JFDI BOOK #58 TRUE HISTORY OF NED KELLY REVIEW

 

REVIEW BY TOM WELLS
 
True History of the Kelly Gang—Peter Carey won his second Booker Prize in four years for this long,dusty journey through late 19 th C. Australia, a curious choice in any year but especially one that included Ian McEwan’s “Atonement” and David Mitchell’s “number9dream”. It’s not that the book is lacking in considerable merit: excellently written (if annoyingly punctuated); exhaustively researched; and impressively specific. But it’s the last merit that is its chief de-merit, because about two-thirds through the saga the reader begins to suffer from detail overload, as Ned and his gang of well-drawn, highly individual characters do a seemingly endless loop between jail, hideout and Mom’s house. But the
growing feeling of disinterest is nothing compared to the giant letdown of the denouement. Since all but the final chapter is in the form of a diary that Ned has kept for his daughter, it would be tough for him to write about the end of his short, violent days. Still, the authorial decision to change from Ned’s gritty, funny, punchy prose to the formal, wordy, soulless account of a newspaper columnist is the dampest of squibs. After a 500-page ride, the reader deserves better.
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