JP Powell author
Crime fiction, literary biography
Bringing history to life
Upcoming Events
- Thu, 09 MarNoosaville09 Mar 2023, 1:30 pmNoosaville, 7 Wallace Dr, Noosaville QLD 4566, Australia
About Me
I'm an archaeologist, a historian, a teacher, a writer. I live on a rural property on Queensland's Sunshine Coast. My passion is to bring the past to life, to let people see that the ground they walk on has been trod by thousands of people over thousands of years. Each of these people have a story to tell.
Here I am working on Sydney University's excavations at Paphos, Cyprus.
Deception Bay
27 April 2022
Brio Books
(BOOK 2 in series)
Deceit is usually wrong, sometimes necessary and often the best course of action
Deception Bay continues JP Powell’s magnificent Brisbane wartime sage. American MP Joe Washington, an investigator with the Provost Marshall’s Office, and Australian Rose McAlister are swept back together when she returns to join Central Bureau, General MacArthur’s code-breaking group of eccentrics. Brisbane’s Bletchley Park.
Again and again, Joe is drawn to the Brisbane River. A man may have jumped into the river, a code breaker allegedly drowned by suicide, and an arm with an unrecognisable tattoo is pulled from the river at the submarine base.
Together they follow the clues but are quickly drawn into into the city’s dark tank stream, filled with predators and conmen and Joe’s nemesis, corrupt Queensland detective Frank Bischof.
ENDORSEMENT
“Deception Bay reads like a compulsive thriller yet is adorned with well’s effortless and often breathtaking evocation of a lost Brisbane city. With The Brisbane Line and now Deception Bay, Powell has built two mighty additions to the city’s literary canon.” - Matt Condon
The Brisbane Line
1 April 2020 -
Brio Books
(BOOK 1 in series)
Wartime Brisbane is the setting for this crime novel, which weaves together historical and fictional characters.
Sergeant Joe Washington works with the American Criminal Investigation Command. While investigating the murder of an American soldier, whose body is found dumped near the South Brisbane cemetery, he comes up against notorious Queensland detective Frank Bischof and discovers why General MacArthur called Brisbane 'the most corrupt place in the South Pacific'.
Watch JP Powell in conversation with Matthew Condon
Love's Obsession
The lives and archaeology of Jim and Eve Stewart
Judy Powell's biography of Jim Stewart, the first person to teach archaeology at an Australian university was published in 2013. It is the story of a difficult but charismatic man who, damaged by alcohol and his years in a German POW camp, inspired students and antagonised colleagues. It is also the story of his second wife Eve who, alone for the last decades of her life, worked to complete his work. Together they excavated on Cyprus. One reviewer describes the book as 'amusing, informative, engagingly written and scandalous without ever being prurient'.
Listen to Judy Powell in conversation with Philip Adams on Radio National's Late Night Live
