Young Jennifer's small world is thrown completely topsy-turvy by sudden revelations about her own and her family's past. Seeking escape, Jennifer is about to undergo her own adventures in a wonderland of her own, with consequences more terrifying than she can (yet) imagine. Glaister is the author of Honour Thy Father and Trick or Treat.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Dangerous secrets and sinister undertones power this uncommon coming-of-age tale. Writing with authority about adolescent insecurity, British author Glaister ( Honour Thy Father ) invests her theme with dramatic resonance, giving her slightly misfit antiheroine some responsibility for a final tragic event. When introduced, 12-year-old Jennifer is preoccupied with digging a tunnel in the garden of her English hometown. She imagines digging straight through to Australia, and thus escaping the dull life she leads with Mama and Bob. Soon after Jennifer commences this project in distancing, Mama drops a bombshell: Jennifer is not their daughter but their grandchild, born to their since-banished daughter. This announcement increases Jennifer's sense of alienation; she begins spending her free time in an abandoned church with a squatter named Johnny. More intrigued than frightened by Johnny's erratic disposition, Jennifer overlooks his possible role in the disappearances of local girls. But then her fantasies and ostensibly innocent lies take on some real consequences, which she must face. Glaister is a shrewd observer of domestic minutiae as well as emotional nuances. A masterful play of dark foreshadowing, the novel grips the reader's emotions as it moves to a haunting conclusion.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
The day Jennifer turned 13, she was told that the people she thought were her parents were really her grandparents. Furthermore, she had been born in November, not in June, as she had always believed. As she struggles to adjust her worldview, Jennifer turns on her grandparents. She discovers the power of lies and begins to use this power to her own ends. Eventually, she learns that real harm can result from a careless lie, and her life is changed forever. Glaister's third novel (following Honour Thy Father , LJ 5/1/91) is poignant and observant, capturing the confusion of adolescence and mixing bizarre elements with everyday life. The author leads the reader through a maze of images, resolving the conflicts she creates with skill and elegance. Recommended for public libraries.
- Joanna M. Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island, Coll. of Continuing Education Lib., Kingston
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
- Joanna M. Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island, Coll. of Continuing Education Lib., Kingston
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars
boring,
By A Customer
This review is from: Digging to Australia (Hardcover)
Dull dull dull. The main character was uninteresting, which makes for an uninteresting book when written in the first person as this one is. Plot points that were intriguing on the book jacket, such as naked Bob and the mysterious Johnny, are largely unexplored in favor of the angst of 13 year old Jenny. The book just never got my attention, and I really didn't care what happened to Jenny.
5.0 out of 5 stars
It is lurid, loud and enormously enjoyable!,
By A Customer
This review is from: Digging to Australia (Hardcover)
The narrator is a girl named Jennifer, who is on the brink of adolescence. Her home life is somewhat strange ( her father, Bob, insists on naked calishtenics every morning for the whole family and her gray-haired mother placidly goes along ) , she has no friends and yearns to be normal. And then her already off-center world is thrown completely topsy-turvy when she learns that her supposed parents are really her grandparents, that her mother fled years ago, and that, worse yet for someone about to turn thirteen, her real birthday is now much later in the year. Seeking escape both in her fantasies ---- her favorite book has long been "Alice in Wonderland" ---- and in real life ---- through her friendship with obsequious new schoolmate, Bronwyn, and with the sinister Johnny, who dwells in a forgotten, never-consecrated church ---- Jennifer is about to undergo her own adventures in her own wonderland, with terrifying and final consequences she cannot ( yet ) even imagine.
I loved it and I recommend it to people of all ages
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