John Marsden

It is sobering to think that the thousands of teenagers who in 1987 eagerly devoured John Marsden’s first novel, So Much To Tell You, and sent it and the author spinning into bestsellerdom are now in their forties – and as such, the target readership for his first adult novel, South of Darkness, a transportation saga that covers some familiar ground with a light tread.

‘This is the most urgently needed book of our time’, says the back cover of this short, non-fiction work of advice to adolescent males, whose subject is how successfully to become a real man. (This boast contrasts strangely with the counsel given not to brag.) My son, the one aged twelve, described the book as being about ‘the need to grow up into little John Marsdens’.

The fifth book in a planned series of seven would not be surprising if it were science fiction or fantasy. But Burning for Revenge is neither, rather its connections are with the much more currently unfashionable genres of adventure and war stories. And what a war adventure series it is. This fifth volume, in hardback, has been on the bestseller lists in this journal and daily newspapers since its publication – not usual for young adult books. The first, Tomorrow When the War Began, is fourth on Angus & Robertson’s Top 100 Books Voted by Australians – after Bryce Courtenay, but before the Bible!

The two books reviewed here, although very different in many ways, do have one thing in common – they have something to do with a secret, which the readers, and the protagonists, all come to know.