The Maw of the Beast is a fast-paced, multi-layered story of ambition, intrigue, adultery, jealousy, vengeance and tragedy.
Disillusioned crime reported George 'Jogger' Jensen has quit the job at a major daily newspaper in Melbourne and sought refuge in his childhood seaside home town of Portarlington on the Bellarine Peninsula to contemplate his future.
Within a week he has come face to face with the last thing he wanted: the body of a young unidentified woman with weights tied to one ankle, hooked out of the sea by local commercial fisherman and old school mate John Tilson.
Despite his vow to rest, George's instinct for a story prompts him to ask questions around town. He discovers there has been an earlier death in Portarlington of a schoolboy from a drug overdose and a suspicion of cover-up involving local businesses which sets him wondering whether there is a connection between the two fatalities.
Forming a fraught alliance with former lover Fiona Catchmore, who is now editor of the Bellarine's weekly newspaper, and with the publication's ambitious young reporter Jenny Adams, George uses all his journalistic wiles to uncover the truth and scoop the daily media corporation.