My copy has a boomerang and a bootprint on the front and since it has the marks referred to in the story it explains visually what they're talking about, although it is difficult to match that shape with the description of the scar on the tree. However, that's petty.The story was written at the end of the twenties and it is important to remember that because the popular stories of the day, especially North American mysteries, had guns, fights, tracking and mysterious interpersonal relationships. This story has all those as well as some extended descriptions of the Australian outback that are fascinating to read, but some of which are really more detailed than required by the story. The description of the flooding which came after some heavy rain is quite marvelous and the detailed experience of fighting through the spiny branches and hard roots of trees torn up by the advancing water is gripping, but the story didn't require as long a piece as that.I find it impossible to be comfortable with the expressed opinion of most of the characters that aboriginal people are "wild" and will always return to the wild, that people who are of mixed blood will always revert to the "lower" side of their heredity, that they can never attain the levels of "civilized" people, no matter how much love, education, or training they're given. This is said even by the mixed blood detective, who lives in a city much of the time, dresses European style, and has a wide range of book learning which he uses in European fashion in his conversation. Upfield can't have it both ways. If there were an indication that he was being ironic I could accept it but there isn't any suggestion of that.Apart from this problematic attitude I really enjoyed the book - oh yes, but then there's the statement that a mixed blood person will turn dark sometime in their twenties, inevitably and definitively. The book gives a clear picture of the way people in the outback picked up the modern means of communication - phones being everywhere to connect the riders with the home place on a daily basis.
This is the second time I have read The Barrakee Mystery. I gave it four stars after the first read (a few years before I joined Goodreads) but I have dropped it down to three after this one. While the story is gripping and the characters solid and entertaining, the racism is outrageous. I do acknowledge the book reflects the period of time in which it was written. And Upfield does make it frustratingly difficult for the modern reader to pigeonhole where he stands on issues of race. On the one hand his hero, Bony, is a half-caste Aborigine and a highly successful and intelligent detective. And there is a glimpse of Upfield’s attitude towards their treatment when Bony drops a comment about the genocide of one particular tribe describing it as “unhappily wiped out by you gentle white people”.On the other hand, most of the characters see no great crime in the murder of an Aboriginal man, and the segregation between white and black is taken for granted. Additionally, a common theme in the Bony books is the idea that no matter how “civilised” an Aborigine appears, he will always revert back to the wild ways of the bush. It’s something that we see Bony frequently battling throughout the Upfield’s books, and it is a key plot element involving one of the minor characters in this book.In the end I feel that it was not Upfield’s intention to be racist, although by modern standards he certainly was. I believe he had a great deal of respect for the Aboriginal people, but it was a respect that was tempered and developed in a world where racism was the accepted norm. From a modern perspective, the racism in his books is shocking. But perhaps at the time of writing what was shocking was that he showed any kind of deference to the Aboriginal people at all.As a quick note, The Barrakee Mystery does include several uses of the N word, which might offend some readers.
Do You like book The Barrakee Mystery (1972)?
Somewhat Zane Grey in Australia's Outback. Perhaps the story is good but the racism is dreadful. This author wrote in the 1920s or so. Apparently he was an inspiration for one of my favourite authors, Tony Hillerman. I rather think Arthur Upfield was trying to be benevolent and even writing in a manner that suggested more tolerance toward the Australian aboriginal people. However, the underlying malice of the English-speaking Whites toward the country's original inhabitants and animals in general, was loud and clear. An ugly, disgusting novel; I could not get beyond the white arrogance and exceptionalism, much less the cruely. End of my attempts to read this author.
—Kathy H
A marvelous book. Not just a detective story but also a thriller and a love story set (incidentally) in a saga describing the appalling treatment of the indigenous people of Australia by the white settlers. Although the attitudes of the characters show how cheaply the lives of Aboriginal Australians were held, I don't believe that Upfield was himself an out and out racist but as an English immigrant I think it would have been very difficult not to be swept along by the attitudes prevailing at the time. Indeed, he appears to me, to have a great admiration of and fascination for the Native population. Bony is such a great invention and his character develops superbly in subsequent books. I would imagine that some modern Australians find Upfield's books uncomfortable reading. Highly recommended.
—John
This is the first of the "Bony" books featuring the half-aboriginal Australian detective, Napoleon Bonaparte. I remember as a child enjoying the TV series based on the Bony books, and was keen to read the novels it was based on.The plot is great, there are great action sequences, and the descriptions of the Australian scenery are fantastic. It seems authentic - you may need to use the glossary at the back for definitions of many of the Australian slang terms used throughout. I felt very sympathetic towards Upfield's clever-but-somewhat-arrogant detective.The problem is that this is a book written in a different time (the 1920s) in Australia, where the attitude towards race was very different. It's very difficult to stomach otherwise likable characters talk about and act towards Aborigines the way they do in this book. No-one seems to think it's too big a deal that a white person kills a black person. There are other examples of this abhorrent attitude towards the indigenous people, but I don't want to spoil the story.Even so, as long as you can appreciate that you're seeing the story through the lens of that time period in Australia, you've got a really good book. I just kept wanting it to speak out against the racism, and it really didn't.
—Graham
