Saving Billie by Peter Corris

Publisher's Synopsis

When journalist Louise Kramer hires Cliff Hardy to find Billie Merchant, Hardy heads for unfamiliar territory of the far southwestern suburbs of Sydney. Billie claims to have information about media big-wheel Jonas Clement - the subject of an incriminating expose by Kramer. Clement doesn't want Billie found and Clement's enemies want to find her first.

Hardie tracks Billie down, but 'saving Billie' means not only rescuing her, it means saving her from herself. Billie, ex-stripper, sometime hooker and druggie, is a handful. Hardy gets help from members of the Pacific Islander community and others, but the enemies close in and he is soon fighting on several different fronts.

Clement and his chief rival, Barclay Greaves, have heavies in the field, and Hardy has to negotiate his way through their divided loyalties. Some negotiations involve cunning but others involve guns. The action takes place against the backdrop of the Federal election campaign, and all outcomes are uncertain.

My Review of Saving Billie by Peter Corris

After picking up a job working as party security at a bash put on by media tycoon Jonas Clement, Cliff Hardy finds himself a new client in Louise Kramer. Kramer is a journalist who had crashed the Clement party while gathering information for a tell-all book about the man. Oddly enough, it was the respectful manner in which Cliff ejected her from the party that led her to seek him out to offer him a job.

Kramer wants Hardy to find a woman by the name of Billie Marchant. Billie was the wife of another private investigator - now dead - who reportedly had incriminating information about Clement. This information would guarantee that the planned book would be a huge seller. The word is that before he died, he passed that information on to his wife. But it's also the kind of inflammatory material that a man like Clement would do anything to try to stop from getting out. So as well as having Hardy on her trail, Billie also has a string of vicious killers behind her. These are men who wouldn't hesitate to kill in order to get their hands on her.

Hardy's goal is to find Billie and then ensure that she won't be found by her more sinister pursuers. The task is made even trickier because Billie has a substance abuse problem - drugs, alcohol you name it, and has been hidden away in a bid to get her over her addictions. Not only does Hardy have to save Billie from enemies but he also has to save her from herself.

The action moves from the busy streets of Sydney's inner west to the more sprawling, but lower class estates out in the south-west of Sydney. Hardy has received a tip that he will find Billie here, in recovery. What he finds is a community of Pacific Islanders living in an estate that is virtually closed off from outsiders. They are deeply religious people, devoted to their church, but are very wary of intruders, something that immediately puts Hardy on his guard. In the course of his inquiries, he picks up the hint that these religious groups could be fronts for a more lucrative, though much less legal pastime. Of course, no one wants some guy snooping around threatening to uncover their secrets, putting yet another barrier between Hardy and his hunt for Billie Marchant.

Caught between a rich guy's hired muscle and a group out to protect their goldmine, Cliff Hardy has some fancy footwork to do to get through this case.

Saving Billie is a fairly standard private investigator mystery that largely follows a tried and tested formula. The initial missing person case that proves to be hiding a nest of intrigue after a few rocks have been overturned. Hardy displays the stubborn nature that has virtually become a trademark, refusing to give up on his case, even after it should have officially been closed.

This is a taut mystery with the progress carried on the back of Hardy's sense of duty. The spare nature of the prose results in a bare minimum of detail about the principal characters. As a result I found it difficult to understand the motivation that was driving Hardy on, but it ensures that events move along smoothly, a necessary detail of a plot-based mystery such as this.

Where Saving Billie is a real winner is in the hidden complexities of the case. Moral judgements lie beneath the surface making the case much more interesting but also blurring not only the boundaries between right and wrong but also the point where Hardy can consider his job a success or not.

Peter Corris has once again delivered a snappy detective novel that continues on the Cliff Hardy story in fine style. It's hardboiled without being overly violent, thought provoking in that it deals with real life problems realistically, and it moves along at a pace that is solid enough to ensure that you'll still be hooked at the end.