Review: The Piper's Son by Melina Marchetta

Thomas Mackee wants oblivion. Wants to forget parents who leave and friends he used to care about and a string of one-night stands, and favourite uncles being blown to smithereens on their way to work on the other side of the world. But when his flatmates turn him out of the house, Tom moves in with his single, pregnant aunt, Georgie. And starts working at the Union pub with his former friends. And winds up living with his grieving father again. And remembers how he abandoned Tara Finke two years ago, after his uncle's death. And in a year when everything's broken, Tom realises that his family and friends need him to help put the pieces back together as much as he needs them.

As a general rule, I'm not the biggest fan of most contemporary novels. I think it's that its a lot harder for a contemporary writer to engage a reader because usually there isn't much action going on, so they really have to work hard at keeping us hooked with something else. With say, paranormal or dystopian, there's generally some big adventure and a bad guy and a happily ever after ending where the said bad guy is defeated. It's edge of your seat action that can keep us reading even if the characterisation and writing are somewhat flawed. With contemporary it's easier to fall short because let's face it, it's easier to write a big action scene than well rounded characters and the like.

Melina Marchetta however is one of the contemporary authors who really does contemporary well. I adore, adore all her books and come out of all of them feeling a wreck of emotions. I don't know any other author who can make me feel more despair or heart ache or joy as I read their books. And Marchetta's latest novel is no different.

The Piper's Son is perhaps less YA than the rest of Marchetta's novels, but it's just as brilliant nonetheless. The characters are older and it's a darker novel in general, in both the mindset of the characters and the issues they face. Thomas Mackee is not the most likeable character to begin with, but Marchetta's writing keeps us caring until we get to know him better and we start caring about him and his family because of who they are as well. It's a roller coaster of emotions that you ride with them and Marchetta's way of making us truly feel for her characters is amazing. And the ending is one that leaves you with a smile on your face and a happy, satisfied feeling all round.

Melina Marchetta has written a marvellously deep and engaging novel with The Piper's Son and I can't wait to read what she comes up with next!

Overall:  ♥♥♥♥♥

Published: March 1st 2010 by Penguin Australia // 9 March 2010 by Candlewick Press (in the US)

Review: On The Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

My father took one hundred and thirty two minutes to die.
I counted.
It happened on the Jellicoe Road. The prettiest road I’d ever seen, where trees made breezy canopies like a tunnel to Shangri-La. We were going to the ocean, hundreds of kilometres away, because I wanted to see the ocean and my father said that it was about time the four of us made that journey. I remember asking, “What’s the difference between a trip and a journey?” and my father said, “Narnie, my love, when we get there, you’ll understand,” and that was the last thing he ever said.
We heard her almost straight away. In the other car, wedged into ours so deep that you couldn’t tell where one began and the other ended. She told us her name was Tate and then she squeezed through the glass and the steel and climbed over her own dead – just to be with Webb and me; to give us her hand so we could clutch it with all our might. And then a kid called Fitz came riding by on a stolen bike and saved our lives.
Someone asked us later, “Didn’t you wonder why no one came across you sooner?”
Did I wonder?
When you see your parents zipped up in black body bags on the Jellicoe Road like they’re some kind of garbage, don’t you know?
‘Wonder dies.’

When I finished reading Jellicoe Road, tears were streaming down my face and all I could do was lie in bed for the next 30 minutes, trying to calm down. An hour later, and I was still an emotional wreck. This book is beyond brilliant. It is ridiculously tragic and yet beautiful and hopeful, all in the same breath.

Jellicoe Road intertwines the story of Taylor and the territory wars between her country boarding school and the Cadets and Townies in the area, with the story of kids that lived there 20 years before. As a result of the two stories being told simultaneously, it can be a little confusing at the start. Everything is connected however and if you keep at it things will click and you won't be able to put it down- I know I said that the first thing I did was lie down and cry, but actually the first thing I did was run to the bathroom because I had been so engrossed in the story well, let's just say I forgot about anything else!

Jellicoe Road is a book that ruins every other book you try to read after it because it just blows everything else out of the water.  I can't tell you anything about the characterization, or the setting or any other technical aspects about the writing in this book because I was too swept away by Taylor, Jonah (oh, Jonah...) and Narnie's stories to notice any of that.  All I know is that Jellicoe Road was amazing. Just absolutely, wonderfully amazing.

Overall:  ♥♥♥♥♥

Published: First published September 2006 by Penguin Australia