AustLit

'I should ask your department's accountant whether he's missing nine hundred thousand bucks. This is the anonymous message that will change Sandra Mahoney's life.

'When a powerful but unpopular bureaucrat is accused of theft and computer fraud, Sandra is convinced that the charge is false. But how to track down the culprit when almost anyone could be an enemy? In her search for the truth, Sandra finds herself in a battle of wits against an elusive and unscrupulous opponent, a battle in which no-one's allegiance can be taken for granted.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

''Jumpers,' McCallum was saying. 'Jumpers are - well, in my experience jumpers are always badly disturbed. They choose to jump because it's so violent.'

Niall Howley has been spending night after night playing an interactive computer game when he's found dead at the bottom of the Telstra tower in Canberra. From a graphic left on his computer, it is apparent that his actual death mimics in an eerie way the death already scripted for him in the game. The police and the coroner call it suicide, but Niall's mother hires Sandra Mahoney, computer crime consultant, to help her understand what has really happened.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Unexpectedly alone in the summer holidays, security consultant Sandra Mahoney mulls over an undignified photograph that has been published in The Canberra Times. When a lobby group asks her to investigate a company producing filters for the internet, Mahoney is surprised to find herself drawn into the currents surrounding a politician's lonely death. With her children away, and more free time on her hands than she's ever had, Mahoney follows a trail that others have ignored.'

Source: back cover

'When the body of young female environmental activist and science student, Laila Fanshaw, is found floating in Lake Burley Griffin, private investigator Sandra Mahoney's life is turned upside down, not least because her partner, Ivan, was in love with Laila. Ivan is a suspect and has no alibi for the time of death.

'A further strain is put on the relationship when another suspect, who worked in the Federal Environment Department, wants to hire Sandra to help him clear his name.

'Sandra has to weigh up her desire to learn the truth against her children's needs. Only six-year-old Katya is Ivan's natural child; adolescent Peter has a different father. But both children are deeply affected by Laila's death and Ivan's reaction to it. Added to this, Sandra's friend in the Federal Police, Detective Sergeant Brook, is absolutely against her involvement in the case.

'It takes all of Sandra's ingenuity and courage to steer herself, and her family, through the dangers that lead to an eventual unmasking of the truth.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.