Cirrus@Austlit

'Australia’s outback hides a mysterious canyon. Hidden deep within is a forest of pine tree that dates from the Cretaceous Period. A megacorporation sends in a team of experts to research this canyon for botanical riches.

'The expedition enters a no-man’s land formed 100 million years ago when Australia was still attached to Antarctica, and dinosaurs ruled the super-continent. But the canyon has more prehistoric and dangerous species than anyone could have possibly imagined.

'Trapped and terrified, unarmed and unable to communicate topside, the team’s extraction deadline is six long hours away.

'The frantic race for survival is on.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

(Publication summary)

'Transitions occur in a liminal space. The familiar is gone. The unknown lies ahead and with it, terrible possibilities.

'Award-winning author Deborah Sheldon explores liminal spaces in this collection of dark, unsettling fiction. Her characters teeter on frightening thresholds with no way back.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Taylor’s Travelling Troupe of boxers has set up its tent at an isolated sheep station: bored farmers always bet to excess. Headlining the bare-knuckle fighters is Bluey, marketed as ‘The Man-Beast’, a Sasquatch-like monster, chained and kept drunk enough to fight punters without killing them. But the troupe has returned to where Bluey was first captured. Recognising the mountains, he calls again and again. And when his call is answered, all hell breaks loose.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'A selection of the darkest Australian fiction.

'Spawn: Weird Horror Tales About Pregnancy, Birth and Babies taps into anxieties, painful memories and nightmares. Here, your worst fears come true.

'Penned by established authors and fresh new voices, these stories range from the gothic and phantasmagorical, through the demonic and supernatural, to the dystopian and sci-fi.

'Prepare for a visceral, frightening read.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'After a six-year estrangement from her troubled family, Simone Parker returns home to the small Australian town of Brownbeck to attend a funeral. Now that their violent and abusive father is dead, she hopes to reconcile with her younger sister, Claire.

'When Simone is the only witness to a brutal and near-fatal bashing, she discovers that Brownbeck harbours a criminal gang trafficking in illegal firearms. At the funeral, she recognises Claire’s new partner as one of the assailants. 

'How can she help police officer Mitchell Ross in his investigation if her own sister might be involved?' (Publication summary)

'To solve murders, you must understand the process of decomposition.

'Australia’s newest body farm, the Victorian Taphonomic Experimental Research Institute, is hidden in bushland some four hours’ drive from Melbourne. Scattered across its 150 acres are human donor cadavers and pig carcasses arranged to mimic some of the ways in which police might find murder victims: exposed to the elements, buried in a shallow grave, wrapped in tarpaulin. Forensic scientists and graduate students meticulously track each stage of putrefaction.

'Today, Detective Rick Evans of the Homicide Squad is at VITERI for the re-creation of one of his cold cases. A human donor will be locked inside a car. But the donor has other ideas... So begins a facility-wide outbreak of the reanimated dead.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.