Silver Sleuths in the Golden Age of Crime

Loraine Stephens

After thirty-five years as a teacher-librarian, Laraine Stephens threw off her pink twinset, tartan skirt, string of pearls, sensible shoes, and 400 denier tights to find out what life was like on the other side of the bookshelves.

Donning a tracksuit and moccasins, she was primed to write historical crime fiction set in Melbourne in the aftermath of the Great War and during the heady days of the 1920s, when gangs, bootleg liquor, and gambling dens inhabited the back streets of Melbourne.

Laraine has a six-book contract with Level Best Books (USA). She is the author of the Reggie da Costa Mysteries. The latest is The White Feather Murders.

Janice Simpson

Lucy Jordan rode through Paris in a sports car at the age of 37. Janice Simpson rode through Paris on a bicycle at the age of 57, and by the time she arrived in Istanbul seven weeks later, still on her bike, her life had gone through a complete gear change.

No more boring work. More time to explore the world. And, funnily enough, crime writing. Well, if you got shot in Russia while pedalling along on a hot summer’s day, you’d probably take up crime too.

Janice now has three crime novels under her belt. Her latest novel is Double Fault, set during the Australian Open.

Katrina Watson

Katrina Watson was a mild-mannered medical doctor and researcher but turned to crime (writing) after life took an unexpected turn in her forties. She was a single mum of four and, out of the blue, contracted Parkinson’s disease. She had to retire much earlier than planned but knew she had a few tales to tell.

Katrina has since published The Bones, a political mystery about the trade in medical skeletons, and has now completed her second novel. Last year, her story “Crime and Management” won the runner-up Body in the Library prize in Sisters in Crime’s Scarlet Stiletto annual short story competition.

Her stories have been published in Stories from the Suburbs. Write Now!, 2020 Vision (which she co-edited and co-published), and Scarlet Stiletto – The Sixteenth Cut. Katrina received an Order of Australia (OAM) in 2018 for services to medicine.

Amanda Hampson

A late bloomer, host Amanda Hampson had her first novel published by Penguin at 50 years of age.

Over the next twenty years, there were five more novels, but her breakout hit was her first foray into crime, The Tea Ladies, a top ten bestselling Australian novel in 2023, it won the 2024 Danger Award (BAD Sydney Writers’ Festival) and was shortlisted for the 2024 Davitt Awards. It was followed by The Cryptic Clue and The Deadly Dispute, with a fourth in the series out in April 2026.