On a lazy summer morning, ageing author Vincent Duncan takes an unsettling phone call from his literary agent. Peter Temple indulges his humorous side in this scathingly brilliant portrayal of a writer past his peak.

John Anselm is a struggling intelligence dealer whose business is information, Con Niemand is a tough ex-mercenary whose business is surviving, and Caroline Wishart is an exposé journalist whose business until now has been the sex lives of British politicians. Their paths collide when they all stumble across a secret terrible enough to destroy lives and topple governments. Against his will, Anselm is plunged into a world of violence, betrayal, and death. He must break out of his anesthetized ...

"Byzantine plot twists and incisively drawn characters combine" to make this Australian crime novel from an award-winning author "an unforgettable read" ( Publishers Weekly, starred review)The Broken Shore, Peter Temple's award-winning eighth novel revolves around big-city detective Joe Cashin. Shaken by a scrape with death, he's posted away from the Homicide Squad to a small town on the South Australian coast where he grew up. Carrying physical sc...

From an award-winning crime novelist, "a brutal tale of corruption, greed, and revenge . . . and one man's determination to uncover the truth" ( Publishers Weekly).Inspector Stephen Villani, head of homicide in Melbourne, Australia, has a full agenda: a murdered woman in a penthouse apartment, three men butchered in a sadistic rampage, a tattoo-faced drug dealer corrupting his rebellious daughter, a crumbling marriage. As these seemingly unrelated events be...

On 20 June 1998 Peter Temple-Morris, Conservative MP for Leominster, crossed the floor to join his rivals on the Labour party benches. What drove a seasoned Conservative politician - one of the so-called 'Cambridge Mafia', with 24 years' experience as a Conservative MP - to change his allegiance so radically? In this memoir of a long and varied political career, Temple-Morris answers this question, unveiling the slow, gradual process of disillusionment with the Conservative party, especial...

Meet Jack Irish, criminal lawyer, debt collector, football lover, turf watcher, trainee cabinetmaker, and the best Australian crime character we've seen in years. When Jack receives a puzzling message from a jailed ex-client, he's too deep in misery over Fitzroy's latest loss to take much notice. Next thing Jack knows, the ex-client's dead and he's been drawn into a life-threatening investigation involving high-level corruption, dark sexual secrets, shonky property deals, and murder. With ...

Frank Calder - ex-soldier and sacked police hostage negotiator - is just eking out a living as a mediator when he's approached by Pat Carson, patriarch of the dynastic Carson family. Pat wants him to deliver ransom money to kidnappers who've abducted his great-granddaughter. Frank urges Pat to call in the law, but he refuses, since police bungling nearly cost the life of another Carson child kidnapped years before. So a reluctant Frank begins to deal with the kidnappers, and quickly become...

John Anselm's a former Beirut hostage; a war correspondent who went to one war too many. A burnt-out case, he's working for a semi-legal Hamburg surveillance firm and trying to come to terms with his past. Then into his life comes Con Niemand, ex-mercenary and professional survivor. Niemand has stumbled across evidence of a terrible secret and now he's on the run. Against his will, Anselm is plunged into a world of violence, betrayal and death. He must pit himself against forces he doesn't...

Shaken by a scrape with death, big-city detective Joe Cashin is posted away from the homicide squad to the quiet town on the South Australian coast where he grew up. Carrying physical scars and not a little guilt, he spends his time playing the country cop, walking his dogs, and thinking about how it all was before. When a prominent local person is attacked and left for dead, Cashin is thrust into what becomes a murder investigation. The evidence points to three boys from the nearby aborig...

Mac Faraday is a man with a past living a quiet life in the country - until his beloved friend Ned Lowey is found hanged. Is it suicide? Faraday won't accept that and starts to ask questions. Why did Ned visit Kinross Hall, the local home for juvenile girls? Why did he keep press cuttings about the skeleton of a girl found in an old mine shaft? Who was the beaten girl found naked beside a lonely road? As Faraday's search begins to uncover chilling secrets, he finds himself thrown back into...

Jack Irish - lawyer, gambler and people-finder - is hunting down the villains who hijacked the winnings from his latest betting coup when he is hired by a mystery client to find missing barman Robbie Colbourne. But Robbie turns up dead of a drug overdose...

Inspector Stephen Villani, head of homicide in Melbourne, Australia, has a full agenda: a murdered woman in a penthouse apartment, three men butchered in a sadistic rampage, a tattoo-faced drug dealer corrupting his rebellious daughter, and a crumbling marriage. As these seemingly unrelated events begin to unfold, Villani finds himself immersed in an unfamiliar world of political scandal and ethical ambiguity. He must navigate the inept bureaucracy that is the police department, all the wh...