The Afterlife of Harry Playford

From acclaimed writer Steven Carroll, comes the second in his new series of post-war literary crime novels featuring Detective Sergeant Stephen Minter.

'What does a pile of clothes left on a deserted beach tell you? It's a cold midwinter Monday. Seaweed and shells litter the flat expanse of sand. There is a light wind, the sea more disgruntled than choppy, the tide out. And there amongst it, the neat pile of clothes. Almost like a coded message waiting to be deciphered.'

Queenscliff, Victoria, 1951: A man has disappeared, leaving only a pile of neatly folded clothes on a beach. Missing, presumed drowned. But for Detective Sergeant Stephen Minter, newly emigrated from England, it's far from an open-and-shut case. Because this is no ordinary man. Harry Playford is a successful politician, a charming man who is a rising ministerial star, a possible contender for the top job, who leaves behind a beautiful wife - and a mistress. There could be a simple explanation. But, these murky days of the Cold War, in a time of rising mistrust and suspicion, spies and espionage, Stephen can't throw off his feeling that something's definitely not right. About the whole business.

From one of Australia's finest, most critically acclaimed writers, The Afterlife of Harry Playford is an absorbing, poignant and moving novel of hard choices and past mistakes.

Praise for the first Detective Sergeant Stephen Minter novel, Death of a Foreign Gentleman:

'A riff on the novels of the golden age of detective fiction ... A novel of remarkable poise, which marries its weighty concerns and deeply felt sensibility to a playful delight in the very real pleasures of the genre it so deftly inhabits' The Age

'An impressive start to a new series' The Australian

About the Author

Steven Carroll is the multi-award winning author of sixteen novels, including A World of Other People (2013), which was the joint winner of the Prime Minister's Literary Award, and The Time We Have Taken (2007), which was the winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize for the Southeast Asia and Pacific Region and the Miles Franklin Award in 2008. The Art of the Engine Driver was shortlisted for France's Prix Femina literary award for Best Foreign Novel in 2005. Forever Young (2015) was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award and the Prime Minister's Literary Award in 2016.

A New England Affair (2017) was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award in 2018 and The Year of the Beast (2019) was longlisted for the 2020 Voss Literary Prize. Goodnight, Vivienne, Goodnight was longlisted for the 2022 ARA Historical Novel Prize and for the 2023 Voss Literary Prize. His previous novel, Death of a Foreign Gentleman (2024), was the first in a series of postwar literary crime novels featuring Detective Sergeant Stephen Minter. Steven lives in Melbourne with his partner, the author Fiona Capp, and their son.