Unnatural Habits by Kerry Greenwood

1929: Pretty little golden-haired girls are going missing in Melbourne. But they're not just pretty. Three of them are pregnant, poor girls from the harsh confines of the Magdalen Laundry. People are getting nervous.

Polly Kettle, a pushy, self-important Girl Reporter with ambition and no sense of self preservation, decides to investigate--and promptly goes missing herself.

It's time for Phryne and Dot to put a stop to this and find Polly Kettle before something quite irreparable happens to all of them. It's a tale of convents and plots, piracy, murder and mystery . . . and Phryne finally finds out if it's true that blondes have more fun. 

Another wonderful, action packed Phryne adventure. Well written, full of likeable characters and laugh out loud moments. 

Ronan's Echo by Joanne Van Os

"Did we have any relatives die in the First World War?"

Forensic Anthropologist Kat Kelso's innocent question begins the unravelling of a hundred years of family history, lies and secrets.

In 1916 twin brothers Denny and Connor Ronan are eager to get to the war before it's all over; Bridie O'Malley, their childhood friend and the woman they both love, watches them leave, understanding too late that war is about more than heroes and handsome boys in uniform.

Nearly a century on from the disastrous battle of Fromelles, Kat Kelso, Bridie's great granddaughter, is on site in France identifying the recovered bodies of lost Australian soldiers. The discovery of her own relative amongst the dead men brings Kat, her mother Fiona and great-aunt Hattie, far more questions than answers.

The wounds of love and war have devastating consequences that ripple across time.

A remarkable, poignant and very moving story of how a major event can echo and triple through generations. 

A Superior Death by Nevada Barr

Trying to keep America's pristine wilderness untouched is no easy job for park ranger Anna Pigeon. It's lonely work, but her unyielding love of nature makes her well-suited for it - especially when murder mars the scene...

A self-avowed 'desert rat', Anna finds herself out of her element when she is reassigned to Isle Royale National Park on the North Shore of Lake Superior. Below the frigid waters lies the Kamloops, a sunken 1927 ship - the final resting place of its five victims. But when divers surface with a tale of seeing a sixth body, Anna must break the Great Lake's grip on its icy secrets...

A quick, entertaining read. I loved the descriptions of the the national park. 

Ready & Willing by Elizabeth Bevarly

When Audrey Magill stumbles onto a portrait of a 19th-century riverboat captain, she thinks it’ll be perfect for her new hat shop. She doesn’t expect to meet a ghost who insists Audrey must help save the soul of his great-great-however-many-greats grandson. Now in addition to scrambling to open her shop in time for the Kentucky Derby, she must convince a complete stranger that he’s in danger of losing his soul— and that everlasting love does exist. 

 A light and fluffy romance....with ghost. 

Lights Out Liverpool by Maureen Gee

As Britain stands alone against a monstrous enemy, the inhabitants of Pearl Street, in Liverpool, face hardship and heartbreak with courage and humour.

The war touches each of them in a different way: for Annie Poulson, a widow, it means never-ending worry when her twin boys are called up and sent to France; Sheila Reilly's husband, Cal, faces the terror of U-Boat attacks; Eileen Costello is liberated from a bitter, loveless marriage when her husband is sent to Egypt and she goes to work in a munitions factory - and falls in love. And Jessica Fleming, down on her luck, is forced to return to the street she'd hoped never to see again.

I loved this book all the way through.  The characters were diverse and interesting. It was a sad ending though, the abusive husband came home from the war and his wife was stuck with him again.

Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore by Matthew Sullivan

Lydia Smith lives her life hiding in plain sight. A clerk at the Bright Ideas Bookstore, she keeps a meticulously crafted existence among her beloved books, eccentric colleagues, and the BookFrogs—the lost and lonely regulars who spend every day marauding the store’s overwhelmed shelves.

But when Joey Molina, a young, beguiling BookFrog, kills himself in the bookstore, Lydia’s life comes unglued. Always Joey’s favorite bookseller, Lydia has inherited his meagre worldly possessions. Trinkets and books; the detritus of a lonely man. But when Lydia flips through his books she finds them defaced in ways both disturbing and inexplicable. They reveal the psyche of a young man on the verge of an emotional reckoning. And they seem to contain a hidden message. What did Joey know? And what does it have to do with Lydia? 

 An enjoyably twisty story with quirky characters.  The second half was better than the first, but it still wasn't a book that grabbed me.  A nice enough easy read.

Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

Burial Rites is a debut book inspired by a true story: the final days of a young woman accused of murder in Iceland in 1829. Set against Iceland’s stark landscape, Hannah Kent brings to life the story of Agnes, who, charged with the brutal murder of her former master, is sent to an isolated farm to await execution. Horrified at the prospect of housing a convicted murderer, the family at first avoids Agnes. Only Toti, a priest Agnes has mysteriously chosen to be her spiritual guardian, seeks to understand her. But as Agnes’s death looms, the farmer’s wife and their daughters learn there is another side to the sensational story they’ve heard. Burial Rites asks the question, how can one woman hope to endure when her life depends upon the stories told by others? 

A well written, very moving story. All the more poignant because it is based on a true story.