PETER DOYLE – Get Rich Quick
“I didn’t spot the body until I was about to dive in. He was floating face down, the water around him streaked with red. He looked like William Holden in that film, except this fellow was big, and he wasn’t talking about how he got there . . .”
Meet Billy Glasheen, a fresh voice in crime fiction. It’s Sydney, the 1950s, and Billy’s trying to make a living, any way he can. Luckily, he’s a likeable guy, with a gift for masterminding elaborate scenarios – whether it’s a gambling scam, transporting a fortune in stolen jewels, or keeping the wheels greased during a hair-raising tour by Little Richard and his rock ‘n’ roll entourage.
But trouble follows close behind – because Billy’s schemes always seem to interfere with the plans of Sydney’s big players, an unholy trinity of crooks, bent cops, and politicians on the make. Suddenly he’s in the frame for murder, and on the run from the police, who’ll happily send him down for it. Billy’s no sleuth, but there’s nowhere to turn for help. To prove it wasn’t him, he’ll have to find the real killer.
Get Rich Quick marks the American debut of noir writer extraordinaire Peter Doyle, Australia’s answer to Jim Thompson and Elmore Leonard. Set in Sydney in the period following World War II, Doyle’s novels – featuring the irresistible Billy Glasheen – brilliantly explore the criminal underworld, high-level political corruption, and the postwar explosion of sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll. Vividly depicting a colourful world of grifters, thieves, rogue cops, crooked politicians, and bohemian musicians, Get Rich Quick paints a compelling picture of a society in which everyone is running some kind of scam.
