"Detective-Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte is called to the drought-sticken outback for this, his latest case. At a desolate sheep station two men have been savagely beaten to death and it's Bony's job to make an arrest. This isn't an easy case, since clues are scarce in this sun-baked, sand-blown country, but Bony's understanding of the bush and the people who live there--both black and white--leads him inexorably to the killer." - from the 1991 Angus & Robertson "Arkon" edition

"Eric Downer and his father John Downer are returning home, after John's annual binge in town, to the 150,000 acres of land they lease at Lake Jane. Three years of drought have dried the lake, killed all the vegetation and most of the sheep. Even from a distance the homestead looks frighteningly desolate. The dog at the gate is near death, the "chooks" are all dead and outside lies the body–not of Brandt the overseer who had stayed behind, but of a stranger. Bony becomes more and more unhappy as he investigates the case and the scant clues all point in a direction which will cause those he has grown to admire much unhappiness." – from "The Armchair Detective"

Location: Mindee (fictional, but obviously based on Menindee) on the Darling River, NSW.

Bony and the Black Virgin was first published in Britain by Heinemann in 1959. The American edition was printed by Macmillan's Collier Books in 1965 under the title The Torn Branch. The Collins/Angus and Robertson edition of 1991 is shown above.