I Consume Things From Some Lands Down Under

Somehow I fell into the world of Kiwi and Aussie crime. I think it started with lockdown and my internet not being the best while I worked from home. So I got DVD's from the library and fell into The Brokenwood Mysteries. It scratched a similar itch to Midsommer Murders and allowed me to work while having the show on to the side mostly listening to it and turning to watch only periodically. I love the way those mystery shows work like that for me. Anyway, Brokenwood is a fantastic little mystery show that has a fun cast of characters, intriguing mysteries and a beautiful setting. 

After this jaunt to New Zealand I searched for more of the like, and landed in Australia and the shows Troppo and Deadloch. While they both are fantastic mysteries, they hit different. Troppo is much more serious and dramatic with characters that aren't easy to love but you end up there anyway. Deadloch is a more comedic opposite partners trying to figure out the crime and how to work together, not to say it's not serious and violent at times, it is, but overall it has a bit of a sense of humor to it.

Then I went to books and found The Echo of Others and The Long Game by Simon Rowell. The first was a very good cold case style mystery that will make you thing about becoming a vegetarian. The second is the first in a series that just doesn't quite hit as well. It's good enough but probably not enough for me to continue the series.

Then I went to Red Dirt Road by S.R. White. This is much more of an isolated in the Outback mystery that really stops to freak you out and build tension with a very small group of suspects. It's in the middle of a series, but I didn't know that at the time and it stands alone very well and I will be reading further in the series for sure.

I then fell into Benjamin Stevenson's Ernest Cunningham Series. This is such an amazing group of books, starting with Everyone in My Family has Killed Someone. While the other 2 that are currently out are not as good, they are still fantastic reads of their own. The third is coming out in a couple weeks and I already have preordered it!

I still have a few more, Mystery Road started a a movie about a Aboriginal copper who fights back against corruption and racism in his town. It's a little slow moving and stylist
ically not what Hollywood would make, but the story is great and the characters you really feel for. The second movie Goldstone isn't as good but it was still enough for me to continue with the TV show shortly.

My bookclub had someone interested in cults and so they had us read Daughter of Gloriavale. This true memoir of a woman's life in the New Zealand religious cult of Gloriavale is a rough read. While the cult isn't as horrible as some you have heard of, there was certainly many abuses of the members, especially women/children, and racism that comes to play as well. It's a sad tale with the happy ending of freedom from the cult by Lilia Tarawa. 

Finally, the wife and I are listening to Michele Prak's The Rush. This is a tension building natural disaster book where the question of what's worse the natural disaster or men? and even though I am one, and I try not to use strong language on here very much, this book makes me want to just say FUCK MEN, they just SUCK!!!!!

I'm sure this is not the end of my expeditions to the other side of the world, and I'll probably be talking about more of them soon!