Cliff Hardy starts out to help a friend but before long he's looking for an enemy - William Mountain: boozer, TV scriptwriter, would-be novelist who is missing and searching for adventure. Mountain's adventure is Hardy's 'case' which rapidly becomes a case he would rather not have. Mountain is the dealer in a deadly game and the hands he deals become more and more bizarre.'Indigenous thrillers are better than any others, and the best of all are Peter Corris' accounts of his Sydney private detective, Cliff Hardy. Corris' story is clever, his asides wry, his language rough but whimsical.' - Mark Thomas, Canberra Times'.Of Peter Corris it can be said "One sentence and the reader is away." - Manning Clark, The National Times'Cliff Hardy is. as Australian as two-up and Fosters.' - The Australian

It’s an explosive situation, and Corris conjures up an atmosphere of brooding tension. SUN-HERALD British Jeremiah Islands Protectorate, South Pacific, 1928: District Officer Will Naismith doesn’t know it yet, but he is in trouble. The rebellious native leader Eglito is gathering his followers to confront the British once and for all. But there is an even greater threat to Naismith from within his own ranks: from his superior, who is alarmed by Naismith’s methods of keeping order, an ambitious young colonial officer and a scheming missionary. When they are joined by Tom Birmingham, a writer with an overactive imagination, his beautiful wife Louise and Richard Webb, war hero turned anthropologist...the islands are set to explode. Corris makes the most of the exotic setting and again conviction in style and character puts it into what deserves to be best-seller league.

The thirty-fourth book in the Cliff Hardy series Still reeling from the shock death of his partner, Cliff suffers a heart attack-but this isn't enough to keep him from investigating the disappearance of the father of the woman nursing him back to health. The search for the renowned geologist takes Hardy behind the scenes at one of Sydney's biggest basin aquifers and ignites the wrath of local big businesses which stand to lose even bigger money if his discoveries are revealed.

The seventh book in the Cliff Hardy series A client falls from the twentieth storey of a building; a rock star goes missing; an erotic Mongol scroll vanishes; a film star has a problem that has nothing to do with creativity - it's all in a day's work for Cliff Hardy. Yachts dance on the sparkling waters of the harbour, and the back alleys are busy: the city's high and low classes go about their daily business. But nothing really surprises Hardy, and, for a hundred and twenty-five a day (plus expenses), he'll provide a few surprises of his own...

The twelfth book in the Cliff Hardy series When Todd Barnes, war veteran and popular drinking mate, leaves Cliff Hardy a tidy sum to find out who killed him, Hardy can hardly refuse - and he needs the money. Todd's widow and some of his cronies are not always cooperative, however, and it's hard to tell friends from enemies, especially when it comes to the mysterious Kevin O'Fearna, known as O'Fear. Hardy's battered Falcon takes him from the familiar mean streets of Sydney to equally dangerous bushland, where he's on his own up against heavy odds. A not-unfamiliar situation for Sydney's most enduring private investigator.

The thirty-sixth book in the Cliff Hardy series 'When beautiful young women kiss you on the cheek you know you're over the hill, but I didn't really feel like that. As Wesley said, I still had the moves.' Cliff Hardy may still have the moves but he's in trouble. The economy's tanking and he's been conned by an unscrupulous financial advisor and lost everything he's got. Cliff only knows one way, and that's forward, so he's following the money trail. It's a twisted road that leads him down deep into Sydney's underbelly, into the territory of big money, bent deals, big yachts and bad people. Cliff's in greater danger than ever before, but he's as tenacious as a dog with a bone.

The thirty-seventh book in the Cliff Hardy series Cliff Hardy has his PI licence back - but does he still have what it takes to cut it on the mean streets of Sydney? Cliff reckons the skills are still there, if a little rusty, and actor Bobby Forrest's case looks promising. Bobby's a nice-enough guy, but why is he being stalked by a red-hot brunette? And why did he have to go online to find a date? When Bobby is murdered, it comes as a shock. Cliff's only solid lead is a white Commodore, the most ubiquitous car around. When a surprising connection with his own past surfaces, Cliff is forced to put some of his skills to the test. But is he heading in the wrong direction? Somehow he has to put it all together without losing his licence again, but in true Hardy fashion he's managing to find his way into trouble, not out of it.

The thirty-eighth book in the Cliff Hardy series This wasn't Hardy's usual brief--uncover the mysteries of a nineteenth-century shipwreck--but he could do with an easy case and the retainer was generous. But is it ever that simple? Not with a notorious crime family tearing itself apart, and an undercover cop playing both sides against the middle. These and an alluring but fiercely ambitious female journalist give Hardy all the trouble he can handle. 'Ever feel manipulated?' Hardy asks. The body count mounts up as he pushes closer to the truth about the mystery and the loot.

The thirty-fifth book in the Cliff Hardy series Hardy has never been much of a family man, so when he meets his second cousin Patrick Malloy it's like being hit with a left hook to the solar plexus - Malloy is his double. Cliff and his cousin become friends and travel to attend a gathering of the Irish Travellers - the gypsy-like folk from whom they are descended. On their return, a shotgun blast shatters their camaraderie. But who was the bullet aimed at, Malloy or Hardy? And why is Malloy's ex-wife, Sheila, now making her presence known to Hardy?

The 16th Cliff Hardy mystery This collection of stories finds Cliff Hardy in his usual milieu of inner Sydney mixing with the good, the bad, and the quirky as he works on his cases. With his wisecracks and fists in readiness, Hardy goes about his daily business of tracking delinquent arsonists, hired killers, and missing girlfriends; protecting eye surgeons and radio announcers; solving old crimes; and helping past acquaintances in the underworld. Always on the outside, but his sympathies with the underdog, Hardy's cases are never what they seem and his solutions are not always what the client expects.

The thirty-third book in the Cliff Hardy series Cliff Hardy, with his PI licence cancelled and his career in Sydney at an end, is preparing for a trip overseas. Cleaning out his office, he comes across an open file-an unsolved case. He starts reading and is thrown back to his investigation. At first glance a straightforward missing persons matter, the investigation took on twists and turns involving military history, Sydney criminals and corruption at high levels. Twenty years later, can he crack the one that got away?

The second book in the Cliff Hardy series Cliff Hardy is stony broke, which makes it hard to resist a job from the man he's been losing money to. Ted Tarleton is a rich bookie with a beautiful, spoiled daughter who's gone missing, and Ted wants Hardy to find her. Her boyfriend is no help, and Hardy faces opposition from all sides as he delves into the increasingly violent wreckage of Noni's past.

The eleventh book in the Cliff Hardy series Gareth Greenway wasn't all he seemed, but Cliff Hardy was used to that. What he wasn't used to was the shadowy world Greenway leads him into: neurosurgeons, mental patients, AIDS sufferers, all negotiating a landscape of dreams and delusions. An old friend of Hardy's ends up dead while Hardy chases the shadows, catching some, losing others. The accompanying stories find Hardy on more familiar ground. When organised crime, political corruption and the Australian army are involved, Hardy battles the odds. But when it comes to a man-to- man contest, put your money on Hardy to win.

Hardy's 14th hardboiled case When Oscar Bach's body is found crushed under rubble, his death was classified as another tragic statistic of the earthquake. So how could he have been seen alive five minutes after the quake? Who would want this man dead? Oscar's quiet life was not all that it appeared to be. He was a man with no apparent past. But something—and someone—has caught up with him now, and they are trying to stop Cliff Hardy from finding the answers.

CLIFF HARDY CLASSICS The early 1980s found Cliff Hardy well established as a private investigator but still battling his demons. He has quit smoking and moderated his drinking. The memory of his brief marriage still haunts him along with other ghosts from his past. A case in Bondi attracts him as an ex-surfer and admirer of the suburb. It began as a routine investigation into a supposed drowning. But Hardy soon finds himself literally fighting for his life in the murky, violent underworld of Bondi. The truth about John Singer, black marketeer and poker machine king is out there somewhere amidst the drug addicts, prostitutes and alcoholics. Hardy's job is to stay alive long enough in that world of easy death to get to the truth. The truth hurts PRAISE FOR THE EMPTY BEACH' A fine, tightly controlled story.' West Australian PRAISE FOR MAN IN THE SHADOWS' There has been no more efficient, entertaining and amusing writer of detective thrillers in Australia than Peter Corris.' The Age

A priceless painting by famous English artist J.M.W. Turner has been rediscovered, and its owners must be traced before it can be sold. But who owns the painting? The answer to that question involves a search spanning seventy years and three continents: from Stalinist Russia to Hollywood in the silent movie era, revolutionary Bolivia, Australia, New Guinea. Linking the destinies of the Gulliver family is the skullduggery of the contemporary art market. Sweeping in its emotional, social and historical range, set against the panorama of twentieth-century history, The Gulliver Fortune is a gripping, absorbing novel. ‘An epic with a vast global sweep’. Sunday Sun, Melbourne ‘Reinforces Corns’ reputation as a master storyteller’. Sunday Telegraph, Sydney ‘Fast-moving and engrossing’. Advertiser, Adelaide

‘The big black car came up out of nowhere… I heard a siren and slowed down and pulled over like an honest citizen. The next thing I knew two men with hats pulled down over their eyes and sunglasses on above their tough expressions were pulling open the front doors of my car. I heard May Lin scream and saw a gun…’ Hollywood. Studio screenwriter Hart Sallust, well-known patron of sleazy bars and nightclubs, has disappeared. Peter McVey, private eye, has been hired to find him. In unfamiliar territory, McVey enlists Browning – part-time actor, part-time private eye – at home in any Hollywood bar. From Hollywood bars to the Chinese underworld, their search uncovers the beautiful May Lin. With Sallust when he disappeared, and seemingly inconsolable. Or is she? Her story has ‘more holes in it than a flyscreen’. This fast-paced, witty novel from Peter Corris features a cameo appearance from Raymond Chandler – master crime-writer and friend of McVey’s. His advice: find out what Sallust was writing when he disappeared…

‘Well, what do you know,’ he said. ‘I’m very pleased to meet up with you at last, sport.’ I leaned back against the door and started into the mocking grey eyes of Errol Flynn. Down on his luck in southern California in the middle of the Depression, Richard Browning falls back on his charm and good looks to find a soft landing. Coral Smit who runs a motor court in Three Cedars looks like the answer, but Browning discovers that a sleepy little town can harbor more ruthless criminals than LA. Cast adrift, he goes first to Montana, where he works as a cowboy and then back to Hollywood to appear before the cameras with Gary Cooper and Anthony Quinn in The Plainsman. As always, Browning runs into trouble in Hollywood. This time he is caught between the FBI and the Ku Klux Klan and to add to his woes he makes a deadly enemy of an Australian actor named Errol Flynn…

‘One of the bayonets came to rest just below my Adam’s apple. I looked down at the shiny steel and then slowly looked along the length of the rifle barrel up into the face of my executioner. He wore thick glasses with metal rims and he had gold fillings in his teeth. I could see the teeth because he was smiling.’ All Richard Browning expects is to go through the motions of making a propaganda film, wear an officer’s uniform, stay in a few fancy hotels and enjoy the fleshpots of war-time Sydney. Instead, he is forced to slog through the Queensland jungle, dodge bullets and bombs and endure the discomforts of a military prison. As Browning ducks and weaves in and out of trouble, his companions in strife are ‘Harry’ Kaminaga, Hawaiian-born Japanese soldier, and Ushi Tanvier, Darlinghurst prostitute. His friendship with the hell-raising actor, Peter Finch, offers him some prospect of escape from his problems, but his enemies in Military Intelligence and among the blackmarket racketeers of the big smoke don’t see why he should survive World War II. Coming home wasn’t meant to be like this…

‘I wanted to give him an uppercut for his arrogance and to get him to lift his head. He was still looking at his boots. He’d lit the cigarette and smoke was drifting past his face. It’s hard to tell from the top of someone’s head, but I was sure that I knew him from somewhere…’ And that’s how Browning met James Dean. Browning’s almost past it, teaching punk would-be actors to fall off horses. When the ‘toxic little son of a bitch’, Jimmy Dean, roars in on his ‘sickle’, it’s the beginning of an odd-couple alliance: they’re both in trouble and needing help. In Marfa, Mexico, where Dean, Rock Hudson, Liz Taylor and Browning – are on location, the movie’s not the only thing being shot. Is this the end for Browning?

When rich, attractive Lorraine Master hires Cliff Hardy to investigate the circumstances surrounding her husband's conviction for smuggling heroin from New Caledonia, Hardy welcomes the assignment. A week on generous expenses sniffing about under a tropical sky, escape from a cold, dry spell in Sydney just the job. But Stewart Master's mates in Noumea prove to be a difficult and dangerous bunch. The danger follows Hardy back to Sydney where he and his client become targets when an intricate conspiracy goes seriously wrong. Hardy deals with a tricky lawyer, a man on the run and Sydney's most corrupt ex-cop. He has allies as well, but in the end his survival will depend on his own guts, experience and savvy. Peter Corris's world weary but always charismatic hero Cliff Hardy has long been established as Australia's favourite investigator. Often bloodied but never bowed in this latest gripping novel, Hardy's legions of fans will relish another pacy adventure, branching further afield than his traditional mean streets territory to the steamy island paradise of French New Caledonia. 'There has been no more efficient, entertaining and amusing writer of detective thrillers in Australia than Peter Corris.' - The Age

The fortieth book in the Cliff Hardy series Is Sydney gun city? It certainly seems so when Cliff Hardy is hired by entrepreneur and one-time pistol-shooting champion Timothy Greenhall to investigate the violent death of his troubled son. Soon Hardy is pitched into a world of crooked cops - former members of the Gun Control Unit - outlaw bikers and honest police trying to quietly clean the stables. Two more murders raise the stakes and relationships are stretched to breaking point. Hardy hooks up with a determined policewoman and forms an unlikely alliance with a charismatic biker chief. Uncovering the tangled conspiracy behind the murders takes Hardy to the Blue Mountains and Camden, to plush legal chambers and a confrontation in an inner-west park - all against the roar of 750cc engines.

In this brand new collection of short stories, Cliff Hardy has his hands full with murder, blackmail, embezzlement and more. True to form, Cliff doesn't waste words or pull punches as he untangles an ugly divorce, investigates the killing of a Glebe drinking buddy, and takes care of a nasty case of blackmail. The eleven tales are set in Cliff's Sydney, a place of thugs, mid-morning beers and crooked cops. 'Until you've read the Cliff Hardy series, you can't call yourself an aficionado of Aussie detective fiction.' - The Age 'Corris writes about [Sydney] in the way that Ian Rankin writes about Edinburgh.' - The Sydney Morning Herald

Stripped of his investigator's licence and with his appeal denied, Cliff Hardy faces an uncertain future. Then something very personal happens that sends him off doing what he does best - confronting, questioning, provoking violence - with the lack of credentials not an issue. Is policewoman Jane Farrow bent or straight? Will vertically challenged but charismatic media star Lee Townsend be a help or an obstacle? Taking and dealing out punishment, mostly on Sydney's North Shore, Hardy encounters corrupt cops, bereft wives and computer geeks. In a shadowy showdown at Balmoral Beach, Hardy sorts out those who need to be sorted, but his future remains even more clouded than before. 'Corris is a tried and true crime writer. Until you've read the Cliff Hardy series, you can't call yourself an aficionado of Aussie detective fiction.' - The Age 'Hardy has grown into a vulnerable and engaging human being . . . Cheap motels are still his milieu.' - The Weekend Australian

When Cliff Hardy signs on as a bodyguard for charismatic populist Rory O'Hara, who is about to embark on a campaign of social and political renewal, it looks like a tricky job - O'Hara has enemies. A murder and a kidnapping cause the campaign to fall apart. Hired to investigate the murder, Hardy uncovers hidden agendas among O'Hara's staff as well as powerful political and commercial forces at work. His investigation takes him from the pubs and brothels of Sydney to the heart of power in Canberra and the outskirts of Darwin. There he teams up with a resourceful indigenous private detective and forms an uneasy alliance with the beautiful Penelope Marinos, formerly O'Hara's PA. A rogue intelligence agent becomes his target and Hardy stumbles upon a terrible secret that draws them into a violent - and disturbing - confrontation.

The Witness Protection Unit’s Luke Dunlop has one job - to make people disappear. And that’s not easy when there’s no margin for error and each case is a matter of life and death. Ex-cop David Scanlon is about to deliver red-hot evidence about his former colleagues to the Sate Counter Corruption Authority. Dunlop has to make sure no-one gets to Scanlon first. When Scanlon’s sixteen-year-old daughter goes missing from the safe house, Dunlop’s problems are just beginning... “Corris’s portrayals of Australian crime stand out as uniquely forceful, hard-driven, compassionate.” James Ellroy

Luke Dunlop is in Witness Protection. He has one job - to make people disappear. And that’s not easy when there’s no margin for error and each case is a matter of life and death. Convicted felon Kerry Douglas Loew, recently married in prison, makes a deal to turn informer for a new identity and a new life. Loew can expect no mercy from his former mates, on trial for the murder of an assistant police commissioner. If they reach him, he’s dead. Finding a way to hide a man married to a TV star is bad enough, but when Dunlop meets Cassie May Loew the trouble really starts. “Corris’s portrayals of Australian crime stand out as uniquely forceful, hard-driven, compassionate.” James Ellroy

Frank Parker, retired senior policeman and Cliff Hardy's long time friend, has a problem. A case from early in his career involving two doctors, one of whom was convicted of hiring a hit man to kill the other and went to gaol for the crime, is coming back to haunt him. The convicted, now dead doctor may have been innocent, and Parker had been the lover of the beautiful Catherine Castiglione, the doctor's wife. Hardy tracks back through the now ageing names and faces, trying to tease out the truth. If the doctor was set up, who was responsible and why? Along the way Hardy encounters dodgy plastic surgeons, a broken-down ex-copper, a voyeuristic cripple and a hireling who wields a mean baseball bat. A charismatic player is the son of Catherine Castiglione, a super-bright charmer, who just may be Frank Parker's love child. Animosities, arrogance and ambition create a spider's web around the violence that breaks out as Hardy searches for the spider.

The forty-first book in the Cliff Hardy series Legendary PI Cliff Hardy has reached an age when the obituaries have become part of his reading, and one triggers his memory of a case in the late 1980s. Back then Sydney was awash with colourful characters, and Cliff is reminded of a case involving 'Ten-Pound Pom' Barry Bartlett and racing identity and investor Sir Keith Mountjoy. Bartlett, a former rugby league player and boxing manager, then a prosperous property developer, had hired Hardy to check on the bona fides of young Ronny Saunders, newly arrived from England and claiming to be Bartlett's son from an early failed marriage. The job brought Hardy into contact with Richard Keppler, head of the no-rules Botany Security Systems, Bronwen Marr, an undercover AFP operative, and sworn adversary Des O'Malley. At a time when corporate capitalism was running riot, an embattled Hardy searched for leads - was Ronny Saunders a pawn in a game involving big oil and fraud on an international scale? Two murders raised the stakes and with the sinister figure of Lady Betty Lee Mountjoy pulling the strings, it was odds against a happy outcome.

Is brilliant young filmmaker Carmel Wise the innocent victim of gangland violence or is she enmeshed in a pornography racket as the press and the police imply? Carmel's businessman father hires Cliff Hardy to find the real reason 'the video girl' was shot dead outside the Greenwich Apartments in Kings Cross. Hardy follows a trail which is broken but clear - houses and flats with the power on and the rent paid, stand empty; photographs and other documents lead to Lionel Darcy, owner of the Champagne Cabaret; banks and business houses will supply just enough information to keep Hardy warm. The trail takes him to the sunny peninsula, leafy Lane Cove and the industrial waterfront. Hardy finds that every question and every answer has to be paid for in pain and fear. And to some questions there may be no answers at all. 'Indigenous thrillers are better than any others, and the best of all are Peter Corris' accounts of his Sydney private detective, Cliff Hardy.' - Mark Thomas, Canberra Times

Politician Peter January is having trouble staying alive so he hires Cliff Hardy to help him. Hardy dislikes the role of politician's 'security consultant' but he dislikes bombers, hit men and hatemailers even more. Protecting January leads to protecting his assistant, Trudi Bell, which is a more enjoyable assignment. It also takes Hardy to Washington DC where the threats are real and the rules are different. To stand close to January is to stand close to danger and corruption, but there are even greater evils and Hardy cannot back away. 'Cliff Hardy is. as Australian as two-up and Fosters.' - The Australian

A collection of fast-paced, gritty stories from Australia's best-loved crime writer. In stories that range from Sydney's mean back streets to its glittering but deadly harbour, Corris's hero Cliff Hardy comes up against a range of villains - along with clients who are not always what they seem.

When journalist Louise Kramer hires Cliff Hardy to find Billie Marchant, Hardy heads for unfamiliar territory of the far south-western suburbs of Sydney. Billie claims to have information about media big-wheel Jonas Clement -- the subject of an incriminating expose by Kramer. Clement doesn't want Billie found and Clement's enemies want to find her first. Hardy tracks Billie down, but saving Billie' means not only rescuing her, it means saving her from herself. Billie, ex-stripper, sometime hooker and druggie, is a handful. Hardy gets help from members of the Pacific Islander community and others, but the enemies close in and he is soon fighting on several different fronts. Clement and his chief rival, Barclay Greaves, have heavies in the field, and Hardy has to negotiate his way through their divided loyalties. Some negotiations involve cunning but others involve guns. The action takes place against the backdrop of the Federal election campaign, and all outcomes are uncertain. 'I don't know how many Cliff Hardy novels there are, but there aren't enough.' - Kerry Greenwood, Sydney Morning Herald 'Hardy is a wonderful creation still, under Corris's magisterial narrative control, capable of those odd echoes and resonances, the elegiac interludes, that characterise the best crime writing.' Graeme Blundell, Weekend Australian odd echoes and resonances, the elegiac interludes, that characterise the best crime writing.' - Graeme Blundell, Weekend Australian

Cliff Hardy goes to Leichhardt gym proprietor Wesley Scott for a 'fitness assessment' and is soon trying to get his son Clinton - known as The Black Prince - back on the rails. A sports star in the making and destined for the top, Clinton is obsessed with tracking down the dealer who sold his girlfriend the steroids that led to her death. Hardy has to find Clinton before he ends up on a murder charge - the trail leads him up to North Queensland and into the shadowy world of illegal boxing.

It's been twenty years since Cliff Hardy saw his ex-wife Cynthia, and he's amazed to get a phone call from her. Cyn is dying of cancer and she's desperate to get in touch with the daughter she gave up for adoption - the daughter who, she confesses, is Cliff's. Cliff is sceptical but agrees to take on the search for her daughter. The trail is far from simple - and more violence threatens him the further he goes.

Cliff Hardy's investigation into the murder of a rich developer takes him into the high flying world of corporate Sydney. The beautiful Claudia Fleischman has been charged with the murder of her husband, and Cliff takes on the job of finding the real killer. He finds his way blocked on all sides, but when a friend is killed, it gets personal. Cliff has to take drastic action. One of Hardy's toughest cases ever.

Casinos are not to Cliff Hardy's liking, nor is wearing a suit and tie, which is why he turns down the job of head of security at a new Sydney gambling establishment. However, when his friend Scott Galvani takes the job and is then murdered, Hardy feels bound to investigate in the face of police indifference. He takes the security job, meets the attractive but unpredictable Vita Drewe, and adds to his list of enemies. Galvani's killers are closer to home than Hardy anticipated and his life and his relationship are on the line.

Wealthy Frederick Farmer died when his weekender burned to the ground. Death by accident, the police found. But his daughter, Dr Elizabeth Farmer, a feisty academic who resembles the younger Germaine Greer, hires Cliff Hardy to investigate. Is her only motive jealousy of her father's attractive second wife, now very rich? Hardy's search takes him from the Illawarra escarpment to Wollongong and Port Kembla, and the police are far from co-operative as he tries to unravel the truth. He has his hands full when a panic-stricken call leads to a second case the search for the precocious daughter of Marisha Karatsky, an exotic, dark-eyed interpreter who gets well and truly under Hardy's guard. Hardy has narrow escapes and people die as his probing hits nerves. Corrupt cops, compromised insurance agents, feral bikies as well as a few good guys are drawn into the maelstrom. Hardy battles on through personal turmoil and vicious opposition with all outcomes uncertain and justice a remote ideal. 'I don't know how many Cliff Hardy novels there are, but there aren't enough.' - Kerry Greenwood, The Sydney Morning Herald 'Hardy is a wonderful creation still, under Corris's magisterial narrative control, capable of those odd echoes and resonances, the elegiac interludes, that characterise the best crime writing.' - Graeme Blundell, The Weekend Australian 'There has been no more efficient, entertaining and amusing writer of detective thrillers in Australia than Peter Corris.' - The Age

I was starting to get interested. As someone who thinks stockmarkets, futures trading and currency speculation ought to be illegal, I was aware that I was radically out of step with the times. I dimly grasped what Marriott was saying, enough to understand that it sounded like being allowed into the mint with a U-haul van.' Cliff Hardy is no financial genius. But in Taking Care of Business he pursues white collar crime with the same doggedness he applies to his more downmarket villains. Hardy's tasks are many and his clients are from all walks of life. He is minder for Thomas Whitney, the highly strung whistle blower, whose company is siphoning money off through Vanuatu. He is hired by computer genius Charles Marriott, whose shady dot com partner wants control of the business and is letting nothing and no one get in his way. And ever keen for some spare cash, he even takes a case from Spiro, his local florist, whose son seems to be involved in some very dodgy business involving tobacco and big bucks. This collection of stories featuring Australia's favourite PI is fast-paced and entertaining. It reads in the best Corris style. Hardy is a wonderful creation still, under Corris's magisterial narrative control, capable of those odd echoes and resonances, the elegiac interludes that characterise the best crime writing.' Graeme Blundell, The Weekend Australian There has been no more efficient, entertaining and amusing writer of detective thrillers in Australia than Peter Corris.' The Age

Meet Cliff Hardy. Smoker, drinker, ex-boxer. And private investigator. When the wealthy Bryn Gutteridge hires Hardy to help his sister, it looks as if blackmail is the problem. Until the case becomes more brutal, twisted and shocking than even Hardy could have guessed. 'A quintessentially Australian literary icon.' Age Introduction by Charles Waterstreet. Peter Corris's first Cliff Hardy novel, The Dying Trade, was published in 1980. It not only introduced a sleuth who was to become an enduring legend, but was also a long love letter to the seamy side of Sydney itself. Over more than three decades Corris has now written thirty-eight Cliff Hardy books, and the city of Sydney is as significant a presence in the books as the figure of Hardy. The third in the series, The Empty Beach, was made into a film starring Bryan Brown. In 1999 Corris was presented with a Ned Kelly Lifetime Achievement Award

Matrimonial Causes: Cliff Hardy 17

The life of a private investigator is seldom plain sailing, and it certainly doesn't help when someone unknown is trying to cancel your licence. Cliff Hardy needs to find out why, and he also needs to get to the bottom of the case of missing schoolteacher Brian Madden. Finding answers to both questions takes all Hardy's resourcefulness and contacts - police, underworld and press. Dangers - and bodies - appear all over Sydney and Hardy is lucky to keep both his life and his licence.

Will one man's loss be Hardy's gain? 'I'd read about it in the papers, heard the radio reports and seen the TV coverage and then forgotten about it, the way you do with news stories.' A missing girl, drugs, yachts, the sex trade and a cold trail that leads from Sydney to Norfolk Island, Byron Bay and Coolangatta. The police suspect the father, Gerard Fonteyn OA, a wealthy businessman. But he's hired Cliff to find her, given him unlimited expenses and posted a $250,000 reward for information. Finally there's a break - an unconfirmed sighting of Juliana Fonteyn, alive and well. But as usual, nothing is straightforward. Various other players are in the game - and Cliff doesn't know the rules, or even what the game might be. He's determined to find out, and as the bodies mount up the danger to himself and to Juliana increases.