Scobie Malone [SEP] creator
Scobie Malone
Scobie Malone is a fictional Sydney homicide detective created by Australian novelist Jon Cleary.
History.
Named after the jockey Scobie Breasley, Malone made his first appearance in Cleary's 1966 novel "The High Commissioner". Cleary says he got the idea from meeting an Australian policeman he knew walking out of Australia House in London one day. He was on six months leave but Cleary wondered what if he had come to arrest the Australian High Commissioner for murder.
Although the original novel was a best seller
Fading Light" (1985) was set in 1939 Berlin.
Biography Writing career Return of Scobie Malone.
After Cleary's daughter's death from breast cancer in 1987, and his wife's subsequent ill health he travelled less. Writing the Scobie Malone series of novels enabled him to tell Australian stories which appealed to an international audience, and he remained popular with readers throughout his career. Malone returned in "Dragons at the Party" (1987), about the Australian Bicentennial, then was in "Now and Then, Amen