Inspector Challis Books In Order

Publication Order of Inspector Challis Books

Gary Disher was born on the 15th August 1949 and grew up in the rural areas of South Australia. His novels and other works are inspired by the memories in the wool and dry wheat country, where his family has been farming for generations. Gary Disher has attained a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Adelaide. Apart from the bachelor’s degree, Fisher also has a Diploma of education for the La Trobe University and a Masters in History from the Monash University. His first ever story was published in the Overland magazine in the year 1976 and the years that followed more and more of his works continued to appear in local newspapers.

All in all, his first ever acknowledgement came many years later, when he was finally awarded a creative writing fellowship at the critically acclaimed Stanford University in California. While at Stanford University, Gary Disher wrote his first ever short story collection. As a widely travelled author, fisher has spent many years in many countries including England, Israel, USA, Italy, South Africa, just to name but a few. During the years that Disher spent in all these countries, he garnered inspiration from the way of life and the way he interacted with the local community thus most of his novels are more lifelike. Despite the fact that most of this places had a significant amount of impact on Disher, the mid-north parts of South Australia was the one place that Disher always wanted to recreate in his fictions.

The mid northern parts of South Australia provides the setting in many of his works like the Sunken Road, the children’s book, The Bamboo Flute, THE Wyatt thriller novel, the wind and finally The Apostle bird and a number of short stories. After he returned to Australia, Gary Disher decided to teach creative writing so as to supplement his annual income. While he was teaching literature, he also wrote across different kind of genres from children fictions to history textbooks to thrillers and many others. In the year 1989, Gary Disher decided to become a full time writer. Apart from becoming a full time writer Disher decided to drop the production of non-fiction novels. According to Fisher, he is always oin the lookout for new fiction ideas though he only works at one kind of this stories at a time.

Ever since he began his career as a writer, Fisher has published over 30 books with some being heartwarming and lyrical like the Bamboo while others being hard-like the Wyatt thrillers. In addition, Gary Fisher has managed to put together several anthologies and also contributed to several periodicals in Australia and beyond. Because of his craftsmanship, Gary has managed to bring himself professional satisfaction to every novel and genre that he has chosen as a means of expression. Apart from professional satisfaction, Gary Disher has also received several awards for his exceptional works. The Bamboo Flute a children’s book scooped the Children Book of the Year Award in the year 1993. The same book was once again shortlisted for the NSW Award and was once again voted by the Publishers Weekly, US as one of the Best Books of the year. In addition, two of his short stories have been shortlisted for the critically acclaimed Steele Rudd Award.

It is almost nine years now after Gary Disher decided to become a full time writer. Gary Disher is currently living with his wife and daughter near the Coast of Victoria Peninsula.

The Dragon Man

The dragon man is the first installment of Gary Disher’s Inspector Challis book series. This first installment introduces us to Detective Inspector Hal Challis who was finding the drought tiring because there was a water shortage. There was very little amount of water that was left in his water tank and close to none in his underground tanks. Just like any other local who was tired of the drought, Inspector Hal Challis was not willing to buy water. But despite of the drought and water shortages, his minds and thoughts were consumed by the most recent case of abduction. A woman had been taken and down in his guts there was a feeling that was telling him there is a serial killer in his area of jurisdiction.

Inspector Hal Challis lived in the small town of Waterloo which happens to be not far from Melbourne. According to the first installment, Waterloo is generally a quiet place though after the latest incidences of abductions most people were beginning to get scared. From the look of things, there was an arsonist who was in the loose. Hence now, Inspector Challis and CIB sergeant, Ellen Destry are in charge of a team that has been given the task to find out what is happening within the town. But along the way, their frustrations pile up due to the lack of information and clues that may prove to be beneficial to their case. While reading this first installment one can only wonder; is the local task force going to find the second victim alive or is the serial killer playing mind games with the local task force?

Kittyhawk Down

As the second book in the series, the characters in this books are beginning to take shape and becoming more informed. The plot line surrounding their lives advances in unison with the general plot of the novel which like before manages to amalgamate a series of seemingly incongruent folks and crimes into a whole by the end of the book. Kittyhawk down features a fashionable development and inspector Challis’s passion for reinstating the World War II planes. Apart from the fashionable developments, this second installment also features his relationship with a newspaper reporter and also his attraction to yet another beautiful lady who repairs and flies the World War II planes.

Conclusion

In all the books in this series, there is a careful blend of human interest together with all the crime stuff discussed in the book. The author, Gary Disher, captures your undivided attention by making you care about all the goings of the various departments at the Waterloo local police station. First of all, he narrates to the reader how this police stations are and how humans end up being caught in a rather increasingly dirty world. Most of the characters in this book are not only candid but also vulnerable hence for the most part of the series you can do nothing but empathize with this characters. Nonetheless, this series is a great example of a highly refined crime writing.