White Dog

Sadly, the best of Temple's series - sad because he passed away and there will be no more from him. Just as he had finally matured into his ability to balance all the elements of the mystery and character and Irish's life, matured into the best of his pitch black noir, he's gone. In the final installment, Jack Irish is searching for evidence to exonerate a woman accused of murder. Each layer of her life he pulls back uncovers dark veins of corruption.

On a side note, if you're a fan of the films made from Temple's books, don't put off the books for fear they are too similar to the films. Temple casts a wide net over Jack Irish's life, and it would be impossible to recreate that on screen - so, there's a fair bit of difference. But show more Temple's skill is something that should draw you to the printed page. I only wish he'd stuck around a little while longer. show less

White Dog is the 4th book in Peter Temple’s extremely popular Jack Irish series. These thrillers are set in Melbourne and feature a far from typical investigator, a solicitor who has a love of cabinet-making, likes to dabble in the horse-racing game and supports St Kilda (just to prove that nobody’s perfect).

Jack is asked by former law partner Andrew Greer to do a little investigative work on behalf of his client, Sarah Longmire, who has been accused of murdering her ex-boyfriend, Mickey Franklin. It’s the kind of job that looks fairly straightforward with the promise that he’ll soon be back in Charlie Taub’s workshop working on the next finely crafted bookshelves or dining table.

Uncovering a little of Mickey’s background show more leads to a little more to look for and suddenly Jack has pushed his way into a situation that turns extremely ugly extremely quickly. There is a secret hiding behind the murder of Mickey Franklin, and this secret belongs to powerful people desperate to keep it that way. They’ve proven they’re prepared to do anything to protect themselves once and now, thanks to Jack Irish, it looks as though they’re going to have to prove it again.

As is common with Peter Temple plots, there is a lot more going on than there seems at first glance. The murder that starts Irish on his path of inquiry is merely part of a much wider and much more sordid affair, one that becomes painfully obvious to Irish by the end.

A feature of Temple’s style is his fine ear for dialogue which is clipped, almost colloquial and simply reeks of authenticity. You can virtually hear the yahoos in the pub talking to each other in the shorthand conversational speech that is so common in pubs all around the country.

Once again, there are the side-stories that make the Jack Irish novels so very distinctive and give them an even greater appeal. In this case, he accompanies horse-racing expert Harry Strang out to the Gippsland region to check out a horse that has been put out to pasture. It was noticed by a neighbouring farmer, standing in the paddock with a rotting rug on its back, but he suspected the horse was a thoroughbred. The word is, the horse has a bit of pace about it, it’s just a matter of training and preparation, just the kind of venture that could result in a big payday if handled right. The progress of this little side story is fascinating as it develops and leads to a tremendous ending, just the kind of outlet to relieve the building pressure every now and then.

White Dog earned Peter Temple his 4th Ned Kelly Award for Crime Fiction. All the endearing elements of the series are built in, as is the outstanding plotting and smooth ear for dialogue, but Irish is taken through a special kind of purgatory this time and it’s worth reading just to see whether he comes out the other side intact. show less

A woman is accused of killing her ex-boyfriend and Jack Irish is asked to help investigate the case and to try to exonerate her. This is the story in the heart of the fourth Irish novel. But just as with all the other novels in the series, it is just the bones of the story.

Outside of the story, there is Melbourne and the circle of friends and acquaintances of Jack Irish. There is the Youth Club and the football, the horses and the cabinet-making, the irrational love interests and the deaths. And if you thought that Jack was in trouble in all the previous books, things go even worse here - he almost gets killed more than once, he loses another woman he loves (and it wakes memories of the wife he lost) and somewhere along the line, life show more continues.

You can see the solution of the crime story from the middle of the book but as with all the other Temple books, it is not about who did it, it is really about how and why. He may not point a finger to the culprits until very late in the story but he does everything else to point it to us - even if Jack Irish does not see it.

It is not a good book to start with if you had never read the series - it relies on the back story and on the familiarity with the characters to build the story. Add the very distinctive style of Temple and the book takes a bit to get used to - it is so Australian, so Temple.

I will miss Jack Irish - this is the last in the series and even if Jack shows up in cameos in later books ("Truth" for example), I wish there were more books telling his story. On the other hand, I am not sure he can survive much more abuse. show less

I just love Peter Temple's writing - sparse, wry, dry wit and beautiful observation.

I didn't like this book at all. Without having read any other Jack Irish book before, I was totally lost among the characters that make up Jack Irish life (his friends, love of football, horses, etc.). Not only it was hard to understand who they where, what they were talking about but it just felt so besides the point in the book. As for the crime plot, it was quite predictable ...

See my comments on Bad Debts. Temple is well worth a read.