Bernard Beckett: Home Boys

Reviewed by MARGIE THOMSON

Beckett is among our most adventurous writers for young people, and he doesn't stand still, style-wise. Jolt was a chilling thriller; No Alarms, bleak social-realism. Home Boys shifts again, being part historical novel, part adventure story, but with supernatural elements that lend mystery and creepiness.

Children, and some adults, will be shocked by Beckett's story of a young English boy, 14-year-old Colin, relocated to New Zealand after World War II - for a better life, the adults around him insist.

In reality, he embarks on a life of great hardship and abuse at the hands of the farming couple he is sent to. Tragically, this story is based on the real experiences of some of the children, now dubbed "the lost generation", brought out under this optimistic but misguided scheme.

Beckett, though, is always interested in relationships between children, and so into this picture comes Dougal, a boy with secrets in his past and a great desire to dominate, and Veronica, a wayward, troubled beauty with whom Colin falls in puppy love. All the children have a great need for love, and particular ways of seeking it.

The story - of abuse, escape, belonging and betrayal amid dour, isolated little communities where all manner of frightening behaviour can be got away with - clips along with great energy.

I still think Jolt is the most coherent of Beckett's recent novels, but this one is a grim, glorious extravagance. Its great dollops of adventure and emotional complexity should please a wide audience.

Publisher: Longacre

Price: $18.95