Winner of the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Crime Novel. Bad Debts is the first Jack Irish Thriller by multi-award-winning author Peter Temple. Melbourne in winter. Rain. Wind. Pubs. Beer. Sex. Corruption. Murder. A phone message from ex-client Danny McKillop doesn't ring any bells for Jack Irish. Life is hard enough without having to dredge up old problems: his beloved football team continues to lose, the odds on his latest plunge at the track seem far too long and he's still cooking for one. But then Danny turns up dead and Jack has to take a walk back into the dark and dangerous past. Peter Temple has worked extensively as a journalist and editor for newspapers and magazines in several countries. He has won five Ned Kelly Awards for his novels, and won the world's most prestigious crimewriting prize, the Duncan Lawrie Dagger. In 2010 he was awarded Australia's greatest writing prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award. His books are published in more than twenty countries. textpublishing.com.au 'Temple writes with the urgency of someone who wants to disrupt an official investigation, and his story is kept up like taut wire. Brothers and sisters in crime, worship at the Temple.' Australian