The Incredible Adventures of TOBY FARRIER

Abandoned because of his destructive and violent behaviour, nine-year-old Toby faces a future of moving from one foster family to another as they to tire of his tantrums. Arthur Farrier, Toby's grandfather risks estrangement from his only child and their family to see Toby get a chance to live a valued life. Finding a reason for the tantrums may have eluded an endless roster of Toby's doctors, quacks and other medical professionals. Arthur believes that inside Toby lives a good kid and so, from a troubled beginning the two begin on an adventure beginning with a locked desk.

A relic from the early Twentieth Century the desk holds secrets of the last case Private Detective Shamus O'Toole had been working on before dying in suspicious circumstances. His longing to reconnect with his father and step-sisters bursts back into his life after a truck accident hospitalises his father. Torn by his desire to link the clues found in an ancient diary and reconnecting with his family, Toby is conflicted, but his quest to resolve the diary's questions leads him and his friends across Melbourne on a treasure hunting adventure.

Arthur, smitten with his granddaughters, begins taking Toby for granted and it's Tracey his step-mother who offers comfort until she accuses him of falling into his old ways and shuns him again. Unable to please any of his family Toby finds a friend in Lizard a palliative care ward patient in the Royal Melbourne Hospital. A most unlikely person to enter Toby's life is another link to Shamus and the ring dangling from a grubby cord hanging around Lizard's neck solves a one hundred year old mystery.