Phryne Fisher

The Honourable Phryne Fisher — wealthy, glamorous, and magnificently self-directed — solves murders in 1920s Melbourne. Kerry Greenwood's 21-book series is a love letter to a particular moment in Australian social history and to a woman who refused every constraint her era placed on her sex.

By Kerry Greenwood · 21 books · 1989–present

By The Editorial Team · Last reviewed April 2026

What is the Phryne Fisher series about?

The Honourable Phryne Fisher is Melbourne’s most glamorous private detective. Kerry Greenwood’s 21-book series is set almost entirely in 1928 and 1929 — the last years of the Jazz Age, before the Depression changed everything — and follows Phryne through a city that is prosperous, racially complex, and full of people who would prefer their secrets to stay buried. Phryne is wealthy, bisexual, unapologetically hedonistic, and extraordinarily competent. She picks up cases the way other women pick up social engagements: because they interest her. The mysteries are brisk and pleasurable, but what makes the series endure is Phryne herself — a fully realised woman who operates in 1920s Melbourne on entirely her own terms.

Should I read the Phryne Fisher series in order?

The novels function well as standalones, but reading in order rewards you. The recurring characters — Phryne’s household, her companions Dot and the irrepressible Lin Chung, Inspector Jack Robinson — accumulate texture over twenty-one books that enriches later entries considerably. The books are short, brisk, and enormously readable, which makes following publication order easy rather than onerous. Start with Cocaine Blues and trust the rhythm Greenwood established from the first page.

Who will enjoy the Phryne Fisher series?

Readers who want their historical crime fiction served with style and wit. Fans of Jacqueline Winspear who want something lighter in tone will find the contrast instructive: where Maisie Dobbs processes her history quietly, Phryne Fisher refuses to process at all and is frequently right. The series also appeals to readers interested in Australian social history — Greenwood writes Melbourne’s immigrant communities, its working class, its radical politics, and its bohemian culture with sustained affection and research. Readers who loved the television adaptation will find the books richer in period detail and considerably more frank.

What makes the Phryne Fisher series worth reading?

The books refuse the cosiness of much period crime fiction. Phryne is morally serious about certain things — justice for the powerless, sexual freedom, women’s bodily autonomy — and Greenwood uses the mysteries to explore those commitments without polemic. Unnatural Habits, which takes on the Magdalene laundry system, is the clearest example, but the same instinct runs through all twenty-one books. This is crime fiction that knows what it’s for, delivered with considerable pleasure and not a wasted page.

Publication Order

1
Cocaine Blues (1989)
Phryne arrives in Melbourne and is promptly hired to investigate a young woman who has been poisoned by an illegal abortionist, setting the tone for everything that follows.
2
Flying Too High (1990)
An amateur aviator is accused of patricide, and Phryne takes to the skies — literally — to clear his name.
3
Murder on the Ballarat Train (1991)
Passengers are chloroformed one by one on the overnight train to Ballarat, and Phryne must identify the poisoner before she becomes the next target.
4
Death at Victoria Dock (1992)
A dying anarchist collapses at Phryne's feet on the docks, and she finds herself drawn into Melbourne's radical political underground.
5
The Green Mill Murder (1993)
A dancer is murdered mid-contest at the Green Mill ballroom, and Phryne investigates while pursuing her own pleasures in the jazz-soaked Melbourne night.
6
Blood and Circuses (1994)
Phryne goes undercover in a travelling circus to investigate threats against its performers and animals.
7
Ruddy Gore (1995)
A Gilbert and Sullivan production at the Princess Theatre is haunted by a malevolent ghost and a very real series of accidents and deaths.
8
Urn Burial (1996)
A weekend at a country house turns lethal when a guest is found dead in a limestone cave, and Phryne must unmask the killer before the house party ends.
9
Raisins and Almonds (1997)
A young man dies in a Jewish bookshop in Carlton and Phryne investigates, moving through Melbourne's Jewish immigrant community with the series' characteristic warmth.
10
Death Before Wicket (1999)
Phryne visits Sydney during the cricket season and finds murder lurking behind the genteel façade of university sport.
11
Away With the Fairies (2001)
A women's magazine editor is found dead, and Phryne investigates the world of 1920s women's publishing and the suffragette generation who made it.
12
Murder in Montparnasse (2002)
Veterans of Phryne's Paris bohemian years are being killed one by one, forcing her to return in memory to the world she left behind.
13
The Castlemaine Murders (2003)
Gold rush skeletons and present-day murders in Castlemaine link Chinese-Australian history to a killer operating in the contemporary goldfields town.
14
Queen of the Flowers (2004)
Phryne agrees to reign over a flower festival and finds herself investigating the disappearance of a young woman whose past is more tangled than her flower crown suggests.
15
Death by Water (2005)
Phryne boards a luxury liner for an ocean voyage and discovers that someone among the first-class passengers is a murderer with unfinished business.
16
Murder in the Dark (2006)
A New Year's house party descends into violence when guests begin to die during a midnight game, and Phryne must find the killer before dawn.
17
Murder on a Midsummer Night (2008)
The illegitimate heir to a fortune is found dead, and Phryne's investigation leads through Melbourne's Italian community and a family secret long kept buried.
18
Dead Man's Chest (2010)
Phryne housesits a Great Ocean Road cottage and finds the owners have vanished, the neighbors are peculiar, and someone is determined she should not ask questions.
19
Unnatural Habits (2012)
Pregnant girls are disappearing from a Magdalene laundry, a young journalist investigating the story goes missing, and Phryne goes to war with Melbourne's moral establishment.
20
Murder and Mendelssohn (2013)
A conductor is murdered during rehearsals for a choral festival, and Phryne investigates while a World War One codebreaker from her past reappears in her life.
21
Death in Daylesford (2021)
Phryne travels to the spa town of Daylesford and finds a health retreat hiding dark secrets about its patients and the treatments being administered in the name of cure.

Related Series

Maisie Dobbs — Historical mysteries with a determined female detective