The Dan Delaney Mysteries Series

In June 1935 Takapuna inventor Victor Penny was attacked by foreign agents seeking what the newspapers dubbed a 'death ray'. The government secretly shifted him to Somes Island in Wellington harbour to develop the weapon. The novel of this true story is told by Temporary Acting Detective Dan Delaney, seconded to Special Branch, forerunner of the Security Intelligence Service. Special Branch is monitoring the German Club in Auckland, an increasingly shrill supporter of the Nazi regime. The unconventional Auckland theatrical scene has made sensational headlines with the alleged murder of his wife by impresario Eric Mareo, his accuser the bisexual dancer Freda Stark, lover of his deceased partner. A mysterious German/Jewish refugee has been involved in both the German Club and this Bohemian scene, making her a person of interest to the young detective and a recently arrived German diplomat. The detective and a helpful Scotland Yard adviser pursue and are pursued by spies determined to steal Penny's blueprint. Round-the-clock protection is provided for Penny by armed soldiers on the supposedly secure Somes Island government facility, used to imprison enemy aliens in the Great War. Corruption on the island is uncovered by the detectives as they face lethal force to acquire an invention all major countries are actively chasing. Using private, media and archival sources, the author reveals the hidden layers threatening a country emerging out of the Depression with little idea of the forces about to plunge it into another world war. Foreign agents want Victor Penny's game-changing weapon, but also control of New Zealand's role in the coming conflict. The author's 52nd book depicts New Zealand at the crossroads of change, for better and for worse.   'Mixing history and fiction into a good old yarn.' Jim Sullivan, Sounds Historical, Radio NZ   'New Zealand's first spy story.' The Wellingtonian.   'He creates the period very well with the clothing and the language and the police force … Clever denouement quite unexpected  … a curious story well told.' Harry Broad, Radio NZ   'A fast-paced action spy story … builds to a great climactic finish. If this is ever made into a film the director will need not look any further for an accurate chronicle.' Tim Gruar, Booksellers NZ    'McGill's writing shines where he is building a sense of place and time. It's particularly strong on the minutiae of life in that period.' Karen Chisholm, creator of Australian Crime Fiction blog.

Prime Minister Peter Fraser is back in New Zealand in 1945 before he continues to lead the small counties pushing to remove colonialism and great power veto from the fledgling United Nations. A plot is under way to kill him. If successful, New Zealand's influence on the international stage ends and the country could descend into chaos, a divided country ripe for international manipulation. Detective Dan Delaney has returned from the war seeking a peaceful life with his refugee bride, but his old boss Inspector Biggart needs his help tracking down shadowy would-be assassins in Wellington's black market underworld, a defensive Italian fishing village and an upmarket yachting haven. Prodded by the Commissioner of Police, Dan reluctantly involves his wife in a dodgy cabaret scene, as former alien internees are killed and British and Soviet spies Dan has previously clashed with arrive to assist a suspected American undercover operation. Dan and his wife risk their lives as they race to identify the threat before a prime minister refusing security is struck down.  'It's a rollicking read. It's got all the great elements of a  spy novel, including a nice little twist at the end.' Grant Robertson, NZ Finance Minister. 'This is a "hard to put down" book . The reader REALLY wants to know what happens next.' Professor Roger Boshier 'The plot unfolds with twists, turns and lots of action … What I really loved about this book is the way it presents New Zealand plonk in the middle of international political history.' Alyson Baker, Crime Watch

Teenagers Matt Delaney and his mate Ante Vukovich steal a priceless religious vessel and in the course of the burglary a man is killed, setting in motion personal and political mayhem. It is 1955 and they just want to be milk-bar cowboys against the squares and their suffocating rules banning unmarried sex and excessive speed and anything worth doing. Matt's uncle Dan Delaney is out of the police and in a dead-end job when Matt's alcoholic mother begs Dan to sort out a charge of murder against her son. They live in what is called West Auckland's Dallie Valley, Ante is Dalmatian and his fascist Catholic Croatian relation has arrived to reclaim the religious icon that could unite his homeland challenge to Yugoslav communist rule. Dan Delaney's only ally against the Croatian and corrupt and brutal police is an ex-Commissioner of Police assisting the National Government clean up the police and establish a separate security intelligence service.   'McGill's trilogy of local thrillers are all pacy novels that are informed by honest and astute social histories. He imagines political incidents and crafts satisfying narrative action around them that opens up an alternative history that just might have been!' Murray Gray, Founding Director, Going West Books & Writers' Festival   'Told at breakneck speed ... a gripping read full of fascinating history ... thick with 1950s slang and outlook.' Alyson Baker, Crime Watch  

Easter 1965 and radical Wellington students are threatening President Johnson's envoy, here to urge New Zealand to commit troops to its Vietnam campaign. American 'advisers' warn security services of violent action by a disaffected anarchist. Former detective and spy-catcher Dan Delaney is first on the scene of a woman dead in a hot tub and his good friend Ru Patterson unconscious beside her. The deceased is a security agent attempting to infiltrate Patterson's left-wing circle, which includes radical students such as the anarchist and Ru's headstrong daughter Hine, Dan's goddaughter. The authorities demand Dan's help. Delaney is caught up in gang and police threats to Hine, a police raid on a suspected marijuana dealer, an SIS interrogation, the planting of an incendiary device, an unexpected encounter with Prime Minister Keith Holyoake, student confrontation at the envoy's airport motel, response to a Parliamentary intrusion with Special Task Force marksmen surrounding the building as Dan pursues the anarchist booby-trapping the building while trying to dodge the police sharpshooters.   'The mysterious "Control" ... comes across like a voice-over in a Raymond Chandler movie ... The star of the book ... gets the girl, loses the girl and then for good measure he's drugged and abducted ... A 1960s Wellington, at once naive and cultured, is lovingly portrayed.' Linda Niccol   'Some very thrilling moments, and the politics are fascinating -- especially considering recent events ... when we are once again realising sections of our community are being dangerously swayed by myths of imminent threat. Another great New Zealand read.' Alyson Baker  

Late January 1985 Dame Kiri is launching Vukovich Sauvignon Blanc on the Sydney Opera House steps with major shareholders the Delaney family present. The American nuclear warship the Buchanan is in harbour for ANZUS exercises and protesters are out in force, among them Ali Delaney and her American boyfriend. Detective Sergeant Maria Pikowai, née Delaney, is in town as protection detail for New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange secretly meeting his Australian counterpart Bob Hawke in the Sydney Hilton hotel. DS Pikowai joins Australian and American security forces confronting plots to sink the warship, kidnap Lange and destroy the ANZUS accord. Then there are the Delaney family problems damned and potentially redeemed by the convict stain. In his sixth outing Dan Delaney is forced to learn more than he wants to about his origins, and it could be the reconciling of his divided family.    'An intense part of New Zealand and Australian history, remodelled with the Paekakariki wordsmith's magic.' David Haxton, Kapiti News and NZ Herald 'You never feel short-changed in a McGill mystery.' David Hill, NZ Listener 'A rollicking tale made especially interesting through its links to recent historical events. Black humour reminiscent of Janet Evanovich.' Rob Crozier 

1975 Former detective and spy-catcher Dan Delaney and his West Auckland family are on a visit to the Holy Land which goes horribly wrong from the moment they land at Ben-Gurion Airport. A plot is underway to desecrate the most sacred sites and incite conflict between the three great religions whose worship centres on a small area of inner Jerusalem. The Jewish authorities are determined at any cost to prevent another terrorist outrage such as that at Ben-Gurion Airport concourse a few years before, or worse, the recent surprise Yom Kippur attack that threatened the nation's survival. Old enemies have put Delaney's family in the crosshairs of their planned outrages when one of Dan's daughters is kidnapped. Dan works with the local authorities to rescue his daughter and locate the bombs primed to cause apocalyptic damage to Jerusalem.      Roger Hall: 'Cracking yarn.' Fiona Kidman: 'A vivid inside view of Israel as well as rattling along with a fast-paced crime story.' Graeme Lay: 'The tautly structured plot of this thriller grips the reader from the first to the final page. Set in the so-called Holy Land, the novel's characters and themes are as meaningful today as they were during the 1970s setting. Jerusalem – spiritual home to Jews, Moslems and Christians – is vividly evoked and forms a vibrant backdrop to the conflicts and tribulations of the Delaney family.'         

The ceasefire has begun in 1995 between the Republicans and the Loyalists as Dan Delaney and his family are in Ireland seeking ancestral roots. They are drawn into helter-skelter pursuit of and by alleged IRA terrorists and Protestant and Catholic police from County Cork to Dublin, Belfast, and Derry. Ex-policeman and ex-national security operative Dan Delaney is 79 and regrets bending to family pressure to travel around Ireland. Instead of finding his grandfather's origins in County Cork, he finds his own troubles with car theft. The trouble ramps up in Dublin, where his daughter is almost killed in a grenade attack outside the Abbey Theatre. His mother's wrong-side-of-the-blanket relations in Derry have left him disinheritance hassles. Unlike the song, he does not wish he is back home in Derry, or anywhere else in this turbulent island of his ancestors. Can the trip trigger change all his long life he has resisted? In the final outing for Dan Delaney, Republican and Loyalist enmities are the historical backdrop, but it is the ad hoc Kiwi approach to problem solving that helped Dan and his family survive national security threats in Sydney, Israel, his native West Auckland, and Wellington, and his most testing threat in Derry. His long and modestly undistinguished career reaches a final solution to both his origins and his family's survival. It is a win/lose scenario -- and the loser dies.   'One of the most exhilarating or disturbing starts to a story a reader could imagine, depending on whose side you are on. The time is 1970 and the scene is infamous Falls Road, Belfast, at the time of the 'Troubles' in Northern Ireland ... Forward to late 1990's and Dan Delaney is visiting Ireland to find his Irish roots spurred on by his wife and their two daughters ... when one is nearly killed by a hand grenade thrown as she leaves the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, thus beginning a rollicking tale through both Irish history, Irish politics and Irish towns and cities. As is the case with such stories you don't know who are the goodies or baddies ... One of the defining and endearing aspects of the series is the involvement of Delaney's family. This is unusual because most detective stories have 'lone wolf' protagonists who often involve a series of uncommitted lovers who they change with each story, a la James Bond.' Dr Michael O'Leary