Comeback

Now that Cliff Hardy has his PI license back in Ned Kelly Award–winner Corris’s well-crafted 37th book featuring the Sydney detective (after 2012’s Follow the Money), Hardy has to determine whether he can adapt to today’s world or whether modern search engines and telecommunications have rendered him obsolete. His first test comes when an up-and-coming actor asks for Hardy’s assistance with a stalker. In short order, Hardy finds himself with a dead client, a growing list of suspects, and questions for which no happy answers exist. In the end, technology matters less than personal insight, and while the aging Hardy may lack technical expertise, he understands people. Where Hardy may worry that a hiatus has eroded his skills, Corris continues to demonstrate that his prose is in no way handicapped by the eroding waves of time or by the encroachment of advancing technology on beloved plot contrivances. (Jan.)