Australian publishing has never seen anything like it. Bryce Courtenay's latest book, Tommo & Hawk has been flogged around the country like a new shampoo. In a nationwide bombardment, Penguin Books gave away 500,000 samples of chapters from the book at traln stations, airports, ferry terminals and bus depots. Penguin's multi-million-dollar deal with Mr Courtney resulted in the biggest print run of any Australian book ever .... 25O,000 copies. In a country where a hardback is considered a success after 10,000 to 15,000 sales, Australia has rarely seen book marketing on this scale. Penguin's Managing Director, Mr Peter Field, said the company had spent an unprecedented sum, " in the high six figures", on marketing the book. The hardback edition of Tommo & Hawk hit the shelves in grocery stores, newsagents and discount stores. This is in line with Mr Courtenay's goal of putting books where people are. (The author is appalled that only 17 per cent of Australians visit bookstores). All this, plus in store book slgnlngs, and media interviews and a $250,000 TV advertising campaign. The 64-year-old author of The Power of One lives like a man with no tomorrow. On top of selling more than three million books, Mr Courtenay is a keen marathon runner, has set up literary programs, works as an advertising consultant and created the concept behind Cadbury's Yowie chocolates. He says he's got 17 book ideas in his head and there's no time to waste. "The tea Iady in my office and the receptionist - both avid readers with no pretences - pronounced it the best book they've ever read. I think it's probably OK!" a satisfied Mr Courtenay pronounced.
So..what did this reviewer think of Tommo & Hawk?
Not a pretty book, far from that..but nor does it depict a pretty subject, the author succeeding all-too-well in reminding us that we are, after all, descended mainly from those who had already made a mess of life back home! How successfully the author has reminded us that our southern self-satisfaction is a veneer laid uneasily on a base and foundations built by the crime and criminals of other, more sophisticated lands! |
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Yes, we can turn over that mirror Bryce Courtenay holds up to that past society with a degree of relief, knowing that the reverse reflection is kinder, but knowing, too that we must look back often, lest we forget to keep the new side well polished!
To use a good old Aussie term, this is a Hell Of A Good Book!! And what an eventfilled journey our author has choeographed for us ..from Tasmanian wildeness to whaleboats to the fledgeling New Zealand cities to Maori villages and mountain fortifications...then back to Sydneytown and the Australian goldfields. And our heroes?, (who narrate the story in present tense in alternate chapters..a technique used less successfully by Monsarrat in The Kapillan Of Malta. The twins are brought to the new land by Mary Abacus, ex-whore herself, now turned businesswoman, and her partner, the philosophising card-sharp, Ikey Solomon. A kidnapping has taken place before the story begins, and gradually we learn of the sadistic treatment each twin has endured .. things so terrible have been done to these boys that their entire lives must be spent recovering. Thus, as well as being the rollicking, bloodthirsty historical saga this tome appears at first flip, Tommo & Hawk is also a `Rites Of Passage' novel, for we see both Tommo and Hawk maturing, mellowing, mending, softening, finding and losing love, discovering and keeping a philosophy of life- and a reason for living...or dying. That they are still at an age we would call adolescence when the book ends so abruptly is not just to realise the author has left the way wide open for sequels..it is also to acknowledge vital differences in time, place, ideas and standards of living; life was shorter then, young people needing to grow up much faster than we ask of their descendents today!
And the three black and white feathers on the cover..and etched onto pages here and there throughout the story? (for this book even utilizes some old-style typographical embellishments!).
I'm really looking forward to the sequels... perhaps the next episode could be marketed at football games....and the the third could be out in time for the Sydney Olympics...? |
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