Matthew Condon

One of the landmark Australian true-crime books, with a new introduction following the death of disgraced Police Commissioner Terry Lewis. 'It was the genius of the system ... from day to day you didn't know who was on the take or not. You didn't know who you could trust.' Three Crooked Kings is the shocking true story of Queensland and...

The message was powerfully clear. If you threatened the harmony of the Joke, you didn't last long. Continuing on from the bestselling Three Crooked Kings, Jacks and Jokers opens in 1976. Terry Lewis, exiled in western Queensland, is soon to be controversially appointed Police Commissioner. As for the other two original Crooked Kings, Tony Murphy is set to ruthlessly take...

Little Fish Are Sweet is Matthew Condon's extraordinary personal account of writing the Three Crooked Kings trilogy. When Condon first interviewed disgraced former police commissioner Terry Lewis, he had no idea that it would be the start of a turbulent six-year journey. As hundreds of people came forward to share their powerful and sometimes shocking stories, decades of crime and...

The gripping finale to Three Crooked Kings and Jacks and Jokers brings to a close Matthew Condon's best-selling true-crime trilogy. In 1983, the soon-to-be-knighted Police Commissioner Terry Lewis continues to turn a blind eye to the operation of The Joke, a highly organised system of graft payments from illegal gambling, prostitution, and illicit drugs. As the tentacles of this fraudulent...

I keep coming back to the light of Brisbane. If you are born into it, this palette of gentle pinks and oranges at dawn and dusk, the blast white of midday in summer, the lemon luminescence of mid-morning and mid-afternoon, you keep it with you and measure all other light by it. If you live away from it, then step...

How a famous cold case, a deadly fire and a quest for justice finally brought down one of Australia's worst killers. 'He takes you in the middle of the night, like an angel, and you're gone for good.' - Witness at Vincent O'Dempsey's committal hearing for murder, 2015. In 2017, Vincent O'Dempsey was sentenced to life in prison for the...