Spirit House
By Mark Dapin
3/5
()
About this ebook
Witty, wise, and deeply moving, this is a remarkable novel, a story of the fall of Singapore and life as a POW, and of a young boy making sense of his future while old men try to live with their past
David is 13 and confused. His mother has left with her lover and dumped David on his grandparents. David's grandfather, Jimmy, is 70. He spends his days at the social club grumbling with his three best friends, all of them Jewish-Australian survivors of the enforced labor camps of the WWII Thai-Burma Railroad. But behind their playful backbiting and irresistible wit, Jimmy and his friends are haunted by the ghosts of long-dead comrades, and the only person Jimmy can confide in is a 13-year-old from a different world.
Mark Dapin
Mark Dapin is an acclaimed journalist, author, screenwriter and historian. He is the author of the novels King of the Cross, Spirit House and R&R. King of the Cross won the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction, and Spirit House was longlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award, and shortlisted for the Age Book of the Year and the Royal Society for Literature’s Ondaatje Prize. R&R was shortlisted for a Ned Kelly Award. Mark holds a doctorate in military history. His history book The Nashos’ War was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction, and won the NIB People’s Choice Award and an Alex Buzo Shortlist Award. He has also written three books of true crime: Public Enemies (shortlisted for a Ned Kelly Award), Prison Break and Carnage. He worked as consultant producer on Network Seven TV show Armed and Dangerous, and as screenwriter on Stan’s Wolf Creek 2. His website is at markdapin.com.
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Reviews for Spirit House
23 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I almost didn't finish this book, but around Chapter 9 I started to get involved in the plot. I am not a fan of the writing, for the most part. It reminds me of the "Guy Noir" skit on "Prairie Home Companion". Only that is supposed to be funny, of course. Nevertheless, I did finish the book and liked it a little better towards the end.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I am a sucker for hardboiled stories set in exotic (at least, exotic to me) locales. Almost everything in Spirit House worked for me, except the friendship with the cop — but, hey, why dwell on that minor point when there are so many things right with the book? I loved the dialogue, the action was told with a dreamy ambiguousness that suited the slightly surreal setting, the Thai characters were a welcome change from the usual crime novel bad guys. I will definitely be tracking down more of Moore's books.