Jeremy Chambers
Forfatter af The Vintage and the Gleaning
Værker af Jeremy Chambers
Le grand ordinaire: roman - traduit de l'anglais (Australie) par Brice Matthieussent (2013) 3 eksemplarer
Satte nøgleord på
Almen Viden
- Fødselsdato
- 1974
- Køn
- male
- Bopæl
- Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
- Erhverv
- novelist
Medlemmer
Anmeldelser
Hæderspriser
Statistikker
- Værker
- 6
- Medlemmer
- 33
- Popularitet
- #421,955
- Vurdering
- 3.9
- Anmeldelser
- 2
- ISBN
- 7
- Sprog
- 2
Told through the eyes of Roland this coming of age novel takes place in a fictitious outer Eastern suburb of Glenella. Roland is seven when in 1982 he and his younger sister Lily movie into this new Suburban development.
Their cream brick-veneers crowding out the older Californian bungalows and old iron roofed farm houses. Chamber lyrical description of the place and time contrast with the inarticulate conversations of young children and teenagers.
"The children walked to the pool through the sunlit empty streets, the miles and miles of concrete and bitumen, the rows of identical brown-brick houses that lined the rising hills, their orange-tinted windows blinding in the sun. The grass on the nature strip was lush from sprinkler hoses that ran all day long, thin sparkling arcs dampening the footpath and trickling down the dusty gutters to the stormwater drains. The road melted, seethed; it turned to black liquid. It shimmered in the distance and made mirages at the rounded peaks and hollows. The children’s thongs slapped the footpath, echoing like rifle shots."
"Birds scuttled. A twig cracked in the heat and fell through the rustling foliage; leaves and branches waved and fluttered in shadow across the lawn and the hot concrete. There was a shrill, piercing pulse of cicadas. Lawnmowers had been droning all afternoon, starting up here and there like stunted voices, joining in harsh choruses across the endless stagger of paling fences. The regularity of the shifting pitch and volume was somnolent, hypnotic."
"‘I don’t really have any friends,’ said Roland.
Cassie dabbed at the corners of her mouth. Her lips were pale, rough with flaking skin she had gnawed on until they bled.
‘Why not?’
‘They’re all idiots at my school.’
She screwed up her nose, looking sceptically at him.
‘They can’t all be idiots.’
‘I suppose I just don’t fit in there.’
‘Yeah,’ said Cassie thoughtfully. ‘I know what you mean. School sucks.’
‘Yeah,’ said Roland."
Cassie is the daughter of the local car dealer tycoon. Reg Noble Auto. Now in their early teens their easy, uncomplicated friendship is staring to be affected by their growing realisation that things are changing.
"They suddenly became awkward with one another, tongue-tied under each other’s gazes and embarrassed at what they did manage to blurt."
Into this burgeoning sort of, could be relationship comes Darren with his motorbike and things become complicated
"Cassie blushed. She took a swig of beer and choked on it, coughing and wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She smiled helplessly as she blushed even deeper...Cassie had regained her poise. She took another sip of beer, careful this time. The boy was sitting with his limbs spread out, one arm over the back of the chair. He held his cigarette loosely between his fingers. His gaze lingered on Cassie’s long, tanned legs.
‘I’m Darren, by the way,’ he said to them. "… (mere)