Bad Debts

Jack Irish gets a voicemail from Danny McKillop, a former client whose name means nothing to him at first. Jack has enough on his plate already: the football club he follows keeps losing, a bet at the races has gone badly, and he eats alone in his own kitchen. Once Danny is found dead, Jack has to revisit a past he would rather leave alone.

Set in Melbourne, the novel follows a sharp, wry narrator who is more at ease with dark humour than with danger. Peter Temple's writing is tense and fast, and it balances crime-novel pacing with a clear-eyed look at its hero, who is developed carefully enough to carry a series.

Bad Debts is the first book in the Jack Irish series.