Tag Archives: Challis and Destry

Sixty Minutes with Garry Disher at the Crime & Justice Festival

Posted on November 8, 2013 by Andrew Nette| 2 Comments

Bitter WashA quick heads up that I’ll be interviewing Australian crime writing legend Garry Disher at the Reader’s Feast Crime & Justice Festival, on Sunday, November 17.

It’s no secret I’m a huge fan of Disher. Have been ever since I picked up the first of his Wyatt novels, Kickback, in the early nineties. He’s got a new one out, Bitter Wash Road. We’ll be talking about that, his other books, including the Wyatt and Challis and Destry books series, and his tips to crime writing. If you’re luck, we might even discuss the time he wrote for television.

I’m half way through Bitter Wash Road and it’s terrific. Set in rural South Australia, it involves a police whistle blower and an investigation into the hit and run killing of a teenage girl that unearths terrible secrets.

The plot is as hardboiled as they come and the writing is simply wonderful.

Dare I say, it might even be Disher’s book best yet.

I’ll post a longer review of this book in the next week or so.

If you have the time, do come along to my discussion with Garry. It takes place 10am, Sunday, November 17 at the Reader’s Feast Bookstore, 162 Collins Street, Melbourne. The ticket will set you back $6, which is not too steep a price to listen to one of the best Australian crime writers working today.… Read more

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Posted in Australian crime fiction, Garry Disher

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Interview: Garry Disher

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Andrew Nette| 2 Comments

Garry Disher is a veteran of the Australian crime-writing scene. He is the author a series of books featuring the professional hold-up man known as Wyatt. Disher wrote six Wyatt novels in the nineties and a seventh was recently released by Text and took out the top prize in the 2010 Ned Kelly awards. Disher has also authored a number of books featuring Hal Challis and Ellen Destry, two police working on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsular, about an hour’s drive southeast of Melbourne, where Disher also lives. I talked to him for the issue 5 of Crime Factory about the difference between writing hard-boiled characters and police procedurals, why after over a ten-year break he decided to write another Wyatt book and the state of crime fiction in Australia.

It’s been over 10 years since the last Wyatt book, Fallout in 1997. Why the break and what inspired you to give Wyatt another outing after such a long time?

The break was to try and get established with the new series of police procedurals, the Challis and Destry books, which for me was a completely different way of looking at plot and structure. I wanted a break from Wyatt because there was basically one book a year and I thought I might get stale on them.… Read more

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Posted in Australian crime fiction, Crime fiction, Donald Westlake aka Richard Stark, Garry Disher, Interviews, Parker

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