'Fans of Carole Nelson Douglas’s Irene Adler series will be pleased'Publishers Weekly'Victorian atmosphere abounds in a twisty, exciting tale of danger and lost love' Kirkus'A terrific adventure'Northern ReaderThe Continent, 1864: Two bomb attacks, three deaths.Clues to an elaborate assassination plot are intercepted in Paris and the authorities believe the assassin’s lair lies in Soho, London. Heloise Chancey, courtesan and professional detective, must go undercover to spy upon the nest of suspects and end their murderous conspiracy.Meanwhile, her Chinese maid, Amah Li Leen finds herself trapped in a deadly nightmare of deceit and madness. Will she be able to escape before time runs out?Danger keeps Heloise close company as she hunts evil down to its devilish source.BOOKS BY M.J. TJIAShe Be DamnedA Necessary MurderThe Death of Me

The Continent, 1864: Two bomb attacks, three deaths. Clues to an elaborate assassination plot are intercepted in Paris, and the authorities believe the assassin's lair lies in Soho, London. When Heloise Chancey, courtesan and professional detective, takes on a wealthy client who requests that she meet a mysterious man in his stead, she never dreams it will lead to her going undercover to spy upon the nest of plotters and end their murderous conspiracy. Danger keeps her company as she hunts evil down to its devilish source. Meanwhile, her Chinese maid, Amah Li Leen, returns to Heloise's house to find it has been ransacked - and soon she finds herself trapped in a deadly nightmare of deceit and madness. Will she be able to escape before time runs out?

A serial killer draws the Victorian courtesan and professional sleuth into 19th century London’s criminal underground in this historical mystery. London, 1863. Women in Waterloo are turning up dead, their sexual organs removed and mutilated. When a girl goes missing and the search proves fruitless, fears grow that the killer may have claimed another victim. With the police at a total loss, it falls to courtesan and professional detective, Heloise Chancey, to investigate. With the assistance of her friend and maid, Amah Li Leen, Heloise inches closer to the truth. But when Amah is implicated in the brutal plot, Heloise begins to question who she can trust. In times like these, even a woman acquainted with London’s dark side must be wary of what lurks in the shadows.

”What a treat! A cracking historical mystery featuring not one, but two tough, resourceful, brave and interesting female leads... A Necessary Murder is smart, raunchy and thrillingly subversive.” – Emily Maguire Stoke Newington, 1863: Little Margaret Lovejoy is found brutally murdered in the outhouse of her family’s estate. A few days later, another victim is found on the doorstep of Eurasian courtesan and professional detective Heloise Chancey at her prestigious address. At the same time, Heloise’s mother, Amah Li Leen, must confront events from her past that threaten her present. In a maelstrom of murder and deceit, Heloise is caught up in a crime that reaches into the very heart of her existence. Fans of Phryne Fisher and Downtown Abbey will love the flamboyant heroines, mouthy servants and bloody murders in the Heloise Chancey Mystery series. “It’s a pleasure to watch Tjia’s unusual sleuth get mad and get even in a grisly tale with a surprising climax; readers will eagerly await the sequel.” – Kirkus Review “Heloise Chancey is a marvellous character, a gutsy, flamboyant self-made woman and expert guide to the nether regions of Victorian London.” – Marele Day Heloise Chancey may be a fictional character living her life in London in the mid 1800s, but she is very much a woman for our times. M.J. Tjia combines this endearing character with the page-turning thrills of a good whodunnit, the rollicking Victorian English read intricately woven with all the colour and flavour of the East.” – Cass Moriarty, Parting Words “Heloise Chancey is a witty, sexy, resourceful sleuth who refuses to be constrained by the Victorian sensibilities of the time, choosing instead to subvert them across lines of gender and culture. Every quest Heloise sets out upon and every clue she reveals along the way is underpinned by an author determined to apply the same forensic detail to historical accuracy as her protagonist is to solving crimes. M.J. Tjia is masterful at bringing the sights and smells of Victorian London vividly to life in this fast-paced, thrilling and absorbing whodunnit, where nothing and no one is ever as you think.” – Sally Piper, Grace’s Table

Winner of the 2017 Seizure Viva La Novella Prize Sparked by the description of a ‘Malay trollope’ in W. Somerset Maugham’s story, ‘The Four Dutchmen’, Mirandi Riwoe’s novella, The Fish Girl, tells of an Indonesian girl whose life is changed irrevocably when she moves from a small fishing village to work in the house of a Dutch merchant. There she finds both hardship and tenderness as her traditional past and colonial present collide. Told with an exquisitely restrained voice and coloured with lush description, this moving book will stay with you long after the last page.

AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER! The war may be officially over, but journalist Billie Walker's search for a missing young immigrant man will plunge her right back into the danger and drama she thought she'd left behind in Europe in this thrilling tale of courage and secrets set in glamorous postwar Sydney. Sydney, 1946. Though war correspondent Billie Walker is happy to finally be home, for her the heady postwar days are tarnished by the loss of her father and the disappearance in Europe of her husband, Jack. To make matters worse, now that the war is over, the newspapers are sidelining her reporting talents to prioritize jobs for returning soldiers. But Billie is a survivor and she's determined to take control of her own future. So she reopens her late father's business, a private investigation agency, and, slowly, the women of Sydney come knocking. At first, Billie's bread and butter is tailing cheating husbands. Then, a young man, the son of European immigrants, goes missing, and Billie finds herself on a dangerous new trail that will lead up into the highest levels of Sydney society and down into its underworld. What is the young man’s connection to an exclusive dance club and a high-class auction house? When the people Billie questions about the young man start to turn up dead, Billie is thrown into the path of Detective Inspector Hank Cooper. Will he take her seriously or will he just get in her way? As the danger mounts and Billie realizes that much more than one young man’s life is at stake, it becomes clear that though the war was won, it is far from over.