Five Boys: Complete & Unabridged [Audiobook] [Audio Cassette]

Mick Jackson (Author), Sir Derek Jacobi (Reader)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2002

Mick Jackson's first novel, The Underground Man, was hailed by critics worldwide as expertly written (The Times, London),the literary hit of the season (Elle), and "highly imaginative" (New York Times), establishing him as a terrifically funny writer with a gift for visceral impact. Now, with Five Boys, Jackson creates a brilliantly captivating and distinctive tale of the impact of World War II on the home front, bringing to light a lost place and time with an expert touch.

When Bobby is evacuated from London to a remote Devonshire village, a strange new chapter of his life begins. Empty of its menfolk, the village is given over to the "stay behinds": the women, the old and young, the nonconscripts, and five terrifying boys who accuse Bobby of being a Nazi spy -- subjecting him to horrible mistreatment. At the center of these eccentric folk is the enigmatic Bee King, a mysterious figure who exercises a powerful, hypnotic influence on the village, and especially the boys.

As the days wind down to the D-day invasion, excitement and tension overtake this remote coastal town. While the Allied soldiers crash the beaches along the French coast, the villagers will enact their own drama -- a tense interplay of events that will engulf them all and ultimately reveal the truth about the Bee King.

Riveting and thoroughly researched, Five Boys offers an unforgettable poetic fusion of fable and history that is certain to linger with the reader long after the last page has been turned.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this funny, touching and highly original novel, a close-knit gang of five boys forms a prism that refracts the idiosyncrasies of WWII English life in a small village in Devon. Ostensibly, the story is about Bobby, a newcomer evacuated from London and the Blitz, who is terrorized and then befriended by the gang. But the real protagonist is the town itself and its unusual denizens: Lillian Minter, the spinster who reluctantly takes Bobby in; the Captain, who spends his days fashioning models of ships wrecked off the Devon coast and, eventually, another newcomer, an apiarist known only as "the Bee King," who introduces the boys to "the harem in the hive." These eccentric characters, and many others, are decisively etched, though the eponymous quintet are strangely undeveloped; only one, Aldred Crouch, emerges from their collective presence. The narrative is episodic, more an integrated collection of seriocomic short stories than a novel with dramatic unity, but these vignettes are a testament to Jackson's writerly skill and imagination. Highly evocative of both time and place, the novel is about the bizarre ways the war affected those left at home and how it changed virtually everything about English life, particularly for the generation too young to serve. Jackson, whose previous book, The Underground Man, was shortlisted for the Booker, has a tender, observant eye and a quirky imagination, qualities that bring this work rare luminosity and insight. (June 4)Forecast: Sales could benefit from Jackson's familiarity to American audiences as a former member of the British bands the Screaming Adbabs and the Dinner Ladies. Booksellers can reference John Boorman's movie, Hope and Glory, for a similar evocation of time and place.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

In his second novel, following The Underground Man (1997), Jackson tracks young Bobby as he is evacuated from London during World War II and billeted with the elderly Miss Minter in South Devon. Deeply homesick, he is somewhat baffled by Miss Minter's odd attempts to keep him continuously busy: she has him sort huge jars of peas and beans. Then he is set upon by the local gang of "five boys," who force him to swallow worms and worse. Bobby is finally able to ingratiate himself with one of them, Aldred, who suffers from an overactive thyroid and is obsessed with London. The six engage in a series of adventures including sneaking into the house of a suspected German spy (it turns out "the spy" uses his telescope to watch the local ladies at their keep-fit class). The story then shifts to the boys' fascination with a mysterious beekeeper who has a private agenda. Jackson's vivid, episodic novel boasts a charmingly quirky cast of characters and subtly but surely plies its dark theme of retribution. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: Chivers Audio Books (January 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0754007928
• ISBN-13: 978-0754007920
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not really a novel, August 19, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Five Boys: A Novel (Paperback)

As you will read with the other reviews, the book is divided into two parts but actually tells three stories. The first story about Bobby starts out well enough but Jackson seems to lose interest in telling that story, which was really interesting, and just evacuates Bobby out of the town and pretty much out of the story. He then turns his attention to how the villagers in the town Bobby had been evacuated to and then out of get along when Americans take over most of the area before the Normandy invasion and then after. Again, Jackson seems to lose interest in telling the story for the war ends but none of the impact of the war is explained. For instance, the father of one of the boys doesn't make it home but it doesn't come up except in passing in story three. I'd think that would make a pretty big impact on a boy and thus be a great story. But Jackson just ends the war and then picks up with a rather bizarre tale of the Bee King and some strange metaphor of revenge and then ends the book.

None of the stories develop fully, although you'd like them to. What results is some splashes of wonderful writing and interesting characters amid a story utterly disjointed. In the end it reminds me of my English grandmother that laughed at the wrong places in jokes because she knew she was suppose to laugh but had no idea what was funny. Jackson can apparently tell a tale but has no idea how to tie a story together and seems to flounder around with ideas. I was very disapointed.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The End of Innocence, January 9, 2003

By 

A. Ross (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Five Boys: A Novel (Hardcover)

I picked up this book believing it was a novel about a young London boy sent to live in Devon to avoid getting killed in the Blitz. However, this is only the first of three separate storylines, which are direly lacking in cohesion but form a charming and poignant ensemble. The first part of the book follows Bobby, who is yanked from his London family with little warning, stuck on a train with no explanation, and winds up in a small town in the care of an unprepared spinster. What follows is a kind of warm fish out of water tale as the city boy struggles to adjust to country life. Central to this is becoming friends with the villages "five boys", a rowdy pack of boys his age who spur each other to various mischief and tomfoolery.

The second part of the book kind of wanders away from Bobby's tale and broadens out into little stories about some of the adult villagers and one of the five boys. A catalyst for this is the arrival of the large American Army preparing for D-Day. This means the forced relocation of those living in a large area right next to the village, which is an interesting and unknown story in its own right. But basically, the wacky antics of the kids gives way to the wacky antics of the adults. These include stories about an undercover operation to recover a pig from American territory, the effects of a dance to which the GIs are invited, and a detailed episode of how a ratatcher exterminates a field full of rats after the GIs are gone.

In the final third of the book, Bobby has returned to London and the five boys are enthralled by a different newcomer, a mysterious man who keeps bees and is impervious to village prying. The beekeeper completely captivates the boys and his enigmatic nature keeps one guessing as to what's really going on. Despite hints here and there, the ending comes as a bit of a shock, and can be read as emblematic of the end of innocence in England.

It's a good book, charming and well written, with plenty of evocative descriptions and smells, and good stories. However, one wonders why it's constructed (and marketed) as a novel, when it's really a series of linked short stories. Without a central figure, mood, or theme, the book doesn't quite hold together in the way one expects a novel to. That aside, it's quite enjoyable, and makes a good companion to Michael Frayn's novel Spies, which is about two London boys during the war.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not A Novel And Not Short Stories, August 5, 2002

By 

taking a rest - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Five Boys: A Novel (Hardcover)

"Five Boys", is the second novel from author Mick Jackson. I don't know what the proper term for his work would be for it is not structured like a typical novel, for at times it reads like separate short stories. All of the events in the book involve the same general area once London is left, but after an initial period of time, the book changes from a singular continuing tale embracing some characters, to almost forgetting others, and focusing in depth on very few.

A young man is evacuated from London with a group of children for their safety from the bombs of the German Luftwaffe. The problem is that in addition to the normal trauma of being separated from family and friends, he meets a quintet of young boys near his new home that makes the idea of staying in London and chancing the bombs an alternative worth considering. These five little brutes all born within two weeks of each other also share the same capacity for havoc and cruelty that came with the brief time they all entered the world. The progression of their abuse is fairly typical, and then it stops, and with it the traditional narrative sequence stops as well.

The author then shares a series of vignettes about a variety of people in and around the village and the effects of having a large pre D-Day contingent of Americans take over a portion of their community for invasion training. This causes a variety of inconveniences which in turn provide for a good deal of comedy. A source of food is behind the checkpoints the Americans have set up and it is decided that it must be retrieved. The cast of characters brought together, and the coffin, a baby carriage, and the effects of the animal eating far too many apples that have become hard cider, make for an interesting chase.

These various episodes continue until the arrival of a man known as the beekeeper. His arrival coincides with the book returning to a more traditional progression, and an end that is startling at the very least.

"The Underground Man", was the first novel by this author, and I will probably go back and read it once again. If I remember correctly that book was eccentric because of the character and his actions, while this book is a bit eccentric in its structure. This writer is enjoyable, he is not just another author treading familiar ground, he goes to new places, and takes new paths to reach them