguins.com/the-dry-jane-harper/

#AutumnPlease #PhotoChallenge. Day 1 and here is my orange stack. I had more than I thought. @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks @Eggs #Scarathlon #TeamCryptKeepers. 6pts @LiseWorks

My #bookspin list for September! Looking forward to seeing the numbers tomorrow. 😀

Had this on my kindle for ages and finally read it. Or should I say devoured it. What a great storyteller Jane Harper is. I lived in Kiewarra felt the heat and could hear the flies buzzing. Im so happy there are two more in this series. Highly recommend.

I don't read a lot of this genre, but when I go camping it is nice to have books that I can get swept up in and just fly through. Jane Harper is one of my favourite authors for this and I wasn't disappointed. Some pretty heavy subject matter though. See comments for content warnings.

A great start to the Sydney Writer‘s Festival yesterday. They are some of my favourite days of the year. I think it‘s great that Jane has got much better at public speaking and is now interviewing people herself. She was talking to Ben Stevenson, the writer of Everyone in my Family has Killed Someone. This book goes against all the writing rules as he thought he was going to die of covid which was in full swing as he was writing it.

This reread was as good as I remembered! I loved the slowburn mystery set in Australia. A man's past comes back to haunt him when he returns to his hometown after an old friend's death. Harper‘s a master @ description & making the reader feel completely submerged in the story as she pulls back the curtain. You discover you had the answer all along, but never realized it. She's become an auto-buy author for me & fans of Tana French should love her.

Aaron returned to his hometown after his childhood friend and family are brutally murdered. A very good thriller, I really wasn't sure until the end who did it. The narrator for this audiobook was really good.

I couldn‘t find a suitable Kindle Scribe case, so I went with stickers and a clear case. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Really enjoying this book so far. The Dry by Jane Harper. #kindlescribe #sundaynightreads 📚💜💕

Really enjoyed this mystery. A family, including a 6-year-old boy, are found dead. Was it a murder-suicide or did someone have it out for them? Federal agent Falk returns to town to look into his former best friend‘s death, but rumors abound about Falk‘s involvement in another death 20 years ago. I felt the current storyline was handled better than the past one. I liked how the drought was used to bring out the darkness in this farming town.