Accessibility Tools

  • Content scaling 100%
  • Font size 100%
  • Line height 100%
  • Letter spacing 100%
Fiction
by Donata Carrazza
October 2011, no. 335

Two Greeks by John Charalambous

University of Queensland Press, $24.95 pb, 264 pp

ABR receives a commission on items purchased through this link. All ABR reviews are fully independent.

What does a young boy make of a father who carries in his pocket a knife that is used to peel fruit, behead chickens, fashion toy flutes, and potentially serves as a weapon to kill his spouse? Two Greeks,the work of third-time novelist John Charalambous, is an engaging study of the power of family and the need for identity. In similar company to Raimond Gaita’s Romulus, My Father and Christos Tsiolkas’s The Slap, the novel delves into difficult emotional territory, but does so with humour and humanity. Like its literary cousins, it has the foundations for an insightful filmic adaptation.

 


Continue reading for only $10 per month.
Subscribe and gain full access to Australian Book Review.

Already a subscriber? .
If you need assistance, feel free to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..



Two Greeks by John Charalambous

University of Queensland Press, $24.95 pb, 264 pp

ABR receives a commission on items purchased through this link. All ABR reviews are fully independent.


From the New Issue

Our Familiars: The meaning of animals in our lives by Anne Coombs

by Hayley Singer

Advances – October 2025

by Australian Book Review

‘Weather’

by Dženana Vucic

You May Also Like

Past Lives

by Michael Sun

Shalom edited by Nancy Keesing

by Muriel Mathers

Mosquito creek by Robert Engwerda

by Stephanie Green

Leave a comment

If you are an ABR subscriber, you will need to sign in to post a comment.

If you have forgotten your sign in details, or if you receive an error message when trying to submit your comment, please email your comment (and the name of the article to which it relates) to ABR Comments. We will review your comment and, subject to approval, we will post it under your name.

Please note that all comments must be approved by ABR and comply with our Terms & Conditions.

Submit comment