Dead Point earned Peter Temple his third Ned Kelly Award for best Australian Crime Novel for 2001.

This is Temple’s third predominately character-driven story revolving around Jack Irish and his Fitzroy cronies. All of the people we meet in this foray into the working-class suburbs of Melbourne that he knows so well are wonderfully portrayed.

The death of Irish’s wife some years back caused him to fall off the treadmill of a very successful legal career and he descended into a haze of alcoholism and unreliability. The earlier books in this series have shown us that Jack is on the way back now and has now settled into a comfortable routine. He now runs an unorthodox suburban legal practice in between the thrill of dodgy big betting plunges with Harry Strang, and undertaking an irregular cabinet-making apprenticeship under the master craftsman, sardonic old Charlie Taub. He and his mates from the pub are also dealing with the fact that their beloved footy team, the Fitzroy Lions, has been taken over by Brisbane – and we all know how seriously Victorians take their tribal footy team loyalties.

In this adventure, there’s a chilling air of change in the wind and it could blow ill for everyone. All of Jack’s settled emotional outlets seem to be in danger of coming to an end. Harry Strang is talking of retirement; Charlie Taub is off to Western Australia to attend a wedding and Irish is petrified that Charlie may decide he likes the west enough to want to stay; there is heated debate in the pub about the heresy of supporting the new footy team; and, to top things off, Meaker’s Coffee Shop, his reliable source of top quality coffee, has changed owners and the coffee is now undrinkable.

Change has hit Irish’s fragile routines and he’s afraid to think what else could be coming just around the corner.

Dead Point unfolds at an unhurried pace. As always, there are two storylines running in parallel throughout the course of the book. Irish has been hired to investigate the death of a missing barman named Robbie Colburne and this leads him into a world of judicial corruption and personal danger. At the same time, he is up to his ears in a more personal investigation into who has been bashing and robbing the people carrying his betting team’s winnings.

Peter Temple is a relatively new find for me - but he has rapidly leapt to the top of my all time favourite author list. I can't wait for Irish's next outing. ( )

Australian setting - rural and in Melbourne - good picture of Melbourne. Likeable main character in Jack Irish. Once begun you can't stop and the gradual revealing of detail about Robbie is just scary enough and horrifyingly fascinating.

As usual, well-written. Another Jack Irish thriller, set in Victoria, Australia. Good feel for place, somewhat dramatic finale, but what else can one expect with detection fiction. ( )