Now and Then - Softcover

Jon Cleary

3.36

42 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006176410 ISBN 13: 9780006176411

Publisher: Fontana, 1989

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A nun is found murdered on the steps of the Quality Couch, Sydney's most expensive house of ill repute. She is Sister Mary Magdalene, an idealistic young woman who previously had worked at a mission in Nicaragua. Detective Inspector Scobie Malone, that most human of cops, picks up the trail when he discovers that her real name was Teresa Hourigan--the illegitimate granddaughter of Fingal Hourigan, one of Australia's most powerful businessmen, who is currently entertaining some rich contras at his palatial home. The case leads Malone deep into Hourigan's murky past and threatens to expose the secret the old man has kept since 1929: the reason he hurriedly left Chicago in fear for his life. It also threatens to destroy his ambitions for his son, Archbishop Kerry Hourigan: to become the first-ever Australian pope. But Kerry's fanatical anticommunism has already led him to acts that will fatally endanger his standing in the Vatican.

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About the Author:

Jon Cleary (1917-2010) was an Australian writer and novelist. He wrote numerous books, including The High Commissioner, the first of a long series of popular detective novels featuring Sydney police inspector Scobie Malone. Several of his works have been adapted for television and film.

From Publishers Weekly:

This Australian writer is known for The Sundowners and 35 more novels, including the four featuring Inspector Scobie Malone of Sydney. Cleary's urbane wit blunts the sting in this story about the circumstances leading to the murder of Sister Mary Magdalene. The nun's body is found outside a luxurious brothel where Malone starts the investigation that leads to an artist known as Miss O'Keefe, who turns out to be Brigid Hourigan, the victim's mother. He learns that the young woman was illegitimate, unacknowledged by Bridgid's millionaire father, Fingal, and her brother, Archbishop Kerry Hourigan. The influential old man's associates, like a small army, form powerful barriers to the detective. But he digs deep, looking for clues in the nun's service to the needy in Nicaragua, in Fingal's early years in Chicago and the source of his fortune. The sad truth closes the case, one of the hero's most intricate and exciting. Mystery Guild featured alternate.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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