It couldn't ever be said that the loss of his Private Investigator's licence has slowed Cliff Hardy down. In TORN APART, the death of his look-alike cousin in Cliff's house, an arrest for importing illegal drugs, a trip to Ireland, a gathering of Irish Traveller descendants, a brush with...Read more
When Hardy got himself into hot water in THE UNDERTOW, you just had to wonder if this was the end of Sydney's most famous hard-boiled detective. In APPEAL DENIED he doesn't get his licence to be a private investigator back; he's got no money; his house and car are falling apart and his...Read more
Love a quest and tracking down copies of these short story collections seems to have become one of my major quests. A lot of these go back to the days of Mean Streets Magazine, and there have always been a few that elluded me. Very happy dancing when I finally spied a copy in Kill City...Read more
After coming to love the regular January Cliff Hardy fix it was a happy day when SILENT KILL arrived. Reading blurbs though can sometimes be problematic and so it was with this one, and the reference to a "rogue intelligence agent". Recently that seems to have been code for "no idea how to...Read more
You really have to worry about Cliff Hardy. Every year he seems to dig himself a bigger, deeper more dramatic hole and he's not as young as he thinks he is.
Or so it seems from these books, but realistically Cliff is timeless. He has to be - don't try to do the maths of how...Read more
The 40th book in the Cliff Hardy series, GUN CONTROL takes on a very current issue in the style that we've all come to expect from Peter Corris. It's worth taking a moment to consider that 40 book history. When Cliff Hardy first made an appearance on the Australian landscape (THE DYING...Read more
Many years ago there was a specialist bookshop tucked away in Auburn Road, Hawthorn run by a crime fiction expert and massive enabler (I think his name was Malcolm Campbell). He was one of those real-life people that made me thankful I'd made the trek from the bush to the big city, and...Read more
This book was on my Quest List for such a long time until I finally managed to track down a copy (and was subsequently somewhat startled to find it listed on Fishpond NZ!). The reason it hit the Quest List was the premise sounded so fascinating - take a bunch of real life cases, give them...Read more
I wondered where Peter Corris would take Cliff after the loss of his PI licence (which, it seems, he's unlikely to ever get back), but I didn't really expect it to be the 1970's. Once you're back in that old case with a few well chosen "commentaries" Corris places you firmly in the 1970's...Read more
The end of the Cliff Hardy series was announced when WIN, LOSE OR DRAW was released in 2017, and then with the subsequent death of Peter Corris, I made a promise to myself to re-read this excellent series, every year, during the Boxing Day Test, as I'd been doing with every new release....Read more
There are probably more, but immediate reactions on getting a book of short stories, is that there are precious few Crime Fiction short story collections by Australian authors around (I'm probably about to be proven totally wrong!). But there's something very engaging about a good...Read more
Is there really such a thing as an innocent person?
Teachers, cops, mothers, wives, everyone has their breaking point; that moment where it could go either way. From the prostitute with no way out, to the bitter author, and a cop who just wants his leave, the characters in this...Read more
The forty-first Cliff Hardy book came out earlier this year. That Empty Feeling is classic Cliff Hardy - stripped down, hardboiled, quintessentially Australian-noir ticking all the required boxes - pace, twists, turns, sex, violence and pitch-perfect dialogue. This time around, the...Read more
“The best of Cliff Hardy, Australia’s legendary PI, with exclusive unpublished writing from Peter Corris on the art of crime fiction…”
You may consider yourself a well-read reader of crime fiction, even of Australian crime fiction (a slimmer yet more determined beast...Read more
Taking a central theme of "is there really such a thing as an innocent person?" and asking a combination of well known and emerging Crime Fiction Writers from Australia to address the question, has culminated in the creation of CRIME SCENES - a short story collection which works on a number...Read more
It is more than fitting that the final word from Peter Corris would be curated by his wife, and long-time editor, Jean Bedford. The chosen short stories are perfect examples of his work, and the 'ABC Of Crime Writing' is every bit as insightful, acerbic, funny and thought-provoking as you'd...Read more
Twelve Australian writers respond to the challenge of creating a hybrid crime story. Murder, mayhem, and malice intercept with science fiction, fantasy, horror, western, fairy tale, and romance writing to create an unholy miasma, the likes of which you have never encountered before. Expect...Read more
Contents:
The second collection of stories by Australian writers of crime, mystery and psychic violence, including Alex Juniper, Peter Corris, Claire McNab, Marele Day and Jennifer Rowe.Read more
The third collection in the Crimes for a Summer Christmas series, featuring stories by 14 Australian writers, including Elizabeth Jolley, Marion Halligan, Peter Corris, Brian Castro, Marele Day and Jean Bedford.
There are probably more, but immediate reactions on getting a book of short stories, is that there are precious few Crime Fiction short story collections by Australian authors around (I'm probably about to be proven totally wrong!). But there's something very engaging about a good...Read more
A body in a billabong...
The bridegroom who disappears on his wedding day...
A murderer for all the right reasons...
The Australian thriller tradition is rich and some of the early examples almost completely unknown. This collection, selected by...Read more