“Every monster has a weakness.

At the height of Australian summer, a serial killer known as The Shark stalks a coastal suburb, hunting young female swimmers.

Afraid and furious at the failure of the police to protect them, two women fight back. Raych is grieving someone she’d have died to save, while Carmen hides her own disturbing connection to the murders.

In desperation, they form an uneasy alliance. And when another girl vanishes, they take matters into their own hands – by kidnapping the prime suspect. But as their interrogation spirals, horrifying truths surface on both sides of the table.

The clock is ticking to save the missing girl. And in their quest for justice, Raych and Carmen must face the darkest question of all: have they caught a monster – or become one?

The Shark is a propulsive psychological thriller about fear, vengeance and the thin line between predator and victim.”

Hello and welcome to damppebbles. Today I am delighted to share my review of The Shark by Emma Styles. The Shark will published by Sphere Books later this week on 12th March 2026 and will be available in hardcover, audio and digital formats. I chose to read a free eARC of The Shark but that has in no way influenced my review.

I read No Country for Girls, Emma Styles’ debut, back in 2022. Since then, I have been waiting patiently (impatiently?) for the author’s second book. I have to say, it was well worth the wait. Featuring strong female characters and a plot that is completely inescapable, once you start reading, it’s nigh on impossible to stop. No Country for Girls was good. The Shark was excellent. Australian noir with a hefty dose of feminist fiction, as I have come to expect from this author in only two books!

A serial killer is terrorising Cottesloe, a coastal suburb in Western Australia. Young women are disappearing, only to be found dead a few days later. The press has dubbed the killer ‘The Shark’. Raych firmly believes her best friend, Piper, was a victim of The Shark, despite there being no body. Piper has been missing for nearly one year, having vanished without a trace on a night out. Raych is furious, heartbroken and absolutely fed up with the local police for taking no real action. They have a suspect who they’re monitoring, but without solid evidence, they can’t arrest him. So girls keep vanishing. Carmen, who unbeknownst to anyone, found the first victim on the beach, feels she has her own dark connection to The Shark. When a new victim is taken by the killer, Carmen and Raych join unlikely forces. Taking matters into their own hands, they kidnap the prime suspect. Playing with fire, and in well over their heads, how far will they go to catch a serial murderer….

The Shark is a tense, dark, taut thriller full of furious female rage, which I was 100% there for. Raych has always loved her best friend, Piper. She just didn’t know how deeply Piper’s feelings ran until the night she disappeared. Now, Raych would do anything to find her. Including putting herself up as bait, hoping the killer will choose her next. Raych is a strong, determined young woman seeking answers, full of anger towards the local authorities and the killer himself. Prepared to pay the ultimate price and sacrifice herself in order to know the truth. She’s not very likeable, but I found myself very much on her side. I wanted her to discover the truth, no matter how difficult it was to hear. More importantly though, I wanted her to survive the ordeal. Even if that wasn’t what she wanted for herself. Carmen is a very different character to Raych. There’s a darkness there which I found highly intriguing. I couldn’t work her out, but that only drew me in all the more.

Would I recommend this book? I would, yes. The Shark is a compelling, intricate, character-driven thriller with two utterly fascinating, strong female leads. They’re damaged and unstoppable in their mission. I thoroughly enjoyed every dark second of this book. It’s multi-layered and beautifully paced. The characters are glorious (in a flawed, edgy way) and blur the lines between victim and monster. Do you have to become a monster to trap a monster? The ending convinced me this book should be made into a movie. Thrilling, full of menace and with bucketloads of fear. The danger and the peril are written so well. I was there in the moment with the characters, holding my breath. Just fabulous. All in all, The Shark is a compulsive, character-driven thriller. Something a bit different to everything else out there, and I loved it. Recommended.

I chose to read and review a free eARC of The Shark. The above review is my own unbiased opinion.

The Shark by Emma Styles was published in the UK by Sphere Books on 12th March 2026 and is available in hardcover, audio and digital formats (please note, the following links are affiliate links which means I receive a small percentage of the purchase price at no extra cost to you): | amazon.co.uk | Waterstones | bookshop.org | Goodreads | damppebbles bookshop.org shop | damppebbles amazon.co.uk shop | damppebbles amazon.com shop |

Emma Styles writes Australian noir about young women taking on the patriarchy. She has an MA in crime fiction from the University of East Anglia and is currently working on her second standalone thriller. No Country for Girls is her debut novel.

Emma grew up near the beach on Whadjuk Noongar Country in Perth, Western Australia and now lives on the south coast of the UK. She’s worked as a veterinarian in country and coastal Australia and the UK, and spent her teens and twenties learning to ski, snowboard, ride horses and motorcycles, and fly small aeroplanes. She loves a road trip and once sat out a cyclone on the north west coast of WA in a LandCruiser Troop Carrier.