Utu

The book contains fairly graphic violence, and some portrayals of sexual assault, as well as a variety of consensual sex that might or might not be to your taste.

I read this over several months, mainly in the bath. So my impression of the book might have been different if I took more baths.

This is a police procedural in form, but it would be a stretch to describe it as copaganda. The police characters are either corrupt, hapless, or semi-deranged drug addicts.

The setting of NZ working through it's colonial past is interesting. I don't know much about Maori culture and history, but the portrayal of systemic racism towards indigenous people rang relatively true to me as a Canadian.

At some point it becomes clear that what is (probably) going on is a violent response to a modern appropriation/theft of Maori lands. As a settler descendant this is both fascinating and a bit scary to contemplate.

This is one of those books where all of the characters are morally somewhat murky. Some are full of rage because of mistreatment, some like the protagonist apparently because they just made bad choices.

In the end it left me a bit numb, with lots of bad things happening to lots of bad people, and a few more or less innocent bystanders.