In June 1935 Takapuna inventor Victor Penny was attacked by foreign agents seeking what the newspapers dubbed a 'death ray'. The government secretly shifted him to Somes Island in Wellington harbour to develop the weapon. The novel of this true story is told by Temporary Acting Detective Dan Delaney, seconded to Special Branch, forerunner of the Security Intelligence Service.Special Branch is monitoring the German Club in Auckland, an increasingly shrill supporter of the Nazi regim...

Stamp in the Creek, the final chronicle set in 1949 has fortune hunters looking for a missing and very valuable Kotuku stamp, including the young Bob Rogers and other unscrupulous criminals employing dynamite, arson, intimidation and the kidnapping of postmaster Jack Cavanagh's son in pursuit of the stamp. The chronicles depict villagers defending their peaceful lifestyle against threats from outside exploiters.The Listener identified 'a veritable Milkwoodful of c...

The Dan Delaney Thrillers is seven novels covering a life and career that begins as a teenage acting detective in 1935 Auckland, where the rookie is assigned to the team protecting a scientist and his inventions sought by countries preparing for war. The Death Ray Debacle is a novel of the true story of Victor Penny, who was attacked in an attempt to steal his blueprints for radar and lasers. Nazis active in the city recruiting Germans and identifying Jews are suspects along with other...

Geyser in the Creek, the second chronicle a generation later opens with an earthquake creating a massive geyser in the creek. This inspires a tourist invasion and exploitation by Bob Rogers and government agencies, opposed by local Maori protecting their land, but Jack Cavanagh just wants to find his missing grandson Jason and friend the ex-stationmaster Rangi Rangihau. A mistreated, pie-pilfering Great Dane is Jack's best hope, if he can entice it out of hiding.The Li...

Gold in the Creek,the first chronicle of the declining coastal village of Kotuku has ex-postmaster Jack Cavanagh at the bowling club AGM fighting to stop its sale when word comes of a gold strike in the local creek. Everybody rushes to the creek, including the posh retirement folk and local clergy. The good news for drug entrepreneur Bob Rogers is the increased traffic, the bad news is his cash crop is nearby. Storekeeper Ron Atkinson sells out of digging implements, his wife cran...

Easter 1965 and radical Wellington students are threatening President Johnson's envoy, here to urge New Zealand to commit troops to its Vietnam campaign. American 'advisers' warn security services of violent action by a disaffected anarchist. Former detective and spy-catcher Dan Delaney is first on the scene of a woman dead in a hot tub and his good friend Ru Patterson unconscious beside her. The deceased is a security agent attempting to infiltrate Patterson's left-wing circle, which incl...

Late January 1985 Dame Kiri is launching Vukovich Sauvignon Blanc on the Sydney Opera House steps with major shareholders the Delaney family present. The American nuclear warship the Buchanan is in harbour for ANZUS exercises and protesters are out in force, among them Ali Delaney and her American boyfriend. Detective Sergeant Maria Pikowai, née Delaney, is in town as protection detail for New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange secretly meeting his Australian counterpart Bob Hawke in the S...

Teenagers Matt Delaney and his mate Ante Vukovich steal a priceless religious vessel and in the course of the burglary a man is killed, setting in motion personal and political mayhem. It is 1955 and they just want to be milk-bar cowboys against the squares and their suffocating rules banning unmarried sex and excessive speed and anything worth doing. Matt's uncle Dan Delaney is out of the police and in a dead-end job when Matt's alcoholic mother begs Dan to sort out a charge of murder aga...

1975 Former detective and spy-catcher Dan Delaney and his West Auckland family are on a visit to the Holy Land which goes horribly wrong from the moment they land at Ben-Gurion Airport. A plot is underway to desecrate the most sacred sites and incite conflict between the three great religions whose worship centres on a small area of inner Jerusalem. The Jewish authorities are determined at any cost to prevent another terrorist outrage such as that at Ben-Gurion Airport concourse a few year...

These three comic novels revolve around a gold strike in the local creek, the sudden appearance of a geyser and the theft of a valuable stamp, threatening damnation and salvation for the sleepy New Zealand coastal community of Kotuku. In the first chronicle the 1980s government restructuring has closed the post office, the petrol pumps and the railway station. Ex-postmaster Jack Cavanagh and struggling storekeeper Ron Atkinson are trying to unify the villagers and the retirement home snobs...

Prime Minister Peter Fraser is back in New Zealand in 1945 before he continues to lead the small counties pushing to remove colonialism and great power veto from the fledgling United Nations. A plot is under way to kill him. If successful, New Zealand's influence on the international stage ends and the country could descend into chaos, a divided country ripe for international manipulation.Detective Dan Delaney has returned from the war seeking a peaceful life with his refugee bride...

The ceasefire has begun in 1995 between the Republicans and the Loyalists as Dan Delaney and his family are in Ireland seeking ancestral roots. They are drawn into helter-skelter pursuit of and by alleged IRA terrorists and Protestant and Catholic police from County Cork to Dublin, Belfast, and Derry. Ex-policeman and ex-national security operative Dan Delaney is 79 and regrets bending to family pressure to travel around Ireland. Instead of finding his grandfather's origins in County Cork,...