2 BY GARRY DISHER

2 from one of my favourite Australian authors - Garry Disher

Disher has written across many genres - children's books, YA books, non-fiction, short stories, general/literary fiction in addition to his crime fiction.





















He has two interesting series of books. One concerns Wyatt - a professional criminal. The other comes at things from the police side of the fence - his Inspector Hal Challis series.

I've read a few of the Wyatt novels, most recently the latest - The Heat.

Hal Challis has yet to be enjoyed.

Garry Disher has a website here.













Port Vila Blues (1995)

Wyatt snatches the cash easily enough. He bypasses the alarm system, eludes the cops, makes it safely back to his bolthole in Hobart.It's the diamond-studded Tiffany brooch - and perhaps the girl - that brings him undone. Now some very hard people want to put Wyatt and that brooch out of circulation.But this is Wyatt's game and Wyatt sets the rules - even if it means a reckoning somewhere far from home.Port Vila Blues is Wyatt's fifth heist. It's faster than ever, racing towards the inevitable confrontation on a clifftop above the deceptively calm waters of Port Vila Bay.

"In a murky world where the cops are robbers, old-style crim Wyatt positively shines. Clear taut writing - not a word wasted." Marele Day

"...tough, violent, relentless and thoroughly convincing" Stuart Coupe

Snapshot (2006)

It had taken months for Janine McQuarrie to succumb to her husband's pressure to have sex with strangers at suburban spouse-swapping parties. But after attending a few such events on the Mornington Peninsula, this Australian social psychologist rebels. And then, driving with her young daughter one day, she gets out of her car to ask directions from another driver, is killed. The little girl escapes when the gunman's pistol misfires.

Inspector Hal Challis, to whose Crime Investigation Unit the case falls, is thwarted in his efforts by his boss. The dead woman was Superintendent McQuarrie's daughter-in-law. He seems to be more interested in protecting his son than in finding his daughter-in-law's murderer. Who might have a motive to kill this attractive young wife and mother? One of her clients? One of the swingers she'd gotten together with at a party? Or, the obvious suspect, her husband? The villain turns out to be someone Challis never would have expected.