Ian Cross: The God Boy

Set in small-town New Zealand during the 1950s, The God Boy is New Zealand's equivalent of Catcher in the Rye or To Kill a Mockingbird. So it is appropriate that Penguin has chosen to launch its New Zealand Classics series by reissuing this haunting coming-of-age tale first published in 1957.

The story is told from the view of a young Catholic schoolboy called Jimmy Sullivan. Now aged 13, he lives in a Catholic orphanage run by nuns. His first sentence, "You would think I care, and I did for a while, but not now", immediately draws you into his troubled world.

The novel reads almost like a confession as he then relates the traumatic events of the previous two years.

He describes his life when he was 11 - a time when "I used to care". He lived with his parents on the outskirts of a small town called Raggleton (loosely based on Wanganui).

While Jimmy loved both his hard-drinking father and his reserved mother, his parents were a mismatched couple who spent much of their time fighting.

Jimmy and his older sister Molly were increasingly caught in the emotional crossfire. His father, in particular, deliberately used the children to provoke his wife's anger. However, while Molly was able to escape her unhappy home life by going to boarding school each term, Jimmy was trapped.

At first Jimmy tried to share his concerns with his school friends but it became painfully clear that they all came from "normal" happy homes. The only adult he knew, apart from his teachers and the local priest, was an old fisherman called Bloody Jack, the local recluse.

Jack was surprisingly sympathetic, but the only advice he could offer the boy was to stop caring.

"Be sorry but don't worry or care," he said. "They can take care of themselves."

But, of course, Jimmy couldn't stop worrying and he resorted to "protection tricks". For example, when hearing his parents arguing he would wash his hands in boiling water, hoping that the burning sensation would stop him from thinking about them.

His school work began to suffer but when his teacher, Sister Angela, tried to get to the bottom of his behaviour, he reassured her that he was "a God boy" and that: "No matter what happens then, there's nothing really to be worried about, because God is watching and will fix things up".

Unfortunately for Jimmy, the personal God he imagined did not step in at the crucial moment, and his mother killed his father during a violent argument. It is clear that Jimmy is still deeply traumatised by his experiences.

Since Cross wrote The God Boy several leading authors for adolescents have written books that touch on family violence, teenage angst and alienation. Yet few have created a character as compelling and as believable as Jimmy Sullivan.

Cross writes with such clarity and insight that it is impossible not to empathise with Jimmy.

While The God Boy is still used as a set class text in many Catholic schools, hopefully this new edition will encourage more teenagers to read this book for themselves. Jimmy's attempts to cope with adult problems are as relevant today as they were in 1957.

Publisher: Penguin

Price: $27.99

Age: 12+

Recommended by: Dorothy Vinicombe