Peter Corris Books in Order

A historical study of movement, trade, and colonial enterprise in the Pacific. Corris tracks how travel, shipping, and settlement reshaped the region.

A work of history about contact between Pacific and Western worlds. Corris brings a historian's eye to the clash, exchange, and misunderstanding that followed.

In Cliff Hardy's first outing, a seemingly straightforward missing person case opens onto corruption and danger in Sydney. It lays down the battered, stubborn moral code that defines the whole series.

Bookie Ted Tarleton wants Hardy to find his missing daughter Noni, a spoiled young woman known in rougher circles as white meat. The trail leads through Sydney's seedy edges and into violence.

A wealthy family matriarch hires Hardy to track down a long-lost heir. The search opens into murder, buried history, and the usual hard landings for Hardy.

A lively collection of quiz questions assembled by Jean Bedford and Peter Corris. It is designed for readers who like general knowledge with an Australian slant.

Hardy is hired to find Annie, the daughter of a friend, and walks into the middle of a major drug deal. The story is short, hard, and morally messy in the best Cliff Hardy way.

This collection sends Cliff Hardy from backstreets to boardrooms and through cases involving junkies, developers, crooks, and desperate families. It is a strong early showcase for the character in short form.

When a widow spots her supposedly dead husband walking a Sydney street, she hires Hardy to find out how that can be. The result is one of the classic Hardy mysteries.

A brisk early novel about competition, loyalty, and the pressure to back the right team. Corris uses the action to show how winning can look very different from the inside.

What looks like easy security work at a flashy party becomes another hard fall into Sydney trouble. Hardy trades quick money for a case full of ego, money, and violence.

After being sacked from the Federal Security Agency and with his marriage wobbling, Ray Crawley is manipulated into a dangerous political game. He is down, but not ready to fold.

A friend's problem with car thieves leads Hardy into a stranger and much more dangerous hunt for the missing William Mountain. The case gets weirder and deadlier the longer it runs.

The murder of a filmmaker sends Hardy into another Sydney maze of ambition and deceit. It is a neat example of Corris mixing show business, money, and violence.

Heading for Hollywood should be Richard Browning's big break, but the trip only opens new trouble. This is a sly, show-business historical with Browning bluffing his way across dangerous ground.

Hardy is hired to guard a government minister, and the job soon turns political in the worst way. Security work, power, and threat all crowd into the same hot summer zone.

A novella and six stories give Cliff Hardy room to work cases both brief and bruising. The shorter form keeps the pace sharp while showing different sides of his world.

A routine assignment draws Ray Crawley into murder and intrigue involving Eastern European refugees. The espionage plot stays tough and grounded rather than glamorous.

A second batch of Cliff Hardy stories, quick, tough, and full of Sydney trouble. These cases show how well Corris could work short form without losing Hardy's voice.

Richard Browning wants a way into film-making, but war, bad relationships, and his own gifts for trouble keep getting in the way. The result is a funny, roguish historical adventure.

Richard Browning gets swept into the glamour and danger around early aviation and film-world ambition. It is a brisk historical adventure full of movement, ego, and trouble.

A historical adventure with mystery at its core, this novel turns exploration and obsession into something tense and unsettling. Corris uses the past to ask hard questions about power and belief.

Set in the Pacific, this historical novel follows ambition, belief, and collision between cultures. Corris gives the adventure shape of mystery without losing the human cost.

When a friend dies, Hardy goes looking for answers and finds trouble in his last word, O'Fear. The search leads toward prison, old connections, and a solid murder puzzle.

Ray Crawley heads into a murky mix of politics, trade, and hidden agendas in the South Pacific. The suspense comes from not knowing who is running the operation, or why.

A blood test after a car accident starts Ray Crawley and his offsider Huck on a case that reaches further than it first appears. Soon they are up against very powerful forces.

A man dies in an earthquake, but someone claims to have seen him alive moments later. Hardy follows that unsettling clue into a case where nothing stays steady for long.

Set in Depression-era California, this Browning adventure drops Richard Browning into a harsher landscape and a fresh round of schemes. The historical backdrop gives his usual bravado a rougher edge.

Ray Crawley is sent into a politically charged operation full of false fronts, pressure, and betrayal. It is one of the more overtly geopolitical books in the series.

Hired to find a missing father last seen near the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Hardy uncovers a darker mystery than he expected. The bridge, the harbour, and the city's past loom over the case.

Hardy barely survives the opening shock and spends the rest of the book trying to work out who wants him dead and why. It is a lean, fast case with danger never far away.

Richard Browning turns private investigator, and the work gets messier than he ever hoped. The case lets Corris mix old-school sleuthing with Browning's charm, vanity, and talent for attracting trouble.

An autobiography of eye surgeon Fred Hollows, told with urgency, warmth, and plain talk. It captures both the work and the force of personality behind it.

Luke Dunlop works in witness protection, where one mistake can get somebody killed. Hiding informer Kerry Douglas Loew is hard enough, but Loew's TV-star wife makes the whole operation much more dangerous.

Ray Crawley thinks he knows the ground, but business interests and foreign connections turn the assignment into something rougher than expected. Brisbane becomes the stage for money, influence, and intrigue.

Richard Browning expects a soft wartime posting making propaganda films and living well in Sydney. Instead he gets jungle hardship, military prison, and enemies who would be happy to see him dead.

Another Cliff Hardy collection, mixing concise cases with the rough humor and pressure that define the series. It is a good reminder that Hardy works just as well over shorter distances.

Luke Dunlop is back in witness protection, trying to keep vulnerable people alive when the system around them is anything but secure. It is a lean, fast crime novel built on trust, fear, and disappearing acts.

This novel goes back to Cliff Hardy's first case. It is part origin story, part hardboiled mystery, showing how Hardy first learned what the work could cost.

Ray Crawley is caught in a deadline case where every delay helps the enemy. The pressure of time, deception, and official secrets drives this tighter, more anxious thriller.

When Peter Finch's romantic misery spills into Richard Browning's life, Browning ends up in a London brawl and then on location in Ceylon with Vivien Leigh. Film glamour gives way to politics, passion, and a missing son.

A flattering job linked to Sydney's casino world quickly stops looking glamorous. Hardy finds power, greed, and danger behind the polished surface.

Luke Dunlop's witness protection job becomes much harder when ex-cop David Scanlon is due to expose corruption and his teenage daughter disappears from the safe house. The case turns into a race against the wrong people getting there first.

Richard Browning finds, again, that wit and nerve are not much protection from trouble. This late Browning adventure keeps the mix of swagger, danger, and dry humor moving.

A life story of actor Ray Barrett, told in a clear, conversational way. Corris helps turn a long career into an engaging memoir about work, luck, and survival.

Strapped for cash, Hardy is lured into a long-unsolved abduction case and the promise of a huge reward. A suppressed ransom note and a fresh killing turn the scheme deadly.

When a rich woman is charged with murdering her developer husband, Hardy digs into the people and deals around the exclusive Washington Club. Soon the case becomes dangerously personal.

Eighteen short pieces let Corris write about golf the way he wrote fiction, directly, wryly, and with a feel for character. It is part sports book, part personal notebook.

Sex, sport, and steroids make an explosive Sydney mix. Hardy steps into a world of ambition and physical risk where the damage is not limited to the playing field.

The past comes back to Hardy in a case that carries real emotional weight. It blends private investigation with one of the most important turns in Hardy's personal life.

Ray Crawley returns to Hanoi expecting an easy trade-delegation job. Then a murder in the hotel puts him back in the middle of danger and divided loyalties.

A small suburban moment opens into a dangerous case full of ambushes, pressure, and bad choices. Hardy follows the trail through a Sydney that feels both ordinary and deeply threatening.

A new client leads Hardy into family tensions, violence, and coastal secrets. It is a lean, bruising case with bad blood close to the surface from the beginning.

Old friendships and old betrayals come back when Hardy investigates men who once called themselves mates. It is a strong mix of memory, loyalty, and the hard truth about what time does to both.

These Cliff Hardy cases return to the everyday grind of the job, money problems, dangerous clients, and trouble that never stays small. Short pieces, but they still hit hard.

Hardy leaves Sydney for a case on the coast, but the change of scenery does not make anything easier. The road trip setting gives this mystery a broader, windblown edge.

Trying to protect Billie turns into one of Hardy's toughest and most personal jobs. To keep one vulnerable life safe, he has to take on people with money, nerve, and no conscience.

Corris reimagines the mutineer Fletcher Christian through a journal and the history of Henry Corkill. It is historical fiction that questions official versions of a famous story.

A fresh job pulls Hardy into old currents of guilt, memory, and crime. The more he pushes against the undertow, the clearer it becomes that someone wants the past left alone.

A closed case refuses to stay closed when Hardy starts asking the wrong people the right questions. Old decisions, legal pressure, and hidden motives make this a stubborn, dangerous puzzle.

A dark story of family loyalty, rivalry, and violence told in Corris's clean, hard style. Brotherhood is tested once money, pride, and old grievances start to bite.

With his PI licence cancelled, Hardy is forced to work from the edges. That only makes the investigation tougher, and the gap between official truth and real truth even wider.

Recovering from major heart surgery, Hardy agrees to help a nurse find her missing father, a Sydney geologist. The search brings him home to corporate secrets and deep trouble.

A fractured family and a messy past turn a new case into one of Hardy's rougher investigations. As the facts come loose, so do tempers, and the danger gets personal.

When the paper trail starts to matter more than the street talk, Hardy follows it anyway. The money leads him into fraud, greed, and people who kill to keep their secrets intact.

Corris reconstructs the story of William Cyril Moxley and the Moorebank killings with a crime writer's eye for detail and motive. It sits on the line between true crime, history, and dark character study.

A historical novel shaped by empire, ambition, and the uneasy making of colonial Australia. Corris mixes adventure and mystery with a sharp interest in who gets written into history.

Cliff Hardy has his PI licence back, but getting back in the game is not simple. This return-to-work case tests his nerve, judgement, and appetite for the damage the job brings.

Written with Philip Nitschke, this book argues through the ethics, politics, and personal stakes of assisted dying. It is part memoir, part case for change, and written to provoke thought.

A job involving the Dunbar family drags Hardy into money, history, and private grudges that refuse to stay buried. The deeper he looks, the more dangerous the family story becomes.

A collection of Cliff Hardy stories that shows how much can go wrong even when there is no single huge case in play. Hardy stays quick, stubborn, and easy to root for.

Hired to protect a politician, Hardy walks straight into corruption, pressure, and political danger. It is a fast, tense later novel with bodyguard work, whistleblowing, and Sydney power games.

Journalist Vic Bright thinks the story of the wandering Craft brothers could make a great film. But as he and Marsha Prentiss retrace the expeditions, they find obsession, lies, and someone watching back.

Hardy is drawn into a case where guns, old loyalties, and bad judgement make every lead dangerous. What begins as routine legwork turns into a tense Sydney chase through crime and betrayal.

An obituary sends Cliff Hardy back to an old case involving crooked businessman Barry Bartlett and a young man claiming to be his lost son. The memory turns into a murder inquiry with wider consequences.

More Cliff Hardy cases, told with Corris's usual economy and sting. These stories are compact, punchy, and good at showing how Hardy thinks under pressure.

In Cliff Hardy's final case, a disappearance pulls him back into Sydney money, grief, and violence. It is a fitting farewell, bruising, reflective, and still very much a Hardy investigation.