The Golden Child in Aussie Readers

Jan 28, 2017 Brenda rated it it was amazing

Shelves: contemporary-fiction, drama, aussie-authors, sent-by-publisher, reviewing-by-request, young-adult, own-read, 2017-release, arc

When Dan Mahony informed his wife Beth that they would be returning home to Australia, she immediately thought they’d move to Sydney. But his clarification that the transfer would be to Newcastle, where both her mother-in-law AND her mother lived – well Beth was horrified to say the least! They had lived in New Jersey, USA for some time. Their girls, Lucy and Charlotte (Charlie) had grown up there, gone to school there – it was their home. Out of the two though, Charlie was the one who was most When Dan Mahony informed his wife Beth that they would be returning home to Australia, she immediately thought they’d move to Sydney. But his clarification that the transfer would be to Newcastle, where both her mother-in-law AND her mother lived – well Beth was horrified to say the least! They had lived in New Jersey, USA for some time. Their girls, Lucy and Charlotte (Charlie) had grown up there, gone to school there – it was their home. Out of the two though, Charlie was the one who was most upset.

The family settled into their life in Newcastle and eventually moved into an old home on The Hill overlooking the ocean. Dan and Beth loved where the house was situated while Charlie of course hated everything – the old house, the lumpy mattress; she missed her friends. Lucy was her usual self, but did agree the house definitely needed renovating. Once the girls were installed in high school – year seven for Charlie – Beth returned to her online blogging. She didn’t have a big audience but enjoyed the interactions with people around the world.

Until it all came crashing down. Bullying in its most insidious form had harmed a classmate and the blame was pointed quite firmly at Beth’s beautiful child. Beth and Dan’s confusion and pain were intense, but of course the rumours were wrong – they had to be didn’t they? Beth and Dan were the parents – they knew their children. They’d brought them up to have the highest of ethics – to aim for only the best. They were kind and generous children – neither was the type of child to do what people were saying…

The Golden Child by Aussie author Wendy James is an intensely breathtaking journey into the world of teenagers and the harm that can come through seemingly innocent past-times; through the selfishness of said teens and the outcome of some “normal” teenage activities. Nowadays with social media in all its forms there’s always the possibility of cyber bullying, and horrifyingly, it happens too often. In The Golden Child there is also high school and being the leader of the gang, impressing peers. The combination of the two can and did create a havoc that Beth and Dan had no idea about. I thoroughly enjoyed The Golden Child, was completely absorbed in what was happening and couldn’t put it down! Most highly recommended.

With thanks to HarperCollinsPublishers AU and the author for my copy to read and review.
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Jan 28, 2017 Janine rated it it was amazing

Gosh what a great book, I started today at 50% read and just finished it tonight, couldn't put it down. Such a topical and somewhat sad reflection on life today. A story that had so many elements to it - social media, bullying, working mothers, sibling rivalry, jealousy, suicide, loneliness, I could go on and on.

Hard to reveal too much without spoilers but it involves two girls at school and bullying. I would like to say that this book should be read by every teenager and parent of a school age ...more

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Jan 21, 2017 Bree T rated it it was amazing

Shelves: arc, australian, aww2017

This novel made me never want to have high-school aged children.

Obviously that’s not an option. My children are 8 and 5, they’re going to get there at some stage. Probably far sooner than I would like. But this book made me desperately want to slow time to a crawl, to put off that inevitable stage. It terrifies me, how much bullying has escalated in this day and age of social media and anonymous keyboard warriors. It terrifies me that schools make all the right noises but struggle to really unde This novel made me never want to have high-school aged children.

Obviously that’s not an option. My children are 8 and 5, they’re going to get there at some stage. Probably far sooner than I would like. But this book made me desperately want to slow time to a crawl, to put off that inevitable stage. It terrifies me, how much bullying has escalated in this day and age of social media and anonymous keyboard warriors. It terrifies me that schools make all the right noises but struggle to really understand what is happening and effectively control it, now that so much of it happens out of school hours and grounds.

At the beginning of the story, Beth lives in America, her husband having been transferred there for work. Her girls seem a dream – younger daughter Charlie is pretty and popular. Older daughter Lucy doesn’t have Charlie’s popularity and circle of friends but is smart and sweet. When Beth’s husband Dan gets a transfer back to Australia, there are mixed feelings. It’s to Newcastle, his home town and where his mother still lives. Not Sydney, Beth’s town. Beth’s home. For Beth, coming back to Australia isn’t going the way she had it planned out in her head.

Unable to work in America as she doesn’t have a greencard, Beth runs a sort of “Mummy blog” and I think this novel pokes gentle fun at the “image” of blogging – the light, breezy posts about life, the quirky antics of children, the effortlessness of it all as well as the regular band of people offering comments in the form of unsolicited advice, their personal experiences/opinions or criticisms. As “Lizzy” on her blog, Beth is able to portray her life the way she wants and I suppose that’s the thing about blogging. There are a plethora of them out there, each one more beautifully constructed than the last. Away from “Lizzy”, Beth’s life is slowly coming apart at the seams. She feels Dan becomes a different person when around his mother, a capable woman that Beth feels doesn’t like her. It’s in that way that many of us feel about our in-laws I suppose….a “feeling”, more on what isn’t said than what is. The children are resentful about leaving, find their new house which is in need of renovation, unappealing and are going through the awkward stages of beginning a new school, of being outsiders. For Charlie, now wanting to be known as Charlotte, it’s a cool assessment of the social hierarchy and mentally calculating how to fit in where she wants to.

Reading a book like this makes me examine my own behaviour as a teenager in high school. There’s no doubt I did some things that, looking back now, I wish I hadn’t. I experienced taunting by other students – I wouldn’t call it bullying because it wasn’t prolonged and overall, I had a mostly positive experience with good friends. But there were definitely times I wished I could change schools (briefly) or that someone else would change schools to make my life a bit easier! I think that sort of stuff is normal – put a few hundred teens together in a relatively small environment and you’re going to get personality clashes and people who fight for dominance. It’s when it goes beyond that, the systematic and relentless targeting of someone, coupled with horrible messages like “kill yourself” that it’s a whole other level. Kids have a pack mentality too, which can lead to people participating in things because others are, for recognition, for a desire not to be singled out themselves and when they isolate a weakness in someone, they can be utterly brutal. Saying things they don’t mean, just words unaware of how seriously they will be taken. I also find that at that age, they don’t seem to connect very well with serious events, which may perhaps explain a few offhand reactions to the serious event that happens in this book.

I’ve read Wendy James before, so I know there are always more layers to the story. The way in which the perspectives build a story here, construct something that you think is true and then tear it down is quite masterful. It made me question what I know about my children as their parent, what I know about their character. How much is what I see because I want to? If my kids ever got involved in bullying or taunting someone at school, how much would I know about it and would I be able to believe it? I look at them now, they have very different personalities. My oldest is incredibly social but a bit sulky and resentful when he doesn’t get things his own way and a typically dominant older brother. My youngest is heartbreakingly shy and lacks the self-confidence his older brother has in spades. I think about how I’d feel if they were a bully or one being bullied and this is the stuff people never tell you about when you have kids! About how you might stop worrying about if they’re feeding ok or sleeping enough or growing right or developing on pace but you worry about other things and honestly, it doesn’t get much better!

This was one of my most anticipated books for the first half of 2017 and I’m so impressed that it lived up to (and perhaps exceeded) all of my expectations. It’s a truly brilliant book both for discussion…or to reflect on yourself. ...more

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Apr 05, 2017 Magdalena added it

Wendy James does a marvelous job of capturing the neurosis of modern life in her new novel The Golden Child. She pulls no punches in her exploration of social dynamics among teen girls, and picks up on both the positive and negative elements of social networking, blogging, cyber-bullying, online narcissism, face-to-face bullying, and the particularly insidious way that young teenagers will play against one another’s insecurities in order to bolster their own fragile egos.

The book is exceptionall Wendy James does a marvelous job of capturing the neurosis of modern life in her new novel The Golden Child. She pulls no punches in her exploration of social dynamics among teen girls, and picks up on both the positive and negative elements of social networking, blogging, cyber-bullying, online narcissism, face-to-face bullying, and the particularly insidious way that young teenagers will play against one another’s insecurities in order to bolster their own fragile egos.

The book is exceptionally well-written, and the story flies by, lightened by the blog posts of protagonist ‘mummy blogger’ Beth Mahony, aka DizzyLizzy.com, an Australian expat who has been living in the US with her husband Dan and two daughters Charlotte and Lucy, blogging about her experiences, including the family’s return to Australia when Dan gets a transfer. The plot moves fast, the narrative driving the reading towards its final unnerving twist. It all happens almost too quickly. James’ writing is so smooth, and the story so powerfully plotted, that its easy to miss how neatly the shifts are between the individual voices, the many delicate links between cause and effect and the parallels between adults and children as we move from one character to another, the way the reader is unwittingly drawn into the toxic culture of privilege that underpins these characters, or how subtle the thematics:

It isn’t the way it happens in films or books: there is no clear demarcation, no real before and after, no particular moment, no instant when everything changes, no point of no return. No line has been drawn in the sand that Beth can look at and say: there, on one side, lies the past, all good; while in the here and now all is chaos. Instead, there’s been a slow accretion of moments, a gradual dawning that things aren’t what they seem. (257)

The balance between the interior musings and rationalisations of the characters and the front they present in their various roles is just right. As the family’s notions of “perfect” and comfort start to unravel, the dramatic irony increases almost to the point of cognitive dissonance. Beth’s blog becomes a recurring trope for how reality is constructed, and this is offset by another unsettling blog called www.goldenchild.com, which presents the machiavellian and unpleasant musings of what we come to know as the antagonist of the story. However uncomfortable the story gets, and it can get very uncomfortable, as the ‘true’ nature of the characters are revealed through their monologues, there is always a lightening thread of humour in the way the characters pick at one another:

Your sister has four kids, but that hasn’t stopped her from working, not for one minute. I don’t understand why you have this desire to sacrifice yourself, when you have so much, so much, going for you.’ (48)

The parallels in the relationship between Beth and her mother, and Charlotte and her mother seem so natural that it’s easy to miss how clever and tightly woven they are. James handles the complexity perfectly, working the transition in settings, space, and place perfectly, playing off the tension between the online world and the ‘real world’. The class system that the characters buy into is ever present, from the contrast between privilege and marginalization to the high school strata. In both instance, the rules of engagement are cruel, arbitrary, and oddly close to the bone:

Against Sophie’s pariah status her gift means nothing – as Amelia has pointed out, piano is the most pointless musical talent you can have, right? It’s not as if it will ever make her famous – it’s not like being able to sing or, even better, dance. (136)

The power structures are repeated and reinforced in fractals that work through the immediate family dynamics, the extended family dynamics, the adult friendships and networks, the schoolyard dynamics, the online world, and even the power structures typified by Beth’s former boyfriend and boss Drew, who is running for political office. Though the book is one of James’ least physically confronting, no one is murdered in The Good Child, it’s one of the most chilling. The ease in which the bullying escalates, or in which the status quo is returned to, and the utter logic behind that return, is not easily shaken off.

Though some of the scenarios in The Golden Child may seem extreme, it’s close enough to reality to leave an impression that doesn’t dissipate once the book is finished. The speed at which genuine warmth and connection are handed over for safety, power, convenience and acceptance mirrors the dynamics of modern life. There’s nothing didactic about The Golden Child. There are no clear villains, not even when it becomes clear who is driving events. There is only one mistake after another, each one manipulated and justified in ways that make sense in the context of the individual narrative. The Golden Child is a superb and very sophisticated novel that is both compulsively readable, and deeply resonant - a powerful combination. ...more

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Aug 22, 2018 Kathy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The Golden Child by Wendy James is a compelling novel with a socially relevant storyline.

Beth Mahony is an Australian ex-pat living in New Jersey with her husband Dan and their two daughters, fourteen year old Lucy and twelve year old Charlotte "Charlie". Beth is a very involved stay-at-home mom who also blogs about her experiences with her family and living far from "home". Beth is shocked when Dan informs her a job opportunity means they are moving back to Australia. The timing turns out to The Golden Child by Wendy James is a compelling novel with a socially relevant storyline.

Beth Mahony is an Australian ex-pat living in New Jersey with her husband Dan and their two daughters, fourteen year old Lucy and twelve year old Charlotte "Charlie". Beth is a very involved stay-at-home mom who also blogs about her experiences with her family and living far from "home". Beth is shocked when Dan informs her a job opportunity means they are moving back to Australia. The timing turns out to be rather fortuitous since Charlie has landed in a bit of trouble at school after an "initiation" rite with her group of friends goes wrong. She is the ringleader of the group and all fingers point to Charlie as being the instigator of the prank that landed a classmate in the hospital. As the Mahony family uneasily settles in their new life, Charlotte is once again at the center of a serious incident in which musically gifted but socially awkward Sophie Pennington attempts to take her own life after she is the victim of bullying at school and on line.

Beth is surprised at the difficulty she is having settling in after their move. She remains out of sync as she tries to organize renovations on their house along with mothering duties. She is delighted by her burgeoning friendship with Sophie's mum, Andi, but Beth remains strangely dissatisfied with her new life. Until their move back to Australia, Beth has been content to not work outside the home, but that quickly changes after their move. At her mother's urging, she contacts a childhood friend's brother who is in the early stages of running for political office. Happy with her part-time job, Beth is dismayed at the growing distance between herself and her daughters as they spend more time in their rooms than with the family.

After struggling with infertility for ten years, Andi and her husband Steve are new parents for the second time. Unlike her experiences with Sophie, young Gus is an easy baby and she is enjoying bonding with the little guy. With the demands of new baby, Andi does not have as much time for her daughter but she does make a concerted effort to help Sophie become friends with Charlotte. It is not until Sophie's desperate act that Andi becomes aware of the horrible bullying at the hands of Charlotte and her classmates.

Charlotte and Lucy are as different as night and day. Lucy is content to fly under the radar and she has a small, but close-knit circle of friends. She is quiet, unassuming and never gives Beth any reason to worry about her. Charlotte, on the other hand, is eager to be in the limelight and she wants to be friends with most popular girls in their new school. Quickly realizing that spending time with Sophie will socially destroy her, Charlotte ignores her at school yet still remains her friend in private.

Despite being a bit slow-paced, The Golden Child is an engrossing peek into the world of mean girls and bullying. Shifting view points, blog posts, an anonymous website and social media offer an insightful view into the various characters' lives as the bullying attacks on Sophie intensify. The storyline is topical and extends beyond the bullying as both Beth and Andi wrestle with parental guilt once the bullying is exposed. Wendy James brings this character-driven novel to an unexpected and twist-filled conclusion. ...more

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