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5★
“I peered up the street through the shadows and just to squint that tiniest bit hurt to the living f**k. When I touched me face it felt like a punkin full of razor blades.”
Jaxie Clackton, 15, has just come to and escaped after being knocked out and tossed in the bone bin by his father in his butcher shop. Just the latest of the many times he’s survived a beating at the hands of Captain Wankbag, as he calls him, or the Cap.
Mum says that’s not respectful. Well, yeah, it’s not. And her point is? ...more
“I peered up the street through the shadows and just to squint that tiniest bit hurt to the living f**k. When I touched me face it felt like a punkin full of razor blades.”
Jaxie Clackton, 15, has just come to and escaped after being knocked out and tossed in the bone bin by his father in his butcher shop. Just the latest of the many times he’s survived a beating at the hands of Captain Wankbag, as he calls him, or the Cap.
Mum says that’s not respectful. Well, yeah, it’s not. And her point is? ...more
Well! A Winton Wild West set in the modern age! Pace and menace in equal measure. Very hard to put down and couldn't slow myself down to enjoy the writing. The writing is exceptional as always. There's a poetic rhythm to the protagonist's profanity and it's oh so Aussie. There's so much about this book that could make it "not my sort of book" but it's done so well it's an eyeopener and a must read. May well be a must read again book for me too. Loved it!
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2.5★
Quite dark as Winton's books often are. I enjoyed the story with two caveats. What was the old man actually hiding from? I found the boys dialect really annoying after a while. Petty points and certainly not enough to take away from good story telling. Not his best maybe, but worth the read nonetheless!
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4.5 stars.
A slow book until the very end when it's so rushed. Most of the book is full of so much angst and reflection and day-to-day detail and then boom, it finishes. You wonder if the author got bored or had a deadline. Blink and you've missed it.
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A typical Tim Winton novel, a gritty, raw, tough story of courage in adversity. The story is told by Jaxie Clackton, a teenage boy who has run away from home after his father’s violent death. His mother is dead, and he has been beaten by his father so he has no reason to stay. He is trying to get to his Aunty’s place in Magnet further up the Western Australian coast. He is trying to survive in the harsh Western Australian bush as he makes his way north. He meets up with Fintan McGillis, a ruined
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Feb 28, 2018
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