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Death in Dreamtime: A Mystery of Masks and Ciphers
"I'm on to a filthy game. A game worse than murder." His cousin's baffling SOS sends Jack Corless speeding hundreds of miles north to Ungimillia, home of The Alchera or Dreamtime Land. In the shadows of the spectacle he finds murder and intrigue, but everywhere illusion and reality seem to merge, and even Inspector "Digger" Haig can't quite read the signs. Sidney Hobson Courtier once again displays his taste for the cryptic and bizarre in Death in Dreamtime , his second book in Wakefield Crime Classics.
194 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
February 20, 2016
I guess the "dreamtime" in the title pretty much indicated what sort of a book this was going to be. One that exoticises the "savage" and has the sort of tribute paid to Aboriginal culture (from I suspect a very ignorant stand-point) that is criticised in Orientalism by Edward W. Said (which I am reading concurrently...and what an interesting juxtaposition).
Aboriginal culture is presented as primitive and based on food, sex and death/pain. The character's reactions to the photograph in the story are both racist and homophobic and the idea that a woman (under suspicion for being involved in the crimes) has too weak sensibilities to be allowed to see the "obscene" photo she is accused of possessing said a lot for the gender in the book (Martha wasn't all bad though). There is also a lovely part where a mentally ill middle-aged woman is being talked about and a character claims she needs a man to beat her up and that would cure her. LOVELY!
The puzzle itself was a little bit ingenious. I am always a sucker for a cypher, secret messages, secret passages that sort of thing. I guess in some ways this was famous five (by Enid Blyton) for adults and that was my attraction to it. The setting was well described although to me a bit awful with all the white representations of Aboriginal "mysteries" (meaning sex and torture). I think another inaccuracy in the novel was the way lorikeets were portrayed as behaving, but I could cope with that better than the racist stuff and black-face.
I think for its time this was an attempt to be respectful and positive about Aboriginal culture (which is depressing in itself). Unlike the series editors who extoll the author's accuracy in depicting Aboriginal culture and who say it is such a pity Sidney Courtier has been neglected, I am happy to consign the unhappy experiment (irritating dude-bro Haig and all) to colonial history and move on.
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Aboriginal culture is presented as primitive and based on food, sex and death/pain. The character's reactions to the photograph in the story are both racist and homophobic and the idea that a woman (under suspicion for being involved in the crimes) has too weak sensibilities to be allowed to see the "obscene" photo she is accused of possessing said a lot for the gender in the book (Martha wasn't all bad though). There is also a lovely part where a mentally ill middle-aged woman is being talked about and a character claims she needs a man to beat her up and that would cure her. LOVELY!
The puzzle itself was a little bit ingenious. I am always a sucker for a cypher, secret messages, secret passages that sort of thing. I guess in some ways this was famous five (by Enid Blyton) for adults and that was my attraction to it. The setting was well described although to me a bit awful with all the white representations of Aboriginal "mysteries" (meaning sex and torture). I think another inaccuracy in the novel was the way lorikeets were portrayed as behaving, but I could cope with that better than the racist stuff and black-face.
I think for its time this was an attempt to be respectful and positive about Aboriginal culture (which is depressing in itself). Unlike the series editors who extoll the author's accuracy in depicting Aboriginal culture and who say it is such a pity Sidney Courtier has been neglected, I am happy to consign the unhappy experiment (irritating dude-bro Haig and all) to colonial history and move on.
Next...
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review