Christmas Book List 2023

This year’s Christmas list features 17 incredible books from the authors I’ve interviewed throughout the year representing a wide range of genres. From historical romance to science fiction, from an IT thriller to true crime, there’s something here for everyone!

Science Fiction

Title: Memories Don’t Lie
Age group: adult
Interview: Pauline Yates on science fiction – it isn’t all about spaceships
Blurb: Sarah Wilson, orphaned niece of Lieutenant John Wilson, is determined to escape his restrictive upbringing and find her place in the world.
Her journey takes a deadly turn when she uncovers secrets about her past, hidden deep in her mother’s memories, that threaten everything Sarah wants.
They could cost her everything she holds dear—and her life.

IT Thriller

Title: The Scaevola Conspiracy
Age group: adult
Interview: Timo on his IT Thriller, The Scaevola Conspiracy
Blurb: Get ready for a high-octane thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat! Luke, an intellectually brilliant but socially awkward data scientist, lands a dream job at a prestigious Silicon Valley tech company. Teaming up with the sharp-tongued ex-hacker Ada and Clark, scion of a famous venture capitalist, their journey takes them into the heart of California’s tech hub where artificial intelligence is about to change the world. But their lives take an unexpected turn when a string of mysterious deaths rocks the tech scene.
Driven by the desire to make things right, they launch an investigation and discover a far-reaching conspiracy lurking beneath the glimmering surface of the Valley. As they venture into forbidden territory, survive adrenaline-fueled break-ins, and become hunted by the authorities, they expose a terrible truth.
But time is running out! Can they prevent the upcoming apocalypse?

Expat Fiction

(Note: this is a genre I’ve made up to fit the books written about protagonists living outside their home country.)

Title: The Golden Land
Age group: adult
Interview: Elizabeth Shick on The Golden Land and writing about expat life
Blurb: The Golden Land is a debut novel that digs deep into the complexities of family history and relationships.
When Etta’s grandmother dies, Etta is compelled to travel to Myanmar to explore complicated adolescent memories of her grandmother’s family and the violence she witnessed there. Full of rich detail and complex relationships, The Golden Land explores those personal narratives that might lie beneath the surface of historical accounts.

Title: The Black and White House
Age group: adult
Interview: Karien Van Ditzhuijzen, the Nomad who Loves Houses
Blurb: Anna is thrilled to move into a black and white house in Adam Park, confident she will thrive in Singapore, find a job, make local friends. But echoes of footsteps in the hallways make her wonder whether rumours of the house being haunted are true. Overwhelmed and lonely in a new country, Anna slowly unravels. When Salimah, single mother to a rebellious teenager, loses her job, she revisits Adam Park where her childhood was uprooted. A place with a dark history. Anna bumps into Salimah, and their lives intertwine in unexpected ways. Tensions rise as the house’s haunting presence grips both women and threatens to upset an already fragile friendship.

Title: Exile
Age group: adult
Interview: Sarah Bourne on writing about social issues
Blurb: On a remote Shetland island, a mother and daughter’s strained relationship is tested as dark and long-hidden secrets are revealed…
Kirstie exiles herself to the small Shetland island of Yell after yet another torrid affair. She knows she went too far this time—her desperate behaviour caused the breakdown of her lover’s marriage. Taking up residence in her grandparents’ croft, which has lain empty since their deaths, and wanting time to reflect on her life and disastrous relationships, Kirstie begins to write about her obsessive ways.
What she hasn’t realised is that the island is full of relatives she never knew she had. Kirstie has spent her life feeling unloved, hurt, and angry, and has wondered what part this played in the all-consuming manner she is drawn into relationships.
As Kirstie allows some of the local people into her life, she learns of her mother Morag’s tragic history—and begins to reassess her mother’s behaviour. But as Kirstie grapples with her past and begins to settle into her present, Morag decides to visit, throwing Kirstie into turmoil once again—and revealing even more shocking truths . . .

General Fiction

Title: All That Is Sacred
Age group: adult
Interview: Donna Carbone on the evolving nature of friendship 
Blurb: When Lynn and her husband set out for a weekend retreat to repair their rocky marriage, icy roads lead to a collision that ends Lynn’s life. Stranded between the physical world and the afterlife, Lynn experiences the grief of her loved ones as they process her death.
Lynn’s life-long friends are not only tortured by loss but also unspoken wounds in their friendship. With clever influences from above, Lynn coaxes them to reunite at a beachside cottage on the one-year anniversary of her death. Determined to prompt their healing, so they could help her family move on, Lynn reminds them of a sacred promise, hoping it will lead to truths they couldn’t face on their own. Will it be enough to remind them of the power of their bond?
As Lynn struggles to repair the relationships she left behind, she soon realizes the greatest challenge will be letting them go.

Title: Life of Cyn
Age group: adult
Interview: Caitlin Avery on Life of Cyn and the #MeToo Movement
Blurb: Some say life begins at forty.
Cyn Mckinley hopes so since her former life is over. Home foreclosure, a cross-country move, and a hidden drinking problem pretty much killed it. Being crushed by crippling anxiety doesn’t help.
When she discovers that her husband’s new boss is the monster who raped her in high school, she spirals further down. Struggling to process this revelation, she conceals it from her husband because they need his job. Instead, she numbs her pain with too much wine, drives drunk, and her husband threatens to divorce her. She reluctantly quits drinking, hoping that will save her marriage.
But clarity from sobriety brings something unexpected to Cyn – the need for justice or revenge. If only she can find a way to make the demon pay for the trauma he inflicted, and the ripples it sent through her life, then maybe she’ll find peace.

Title: The Train
Age group: adult
Interview: Sarah Bourne on writing about social issues
Blurb: When the day starts with tragedy… where will it lead?
When a woman steps in front of a commuter train to end her life, it sets in motion a chain of events that will also change the lives of its passengers forever.
Eight strangers start their day unaware of the events about to unfold, but they find themselves having to reassess who they are and what they want from life.
Emotional responses rise to the surface, including some of the choices they’ve made in life and their own mortality. Can their lives go on as they were, or will this stranger’s death be the catalyst they need for change?
The Train is an emotional look at how people react to a tragic event and asks the question, how do we recover from tragedy?

Title: InVisible
Age group: adult
Interview: Sarah Bourne on writing about social issues
Blurb: A woman is detained by authorities after a terrorist attack, sending her on a twisting path from London to Afghanistan in this emotionally powerful saga. 
When Laila and her lover, Faisal, are detained after the 2005 terrorist attack in London, it sets in motion a chain of events that will alter Laila’s life forever. 
After being held in solitary confinement for months, Laila is released back into the world without charge, a woman changed beyond recognition. When she decides to leave the country and travel to Pakistan to look for her elusive father, Laila is reunited with Faisal in Peshawar—but the romance is short-lived when she finds herself kidnapped and taken to Afghanistan, leaving her sad, angry, and uncertain if she will ever find her place in the world and the freedom she craves . . .

Title: When Lives Collide
Age group: adult
Interview: Sarah Bourne on writing about social issues
Blurb: A hit-and-run puts two women on a collision course with fate, in this mind-blowing psychological thriller from the author of Exile.
It only takes one second to change a life. Loretta Davidson learns this the hard way when, on a rainy afternoon, her car crashes into another vehicle at an intersection. Loretta survives with only a few stitches. Her four-year-old son is not so lucky. Falling into a coma, he soon succumbs to his injuries, leaving Loretta and her husband devastated. 
Emma Elliot’s four-wheel drive glanced off the car she hit, and she left the scene of the accident convinced no one was hurt. She could not be late running errands for her partner—or there would be hell to pay. He had hit her before, and he would do it again. 
In the months following the accident, Loretta struggles to survive her grief as her marriage crumbles. Emma gets engaged—and then pregnant. But the twists and turns life throws at the two women have a way of balancing things out, sending them straight into one another’s paths one more time.

Historical Fiction

Title: Instead of Harmony
Age group: adult
Interview: Sara Adrien on her second series
Blurb: Sweethearts trapped in a childhood love triangle. He’s empty without his muse. She’s caught up in her parents’ missteps. Will their wounded souls find healing in each other’s arms?
London, 1814. Raphael Klonimus can fix anything but his broken heart. The son of a prominent Jewish family of jewellers, the talented pianist hasn’t felt whole since he lost the girl he loved to an arranged marriage. He’s shocked when he discovers a letter on his bed leading to an old hiding spot where a surprise visitor waits in the cold.
Delilah “Laila” Mandel’s grief is mixed with desperate hope to reunite with the boy next door. Marrying a fatally ill friend to clear her mother’s debts, the new widow yearns for the embrace of the man who might have already moved on after she was forced to leave him behind. When her deceased husband’s scheming cousin attempts to blackmail her to wed again, she flees to the capital city hoping her childhood sweetheart will help.
Considering himself a coward for once letting her go, Raphael sweeps the beautiful woman off to a secret castle despite seeing himself as unworthy of her affections. But after a bone-melting kiss that starts to mend their hurts, Laila fears others’ greed and desires could crush their second chance at happiness.
Will they break free of the chains that bind them and grab hold of a rapturous forever?

Title: In Eternal Love
Age group: adult
Interview: Sara Adrian on the thrill of writing treasure hunts
Blurb: He hates surprises. How can he consolidate duty and passion when the love of his life presents him with the surprise of a lifetime?
Meet Aaron, the third of the Klonimus brothers whose love story will sweep you off your feet. A student at Edinburgh University, Aaron and his classmate are working on an intricate clockwork mechanism. But when Aaron seeks out his brothers’ help to make it work, he returns to London and leaves his love behind.
At a time when girls cannot enrol, Liora secretly attends university with her brother. When Aaron’s sweet manners and good looks catch her off guard, can she withstand the sparks that fly between them?

Title: In Tune With His Heart
Age group: adult
Interview: Sara Adrian on the thrill of writing treasure hunts of Jewish Regency romances.
Blurb: When the oldest Klonimus brother does everything that’s expected of him, he falls short of his own expectations. Can he overcome a stroke of fate and find love?
Gideon was betrothed to a lovely girl since his childhood, and he had to do right by his family and marry her, a virtual stranger. But when he suffers an injury after a hate crime against Jews, his new wife nurses him to health. Can they become more than friends?
Rosie left her beloved French country home to marry into the renowned Klonimus family in London. Shy as she is, she prefers to speak through her music rather than confront people. When her husband takes her on an adventurous trip to Italy and her preferred means of communicating – her violin – is stolen, can she overcome her fears and forge a path for love?

Title: Ella’s War
Age group: adult
Interview: Sarah Bourne on writing about social issues
Blurb: Will she ever discover the truth?
Ella Elkington wakes up in hospital with minor physical injuries but no memory. She cannot even remember her own name.
The doctor treating her tells her that she had a car accident and has been identified by a letter found in a handbag. Asking to see the letter, hoping to find out about herself, she learns the letter is now missing.
When the hospital tracks down her brother, he visits her, and Ella has glimmers of childhood memories.
After she is released from hospital, with the help of diaries and letters, and her long-time friend Sheila, Ella begins to piece together her past. She learns she was a nurse during the war, who was sent to work in a mobile hospital in France after the D-Day landings.
But, haunted by nightmares, Ella struggles to understand how she ended up in the accident.
What happened to the missing letter?
And who is the young man who haunts her dreams?
In order to understand who she is, Ella must face a terrible truth in order to make peace with the past and find a way to live again…

Nonfiction

Title: Look What You Made Me Do
Age group: adult
Interview: Megan Norris on using her book to help survivors of family violence
Blurb: Megan Norris’ exploration of revenge killings during marital breakdown, won the 2017 Davitt Award from Australian Sisters in Crime Davitt for best True Crime.
One Australian woman is hospitalised every three hours and two more lose their lives each week as a result of family violence. But for some women there is a punishment far more enduring than injury or their own death.
Look What You Made Me Do is a timely exploration of the evil inflicted by vengeful fathers who have killed their own children simply to punish partners for ending unrewarding, often abusive relationships.
Drawing on her own experience as a court reporter, award-winning crime writer Megan Norris examines the revenge murders of eighteen children to shine a light on the ultimate act of family violence and the shattering legacy of grief such crimes have on surviving mothers.
From the 2018 execution-style shooting murders of Sydney teenagers, Jack and Jennifer Edwards whose angry dad was granted a licence to kill despite his long-standing history of domestic violence – to the premeditated murders of Brisbane mum, Hannah Clarke and her three children whose car was torched by her vengeful ex – this book shows it is not only women who are at risk when family violence turns deadly.

Title: This Messy Mobile Life
Age group: adult
Interview: Mariam Ottimofiore on being an eternal expat
Blurb: Do your family dinners happen in more than one language? Do you celebrate Christmas and Eid? Do you and your family feel at home in more than one country? If so, then you may be a MOLA Family and yes, this multicultural, multilingual, mobile life can get a little ‘messy’.
In South America, a mola is a shirt made from intricately stitched layers of patterns and cloth. Worn with pride, it represents who you are – inside and out. Mariam Ottimofiore presents a mola as the perfect metaphor for globally mobile families living between cultures, countries, languages, nationalities, identities and homes, who find their story hard to articulate. She has created the MOLA tool to help global families design and show their stories to the world. This is your ‘life by design.’
Raw, honest, inspiring and uplifting, This Messy Mobile Life comprises personal reflection, expert advice and survey research to help you take your global family from mess to mola.

Children’s Picture Book

Title: What Will You Make Today?
Age group: children’s picture book
Interview: Maura Pierlot on the pros and cons of changing genres
Blurb: What Will You Make Today? is a non-fiction picture book that invites children to explore the many ways they can make a difference in the world. In a world bursting with possibilities, what will you make today? Will you make believe? Will you make noise? Will you make a wish? Will you make an excuse? Will you make things right? Will you make up your mind? Will you make a difference? A series of questions subtly builds perspective from a personal standpoint, culminating in a wholistic view of the world. What Will You Make Today? aims to show children how their choices can effect change and make an impact in their own lives, in the lives of others and in the world.

Best of luck with your Christmas shopping. I hope you can find something here for your book-lover friends (or yourself!).

Here’s last year’s list: Christmas Book List 2022
Here’s next year’s list: Christmas Book List 2024
Next time: Research is important in writing fiction. Here’s Five Learnings from Firing a Shotgun.