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A review by jstilts
The Sands Of Windee by Arthur Upfield
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
A great piece of detective fiction with an extraordinary main character - and historically fascinating for it's unintended unique insight into racism against Aboriginal Australians at it's time of publication - 1931. Furthermore this book inspired a real-life copycat murder, most incredibly discovered after publication but determined to have occured *before* it's publication - which must have caused the author Arthur Upfield to first experience a peak in sales and then experience trouble with the police once it was ascertained he also knew the victims personally!
But that's another story, back to this work of fiction. We'll talk racism in a moment (it's prevalent yet fascinating) but that aside: this book sees the very slow unraveling of a cold-case of a missing persons case that the main character alone - Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte - believes to be murder. He quits his job to go undercover, only to discover no trace of a corpse exists - making for a crime almost impossible to prosecute. We see through his eyes and others what life was like in the many roles needed to run a vast outback sheep station, the racism Bony is subjected to as a (to use the terms of the early twentieth century) half-caste Aboriginal, we experience the horrors of bushfire, and we watch him untangle numerous crimes and scandals as he hunts for the killers and potential accomplices without revealing his true intentions. I rate this book and others in Arthur Upfield's series of novels about Detective-Inspector Napoleon "Bony" Bonaparte highly enough I'd describe him as the Australian Agatha Christie, and Bony is his Poirot.
Now, racism - and why this book is worth reading despite it. Be warned this book is very much a product of the 1930s and contains racist concepts and uses racist terms that are offensive and hard to read - and is guilty of both cultural appropriation and of speaking on behalf of Aboriginal people rather than allowing them their voice. What makes this book and others in the series fascinating is the author (a white Englishman) is absolutely not intending to cause offence: his lead character is an Aboriginal Australian who as a Detective-Inspector of the Queensland Police is the intellectual, moral and cultural superior of everyone in the book, his white colleagues are in awe of him because he is *so* impressive, he has never failed in a case - his only failing is his pride and vanity in knowing all this to be true. The author includes passages on how Aboriginal Australians are the superior culture to all others in the world, including this quote "the black fellow possessed culture when the white man ate raw flesh because he did not know how to make a fire" which is something white Australians struggle admitting to this day, let alone a hundred years ago in the 1920s and 1930s! There is no way the author is trying to be racist - but because this work still manages to be massively racist throughout is why I find it so fascinating: it reveals the type of and the extent of ingrained racist thoughts and concepts prevelant in Australia at the time, including the author, who doubtless thought himself as not only not racist but also a friend, an ally, a champion of Aboriginal Australians (which for a 1920s/1930s author hoping to sell books is frankly astonishing).
It is good to reflect on how we may perhaps consider ourselves as indviduals to be not racist, or perhaps to be allies of LGBTIQ+ and yet still be unknowingly failing to do our best now, and how we may cringe in the future when we look back upon our thoughts, words and actions - or how history may consider us.
But that's another story, back to this work of fiction. We'll talk racism in a moment (it's prevalent yet fascinating) but that aside: this book sees the very slow unraveling of a cold-case of a missing persons case that the main character alone - Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte - believes to be murder. He quits his job to go undercover, only to discover no trace of a corpse exists - making for a crime almost impossible to prosecute. We see through his eyes and others what life was like in the many roles needed to run a vast outback sheep station, the racism Bony is subjected to as a (to use the terms of the early twentieth century) half-caste Aboriginal, we experience the horrors of bushfire, and we watch him untangle numerous crimes and scandals as he hunts for the killers and potential accomplices without revealing his true intentions. I rate this book and others in Arthur Upfield's series of novels about Detective-Inspector Napoleon "Bony" Bonaparte highly enough I'd describe him as the Australian Agatha Christie, and Bony is his Poirot.
Now, racism - and why this book is worth reading despite it. Be warned this book is very much a product of the 1930s and contains racist concepts and uses racist terms that are offensive and hard to read - and is guilty of both cultural appropriation and of speaking on behalf of Aboriginal people rather than allowing them their voice. What makes this book and others in the series fascinating is the author (a white Englishman) is absolutely not intending to cause offence: his lead character is an Aboriginal Australian who as a Detective-Inspector of the Queensland Police is the intellectual, moral and cultural superior of everyone in the book, his white colleagues are in awe of him because he is *so* impressive, he has never failed in a case - his only failing is his pride and vanity in knowing all this to be true. The author includes passages on how Aboriginal Australians are the superior culture to all others in the world, including this quote "the black fellow possessed culture when the white man ate raw flesh because he did not know how to make a fire" which is something white Australians struggle admitting to this day, let alone a hundred years ago in the 1920s and 1930s! There is no way the author is trying to be racist - but because this work still manages to be massively racist throughout is why I find it so fascinating: it reveals the type of and the extent of ingrained racist thoughts and concepts prevelant in Australia at the time, including the author, who doubtless thought himself as not only not racist but also a friend, an ally, a champion of Aboriginal Australians (which for a 1920s/1930s author hoping to sell books is frankly astonishing).
It is good to reflect on how we may perhaps consider ourselves as indviduals to be not racist, or perhaps to be allies of LGBTIQ+ and yet still be unknowingly failing to do our best now, and how we may cringe in the future when we look back upon our thoughts, words and actions - or how history may consider us.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Colonisation, Cultural appropriation, Racism, Fire/Fire injury, and Racial slurs
Moderate: Kidnapping, Murder, Alcohol, Animal death, and Death
Minor: Confinement, Gun violence, Car accident, and Miscarriage