There's no two ways about Les Norton - the carrot-topped country boy who works as a bouncer at Sydney's top illegal casino. He's tough and he's mean. He's got a granite jaw, fists like hams, and they say the last time he took a tenner from his wallet Henry Lawson blinked at the light. Lethal but loyal, he's always good for a laugh. In this, the third collection of Les Norton adventures, Les gets his boss off the hook. But not without the help of the boy from Binjiwunyawunya. Les then finds himself in a spot of bother in Long Bay Gaol then in a lot more bother on a St. Kilda tram in Melbourne.

Les thought that playing minder to Peregrine Normanhurst III sounded like a dead-set snack: Les would keep Peregrine out of trouble. So what if he was on the run from the IRA? They’d never follow him to Australia… But Les quickly finds himself thrust into an adventure that moves at breakneck speed from the corridors of power in Canberra to the grimy tenements of Belfast, to climax in a nerve-shattering, blood-spattered shoot out on a survivalist fortress in the Tweed Valley.

Les Norton, a big red-headed country boy from Queensland, has just arrived in the big smoke and is set to make his mark. Working as a bouncer at an illegal casino in the Cross, Les encounters a number of fascinating characters who make up the seamier side of one of the most exciting cities in the world – gamblers, conmen, bookies, bouncers, hookers and hit men, who ply their respective trades from the golden sands of Bondi to the tainted gutters of Kings Cross... usually on the wrong side of the law.

Okay, so it looks like the Kelly Club is finally closing down - it had to happen sooner or later. And it isn’t as if Les Norton will starve. He has money snookered away, he owns his house, and his blue-chip investment - a block of flats in Randwick - must be worth a fortune by now. Except that the place is falling down, the council is reclaiming the land, there’s been a murder in Flat 5, and the tenants are the biggest bunch of misfits since the Manson family.

All Les Norton wanted was a quiet coffee and Sacher cake at the Hakoah Club in Bondi, and to be left alone to sort out his troubled love life. How he let notorious conman Kelvin Kramer talk him up to Surfers Paradise for five days, Les will never know. He went along expecting some relaxation in the sun, the chance to earn a little money, and possibly a little fresh romance. Les definitely got the earn. He certainly got the girl. But what Norton mainly got in Surfers Paradise was trouble. In a size 40 Double-D cup.

Norton's old friend turned out to be the biggest brothel owner in America. Madam to the stars. Through her, Les met Mitzi Moonkiss; he also met the Japanese Yakuza, lesbian geisha girls and every time he put his head out the door some boofhead US Marine was looking for a fight. And these were all the nice people. Somewhere in the middle a crazed serial killer was on the loose with a bayonet. Aloha, Les.

Norton needed a holiday - anywhere - as long as it was out of Bondi. Price was only too willing to oblige - Les could have his house at Terrigal. All he had to do was look after George Brennan's nephew for a week while he was there. Sounded okay to Norton, and it was better than spending his own money. Jimmy Rosewater was young, cool and the original brown-eyed handsome man. He loved good wine, going to restaurants, going line-dancing, and the ladies loved him. This suited Les nicely.

Moving into his old flame Susie's flat in Bondi should have been a piece of cake for Les Norton - except that Price and Eddie had other ideas. There were two bodies buried under the handball courts at the Bondi baths. The man to get them out? Major Garrick Lewis, aka, The Gecko. With Norton for company, The Gecko literally took Bondi, and everything that went with it, in stride - Mossad hit squads, the KGB, ASIO, yobbo builders and loose women looking for action. And for once, Les is flat out keeping up.

Just when everything was going so good, Les slips a disc in his back. He can't run, he can't train. He can't do anything much. But he can still drive his car. So it's down to Narooma for the South Coast Blues Festival and a bit of R&R: 30 bands and three days and nights of non-stop rock 'n' roll. Which would have been great, only Les has to have a slight altercation with four fishermen on his first night in town. Now the toughest, meanest, most horrible bloke on the south coast is after his blood.

Les figured by tossing $50,000 into the Gull's movie he'd become the next Sam Goldwyn. Only someone put a bomb on the film set. And who gets the blame? Now Norton's a fugitive from the law, desperate to prove his innocence.

Look out Wagga Wagga. Les Norton's in town and he feels like dancing. Extreme Polo. The wildest game on water. That's what it said on TV. All Les had to do was drive down to Wagga Wagga for an old mate who owed him a favor, Neville (Nizegy) Nixon, and pick up the Murrumbidgee Mud Crabs.

Robert G. Barrrett's latest Les Norton adventure, The Wind and the Monkey, set in Port Stephens, NSW, is a romance as well as an adventure - proving once again Barrett's enormous appeal to both men and women readers.

Robert G. Barrett is a master of political incorrectness. For more than a decade now, Robert G. Barrett has been entertaining Australians with the cocky Queenslander Les Norton and his outrageous exploits. In this collection, as well as more great Les Norton stories, Robert G. Barrett offers his views on getting published, getting famous, getting the dole and getting a date. Rider on the Storm and Other Bits is Les Norton at his worst and Robert G. Barrett at his best.

Robert G Barrett's Rosa-Marie's Baby is action, romance, and intrigue with a diabolical twist. Set in Melbourne, Lorne and Apollo Bay, Victoria, it proves once again why Robert G Barrett is called the king of popular Australian fiction.

Arranging the hit on Fabio was a low act, and Les knew it. And when you get Sydney's deadliest killer to do the hit, there's always a quid pro quo. In this case, Les had to take a trip to Nimbin to help an old army mate of Eddie Salita's open a bar, the Double L Ranch. Which suited Les, since he had to take his friend Tony Nathan to the waxhead wedding of the year at Bluey's Beach, and it was on the way. The waxhead wedding of the year turned into the ethnic brawl of the decade.