Silvey, while drawing to some degree on his own experience growing up in a somewhat similar place to Corrigan, had no desire to write a book that was parochial. I was also interested to what extent the fictional Corrigan might reflect the realities of life in rural WA. I was particularly struck by the degree to which past actions haunt the contemporary landscapes of town whether it be through the fragile relationships within families, the sense of shame and subsequent secrecy that can destroy the concept of love itself, and the inability of a community to cope with and accept difference, rendering notions of the communal redundant.
While the aggression of Corrigan is often apparent, it is the potential for violence pervading the town that provides a relentless tension throughout the book. While Charlie in particular is racked with guilt and despair over his own actions as well as those of others, he also articulates a poignancy and tenderness beyond his years on realising that he must confront his own dishonesty. It is also a place wrought by tragedy and loss a theme explored in the book through the emotions, thoughts and exchanges between Charlie and Jasper. One is the young teenager, Charlie Bucktin, the narrator of the novel, while the second is his closest friend, Jeffrey Lu, a boy of Vietnamese background, who confronts the racial taunts regularly hurled at him with a razor-sharp intellect and the genius of a pull shot to the boundary.Ĭorrigan is a town steeped in mystery, where the barely hidden secrets and whispers of the past litter the landscape. The tragic circumstances that follow this eventful night involve the outcast Jasper Jones himself, a ‘mixed race’ boy, born of shame, secrecy and town gossip, and a pair of self-imposed internal exiles of Corrigan. The story is set in the fictional WA rural town of Corrigan in 1965, and begins with the rattling at a bedroom window in the dead of night, the mysterious death of a young girl, and the murky secrets held in the bottom of a swamp. Jasper Jones is an engrossing and immediate page-turner that evokes an influential literary history while producing an original and rewarding narrative in its own right.
Those who have been eagerly awaiting a second novel from Silvey will be pleased. The reception and following success of Rhubarb resulted in Silvey receiving a prestigious Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Novelist award in 2007.
The excitement surrounding the book’s release quickly spread from his home state, Western Australia, to the eastern seaboard. Craig Silvey’s first novel, Rhubarb, was published to critical acclaim in 2004.
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