Jean Bedford

To Make A Killing

Submitted by Karen on

Author's Home Country: 
Australia
Category: 
Crime Fiction

Blurb from the book

Private eye Anna Southwood is hired by Hilda Trelawney to investigate her husband's apparantely accidental death. Hilda is convinced it was murder. The case takes Anna to a sleepy fishing village on the south coast. Anna uncovers corruption in the present and past; fanatiscm and greed; lies and more lies, as gradually she unpeels layers of concealment that have lain in place for more than 40 years.

ISBN: 
0207172390
Series: 
Anna Southwood
Publisher: 
Angus & Robertson
Year of Publication: 
1990

Signs of Murder

Submitted by Karen on

Author's Home Country: 
Australia
Category: 
Crime Fiction

Blurb from the book

They caught up with her before she reached her car. She didn't hear their footsteps coming up behind her in the dark tree-lined street, had no awareness of them until they grabbed her from behind and threw her to the pavement. Fiona Galloway, a young, deaf social worker, has been threatened: keep her mouth shut or else! Frightened, she seeks out private eye Anna Southwood.

ISBN: 
0207186340
Series: 
Anna Southwood
Publisher: 
Angus & Robertson
Year of Publication: 
1993

Crosstown Traffic

Submitted by Karen on

Category: 
Crime Fiction
Author's Home Country: 
Australia
Sub Genre: 
Short Stories

Blurb from the book

Twelve adventurous 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.

Year of Publication: 
1993

CROSSTOWN TRAFFIC, edited by Stuart Coupe, Julie Ogden & Robert Hood

Author Information
Book Title: 
Crosstown Traffic
Author Name: 
Bill Congreve
Garry Disher
Jan McKemmish
Jean Bedford
Kerry Greenwood
Marele Day
Peter Corris
Robert Wallace
Steve Wright
Terry Dowling
Dominic Cadden
Author's Home Country: 
Australia
ISBN: 
1875604154
Categorisation
Category: 
Crime Fiction
Sub Genre: 
Short Stories
Publisher: 
Five Islands Press
Year of Publication: 
1993

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 the unexpected. Prepare for the confrontation. The crime fiction story has been invaded by marauding genres. The boundaries have been blurred. You have been warned.

Book Review: 

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 during a recent trip to Melbourne.

As per the blurb this is a cross genre set of stories, many of which take the reader off in most unexpected directions.  Crime morphing into Western, Science Fiction, Fairy Tales and Fantasy shouldn't really be all that surprising if you think about it - the context of a story doesn't really matter, the quality of the story-telling is paramount.  And the writers in this collection are some of our best genre writers, and it's a relief to know that many are still writing to this day.

Great fun - so pleased I tracked down a copy of this collection.  Okay - now everyone else can get out their own their own quest (we're not going to be falling over each other looking for this book :) )

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