The Dickens Boy

By the Booker-winning author of Schindler´s Ark, a vibrant novel about Charles Dickens´ son and his little-known adventures in the Australian Outback. In 1868, Charles Dickens dispatches his youngest child, sixteen-year-old Edward, to Australia. Posted to a remote sheep station in New South Wales, Edward discovers that his father´s fame has reached even there, as has the gossip about his father´s scandalous liaison with an actress. Amid colonists, ex-convicts, local tribespeople and a handful of eligible young women, Edward strives to be his own man - and keep secret the fact that he´s read none of his father´s novels. Conjuring up a life of sheep-droving, horse-racing and cricket tournaments in a community riven with tensions and prejudice, the story of Edward´s adventures also affords an intimate portrait of Dickens´ himself. This vivacious novel is classic Keneally: historical figures and events re-imagined with verve, humour and compassion.