Heart-warming humours take on a not uncommon situation - a read for adults and children alike

A Boy Called Hope by Lara Williamson

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a story about an eleven year old boy, Dan Hope, seeking his estranged father who left the family home for another woman several years earlier. The father has had no contact with his son or the rest of the family since he left but Dan is forever hopeful he can still have a relationship with his dad. Dan’s older sister Grace is a great counterbalance to Dan’s naïve belief that their dad will return and all will be well.
Ms Williamson has an excellent writing style with a focus on pertinent descriptions—just sufficient to allow the reader to visualise the scene—emotional responses to the many and varied situations Dan finds himself in, and the action/reaction interplay of a young, nearly teenager boy, trying to make sense of his world. Written in the first person, Ms Williamson incorporates a great device – clichés – so we see a mainly humorous world through Dan’s eyes in which he tries to make sense of absurd phrases grownups take for granted.
Although written for young pre-teenage boys the story is a worthy read for children and adults alike, and has a theme ‘a little bit of hope can go a long way,’ which is relevant to everyone.
This is Ms Williamson’s debut novel. And rightly, she has received a lot of success and well deserved accolades, though for her next book ‘The Boy Who Sailed the Ocean in an Armchair,’ she has set the bar very high.
A thoroughly enjoyable read.




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