I Am Ned Kelly — John Molony

“Almost every Australian knows the name ‘Ned Kelly’. Few know more than the basic facts…”

In this selection off our Top Shelf, historian John Molony explores the circumstances surrounding the life and death of Ned Kelly. It’s part work of scholarship and serious biography and part speculative fiction. Take a look at this excerpt from the dust-cover:

“On the eve of his hanging, his mother, a prisoner in the same Melbourne Gaol, said to him, ‘Mind you die like a Kelly, son’; he had certainly lived like one. This is the story of Ned Kelly, of his people, who were destined to poverty, degradation and rejection, and of the land that made a legend of him.”

Our copy is a first edition in very good condition, for $25. It surely is an important milestone in Ned Kelly scholarship, but this is no dry historical tome. The early chapters outline Ned Kelly’s childhood without slipping into a laundry list of woes. The book doesn’t seek so much to explain Ned Kelly’s actions as to catalogue them in a very erudite fashion. An enjoyable book for any lover of Australiana or real life crime!

Filed under Awesome Aussie Authors, BOOKS, Books that deserve a look | Tags: Aussie Author, Aussie Crime, Australian Crime, outback crime | Comments Off

Classic Aussie Crime – Arthur Upfield

If you’ve ever travelled or lived in the real Australian outback you will really enjoy Arthur Upfield’s depictions of the landscape and its climate, as well as his descriptions of the characters and language of the era. It’s a real slice of our history in a crime novel format.

Upfield created Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony) from the Queensland Police. He was in 29 novels, mostly set in the Australian outback. The books were turned into a popular television series in the 1970′s.

You may have seen the ABC drama recently called 3 Acts of Murder, based on a true crime story. Arthur Upfield had written a book called The sands of Windee, that was used as inspiration for a real life murder.

There are plenty of websites where you can find out more about him. Here’s just one.

http://www.collectingbooksandmagazines.com/upfield.html

Magda

This book is for sale at JimmyDs Bookshop for $10.00.

Filed under Awesome Aussie Authors, Cool Crime Writers | Tags: 3 Acts of Murder, Arther Upfield, Aussie Crime, Australian Crime, Bony, Classic Crime, Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte, outback crime, The sands of Windee | Comment (1)