A remote section of New South Wales has seen some baffling tragedies over the past 18 months or so. Two people — a woman and a man — have been found strangled to death in the area. The murders occur during fierce sandstorms that last for more than day, thus wiping out any tracks or evidence that the killer might have left behind.

It's a setup tailor made for Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte, a half-caste detective who once again goes undercover to try to ferret out the culprit. The cold case heats up quickly when another storm provides cover for a third attack. Can Bony piece together the puzzle before the winds rise again?

I find the exotic (to me) setting endlessly fascinating, and the characters are finely drawn. There was a plot twist that I saw coming from a mile away but I won't subtract any points as I suspect the reader is meant to catch on long before the twist is revealed.

In this, the fifth book in the series, the formula that Upfield employed has come into focus, though recognizing that doesn't really diminish my enjoyment of the books much. Bony always goes undercover; his magnetic personality magically overcomes the reflexive racism of pretty much every white person he counters, and the weather plays a supporting role in the plot. Oh, and there is a beautiful young woman and a mysterious Englishman who is clearly living and working below his station; if you guessed that the two are destined to end up together I can only assume you've read one of the earlier books.

I might be projecting based on a limited experience with mysteries of this era, but in that inevitable romantic subplot I see echoes of Patricia Wentworth's Miss Silver series, which also featured star-crossed lovers whose happy ending could be seen from a mile away, even in a sandstorm. ( )

One of the early Bony stories set in his classic setting, a sttaion dee in the outback. Two murders had been committed there a year before, and the original investigation had been bungled, so now Bony has to tackle a cold case. ( )

Gleeful anticipation describes the approach of Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte to an interesting case, and it also describes how any reader familiar with Arthur Upfield’s Bony series begins one of those novels. Winds of Evil is the fifth novel of the series. Bony arrives at the outback NSW town of Carie to investigate the strangling murders of an aboriginal girl and a white man, as well as the attempted strangling of a white woman. Under the guise of a farm labourer, Bony discovers that all the events occurred during fierce sandstorms. After himself having a narrow escape from the hands of the strangler, he eventually refines his suspect to eleven men. With an interesting cast of characters, Upfield’s usual eloquent descriptions of the surrounds, plenty of twists and turns, and the odd red herring, Winds of Evil is another Upfield masterpiece. ( )

#5 in the series featuring Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony, as he prefers to be called), the (and I quote the book here) "half-caste" detective who does not like to think of himself as a policeman. These books are set in Australia; Bony had a white father and aboriginal mother, now has children of his own & loves his job: detecting & crime solving. In this installment, he has a rather perplexing mission: he must not only solve a crime that is a year old, but he must prevent another one from happening. It seems that every time the windstorms kick up down at the Wirragatta Station (in the outback), someone gets strangled to death. Bony is sent for and as he arrives, there is an attempted murder done in the same fashion. The policeman in charge is incompetent, so Bony must find the killer before he can strike again.

This one was quite good; there were a large number of suspects from which to choose and it was fun trying to whittle them down. However, I will say, that one part of the mystery was very transparent and I figured it out. But that shouldn't stop anyone (and it didn't me) from enjoying the rest of the story. I love these mysteries and plan to collect the entire set. If you've read these mysteries before, then you'll enjoy this one; if you want something new in a mystery series, then try this one. One caveat: you may feel that the language in these books is racist and disdain the book for that reason, but I ask you to consider the time in which this was written as well as attitudes belonging to that time period before you rush off to condemn this author. These are fun, and I do enjoy Bony's character very much. ( )