Peter Temple

The first two books in Peter Temple's highly acclaimed Jack Irish series, now published in one volume.

Bad Debts' (Winner of the 1996 Ned Kelly Award) Ex-lawyer Jack Irish is in no special hurry to return a call from ex-client Danny McKillop. For one thing, they go back to a time Jack would rather forget. But when Danny is shot dead by police in the carpark of The Hero of Trafalgar, Jack reckons he owes Danny a few well-placed questions. Trouble is, the answers could take him to some very bad places indeed.

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 Colburne. But Robbie turns up dead of a drug overdose. The case should be closed, but the dashing young barman was far from what he seemed, and the client wants to know more.

As Jack explores the young man's past, he finds himself drawn int oa deadly network of power, politics and money. In this world, nothing can be taken at face value and everyone is expendable - including Jack.

Jack Irish - gambler, lawyer, finder of missing people - is recovering from a foray into the criminal underworld when he agrees to look for the missing son of Des Connors, the last living link to Jack's father. It's an offer he soon regrets.

As Jack begins his search, he discovers that prodigal sons sometimes go missing for a reason. Gary Connors was a man with something to hide, and his trail leads Jack to millionaire and political kingmaker Steven Levesque, a man harboring a deep and deadly secret.

There wasn't anything the cops could do for you if people wanted to kill you. Not unless there was something you could do for the cops, and then you ended up living in a caravan park in Deniliquin on the witness protection program.

Meet Jack Irish, criminal lawyer, debt collector, football lover, turf watcher, trainee cabinetmaker, and the best Australian crime character we've seen in years.

Mickey Franklin was funny and clever and dangerous. Not anymore, now that a mysterious and beautiful sculptor named Sarah Longmore is accused of shooting him five times.

Jack Irish - gambler, cook and cabinet-maker, finder of people who don't want to be found - gets the job of hunting for clues that might save her.

John Anselm is a former Beirut hostage, a foreign correspondent who went to one war too many. A burnt-out-case, he lives in his family's ancestral house in Germany, working for a semi-legal and near-broke surveillance firm and wrestling with his own fractured identity and family history.

MacFaraday is a man with a past living a quiet life in the country - until his beloved friend New Lowey is found hanged. Is it suicide?

Faraday won't accept that and starts to ask questions. As Faraday's search begins to uncover chilling secrets, he finds himself thrown back into the past, forced to confront the dangers of his old life.

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, Anne. 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 becomes convinced that both Carson kidnappings were motivated by something other than money.

Blurb from the book

At the close of a long day, Inspector Stephen Villani stands in the bathroom of a luxury apartment high above the city.  In the glass bath, a young woman lies dead.

Villani's job as head of the Victoria Police Homicide Squad is bathed in blood and sorrow.  His life is his work.  It is his identity, his calling, his touchstone.  But now, over a few sweltering summer days, as fires burn across the state and his superiors and colleagues scheme and jostle, he finds all the certainties of his life are crumbling.

Blurb from the book

Joe Cashin was different once. He moved easily then; was surer and less thoughtful. But there are consequences when you've come so close to dying. For Cashin, they included a posting away from the world of Homicide to the quiet place on the coast where he grew up. Now all he has to do is play the country cop and walk the dogs. And sometimes think about how he was before.