Craig Silvey's Jasper Jones: a novel was a hit with majority of our book clubbers. One reader had got waylaid not long into the book but felt she had missed something worthwhile as discussion ensued.
Jeffery Lu was a great favourite: his resilience, irrepressibility and wicked wit really captured readers' hearts. The discrimination he and his family suffered at the hands of the town both at the social event and the cricket really upset our readers. Bullying from school children was considered bad enough, but when it was sanctioned and abetted by the town's adults, it seemed unbearable. There was the comment that bullying seems to have appeared rather regularly in our book club reads so maybe authors feel this issue is sufficiently prevalent to warrant attention in their works.
There was much discussion as to the way the adults behaved badly while the main child characters displayed a mature compassion and understanding beyond their years. The lack of empathy shown by the majority of adult characters, Charlie's dad and Mad Jack Lionel excepted, was a source of concern for our readers. Opinions varied as to whether this sort of behaviour would be condoned in small Australian towns today.
Our readers really enjoyed the camaraderie and banter between Charlie and Jeffrey. The range of their conversation topics, their arguments regarding hypotheticals as well as the mental games they played really intrigued and amused our readers. Our book clubbers also delighted in the developing relationship between Eliza and Charlie which was accompanied by Jeffrey's persistent, consistent 'Sassytime!' commentary. Opinions varied as to whether Jasper Jones would ever outrun society's bleak perception and expectation that he was 'bad'.
The overall conclusion was that Jasper Jones was a worthy read, well written and a credible depiction of small Australian towns in the 1960s. Our readers thought this novel could be developed into a great movie.
Our next novel is a crime thriller that takes us to the UK; SJ Watson's Before I Go To Sleep.
I'll include more details about this book in my next blog!
You may need to read this book with the lights on..............
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