A cat... a ping-pong ball... a drunken gardener... With these slight clues to go on Detective-Inspector Bonaparte investigates the mysterious death of famous author, Mervyn Blake, who dies an agonising death late one night in his writing room. But how did he die? No one knows. No one that is until Bony's acute observation of human nature uncovers the murderer - and the method used to kill Blake. One of the few Bonaparte mysteries not set in the outback, reveals Upfield at his best and most ingenious. Napoleon Bonaparte - my best detective. - Daily Express

Arthur Upfield created Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony) who features in twenty-nine novels written from the 1920s to the the 1960s, mostly set in the Australian Outback. He was the first Australian professional writer of crime detection novels. Upfield arrived in Australia from England on 4 November 1911, and this collection of twenty-two critical essays by academics and scholars has been published to celebrate the centenary of his arrival. The essays were all written after Upfield’s death in 1964 and provide a wide range of responses to his fiction. The contributors, from Australia, Europe and the United States, include journalist Pamela Ruskin who was Upfield’s agent for fifteen years, anthropologists, literary scholars, pioneers in the academic study of popular culture such as John G. Cawelti and Ray B. Browne, and novelists Tony Hillerman and Mudrooroo whose own works have been inspired by Upfield’s. The collection sheds light on the extent and nature of critical responses to Upfield over time, demonstrates the type of recognition he has received and highlights the way in which different preoccupations and critical trends have dealt with his work. The essays provide the basis for an assessment of Upfield’s place not only in the international annals of crime fiction but also in the literary and cultural history of Australia.

Written from a multicultural and interdisciplinary perspective, this collection of new essays explores the semiotics of food in the 20th- and 21st-century crime fiction of authors such as Anthony Bourdain, Arthur Upfield, Sara Paretsky, Andrea Camilleri, Fred Vargas, Ruth Rendell, Stieg Larsson, Leonardo Padura, Georges Simenon, Paco Ignacio Taibo II, and Donna Leon. The collection covers a range of issues, such as the provision of intra-, peri- or paratextual recipes, the aesthetics and ethics of food, eating rituals as indications of cultural belonging, and regional, national and supranational identities. It also tackles eating disorders and other seemingly abnormal habits as signs of "Otherness." Also mentioned are the television productions of the Inspector Montalbano series (1999-ongoing), the Danish-Swedish Bron/Broen (2011, The Bridge), and its remakes The Tunnel (2013, France/UK) and The Bridge (2013, USA).

In the world of crime fiction, Arthur W. Upfield stands among the giants. His detective-inspector Napoleon Bonaparte, is one of the most memorable of all crime fighters. Upfield was an independent, fiercely self-assertive ex-Britisher, who loved Australia, especially the Outback. In many ways Upfield became Outback Australia—the “Spirit of Australia.”

A collection of projects by some University of Melbourne students involving dolls made up to look like victims and villains from Arthur Conan Doyle's books about Sherlock Holmes.