Sleeping Dogs [Hardcover]

Sonya Hartnett (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1995

When a stranger enters a family's midst and insists on discovering all of their darkest secrets, the family begins a slow and painful descent into decay and madness. By the author of Wilful Blue.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The eeriness that underscores Hartnett's Wilful Blue is even more prevalent in this grittier novel, also set in rural Australia. From the very beginning, readers will sense an unnatural aura surrounding the Willow family and the desolate land where they live. Isolated from townspeople, brutalized by their father and ignored by their unstable mother, the five Willow children (some of them grown) run the farm as well as a dilapidated caravan park, a place guests never visit twice. Yearning for but fearing freedom, the children remain a tightly closed clique until Oliver, the youngest boy, shares family secrets with one of the caravan tenants, an artist, who has become infatuated with Oliver's 23-year-old sister. The first chapter's grisly images of snarling dogs, butchered sheep and incestuous acts foreshadow the series of bizarre events that spiral toward a tragic conclusion involving the murder of the most sensitive and talented member of the family. Both fascinating and disturbing, this chilling story reveals how morality can be twisted by obsessive family loyalty. Ages 13-up.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

Grade 9 Up?Peek into the insular Down Under world of a family of hardscrabble farmers who operate a caravan park (campground) on the side. Griffin Willow is a domineering, alcoholic, abusive patriarch who intimidates his offspring into shunning the outside world. Grace, his wife, has withdrawn from life after bearing five children. Edward is titular head and eldest of the sibs; beautiful Michelle, 23, has an incestuous relationship with her "mentally different" younger brother, Jordan, 20, a talented artist who is regularly and viciously beaten by Griffin. Oliver, 15, harbors futile dreams of escape to college; and Jennifer, 14, is the lost child. Arriving at the campground, Bow Fox, a landscape artist looking for scenes to paint, intrudes. Through bizarre, disconnected bits of dialogue and events, character traits of the protagonists and the facts about the family are subtly revealed to Bow and to readers. Fearing that Bow will inform Griffin about the incest, the sibs hatch a plot to rid themselves of the stranger that capitalizes on his fear of dogs. In the cataclysmic climax, the revelatory note Bow delivers to Griffin drives the man to shoot and kill Jordan. The ironic denouement leaves Bow Fox wishing the family well, unaware of the havoc he has wreaked. Which sleeping dog should have been left to lie? Griffin? Bow, the catalyst of all the carnage amidst the ugliness and chaos? Jordan and Michelle, whose behavior has broken taboos? Or even young Oliver, who let slip the secret because he so desperately wanted to have a friend? This weird tale of one disturbed family is as hot and dry as Kristy Gunn's Rain (Atlantic Monthly, 1995) was sopping wet, and is equally chilling. It is bleak, stark, and offers no hope for a better tomorrow.?Joel Shoemaker, Southeast Jr. High School, Iowa City, IA
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 14 and up
  
• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: Viking Juvenile (September 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670865036
• ISBN-13: 978-0670865031
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,733,526 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A dark, twisted novel with a shocking conclusion, February 24, 2000

By 

Cameron Diaz (Manhattan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sleeping Dogs (Hardcover)

Sleeping Dogs is a masterpiece, delving deep into human mind and morals. Hartnett takes young adult literature to its boundaries. She crafts the Willow family so well, with the proud, haughty Michelle, the dreamy Jordan, and the powerful, dominant father, Griffin Willow. The Willows came to the small town suddenly, almost fifteen years ago. But for the fifteen years they have been there, no one outside the family knows anything about them. They have lived on their small farm, completely alone, isolated from the rest of the town. At first glance, the family is merely old fashioned. The father is the master of the house. The wife is obedient. And their five children, Edward, Michelle, Jordan, Oliver, and Jennifer, or `Speck' all have their unique traits; Edward is the worker in the family, Michelle daddy's girl, Jordan the artist, Oliver the brain, and Speck has the most spunk of them all. But even this close, traditional family has its secrets. Grace, Griffin's wife, has been cowed into obedience and eventually silence. Michelle is vain and haughty, and controlling of Jordan. She is the only one who truly accepts Jordan, as the rest of the family seems to reject him. His pale skin and fair hair are a striking contrast to the dark complexions of the rest of the family, a genetic trait which seems to have missed Jordan. Michelle's fierce protectiveness of Jordan and the isolation of the farm form a bond between them that is dangerously close. However, their secret seems to be safe until a man comes to their farm seeking refuge from a storm. He seems bent on destroying the family. When naive Oliver lets Michelle and Jordan's dark secret slip, a secret that not even their parents seem to know about, the children realize that there is only one solution. To keep Michelle and Jordan from exposure, they decide that there is only one way to deal with the newcomer: eliminate the threat. The tale unfolds, and as it builds up to the climax, all the blocks come crashing down in a finale that will haunt the reader long after the book is put down.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Yikes..., June 25, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Sleeping Dogs (Hardcover)

This book was horribly hard to rip away from. Not for the weak minded. It is reminicent of Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury," although much easier to read and get into! It was absolutely amazing.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Better then Expected..., April 7, 2005

By 

Brian Parmer "Brian" (Hong Kong) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sleeping Dogs (Hardcover)

In Sleeping Dogs, Sonya Hartnett shows that sometimes you have to battle day in and day out against life. She puts us in a completely different perspective that many of us wouldn't even know where to begin. The story takes place in the nineties at a caravan park in Australia. As you read this book it becomes more interesting and appealing after every page and will leave you wanting more.
Sleeping Dogs shows how five children cope with an abusive dad and a mom who could care less to listen to them. The brothers and sisters have a bond with each other because they are going through the same thing and at the same time wanting freedom. The twist happens when a stranger Bow Fox finds himself at the caravan park and builds a friendship with one of the children. He discovers the family secret, which leaves the children with one option.
As you read this compelling and breath-taking book you find that this is a deformed family and you can't simply get enough of them. Harnett has the ability to connect with her readers and make it seem like you are a part of the story while you read it. With the pain and suffering these children endure I believe that this book is target for people of all ages from high school and up. Simply because if you are a teenager you could either relate to having to suffer through pain and abuse or you could get a new and different perspective and could change how you see things. This book can do that to you because it is an eye-opening book and is very impressive piece from Hartnett and to read what these children go through and how they overcome the odds is just amazing. For an adult it makes you realize maybe you take your children for granted or don't show how much you care for them. This book can do this to you and I believe high schools should put this in part of the curriculum just because of what it can do to you and essentially make you a better person just by reading this story.
The issues raised in this book are how far adults can push there children before they have nothing left to do but betray that loyalty. I believe this issue is something that was important to address as an author because you typically don't see this sort of issue and it is something interesting to witness because most of us aren't familiar with these circumstances. Overall this book is very intriguing and something you should read just because of the fact that it deals with issues that can make a child down about themselves and how amazing it can be when they finally free themselves to a completely different world.