Boy Swallows Universe
Trent Dalton, 2019
HarperCollins
464 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062898104
Summary
An utterly wonderful debut novel of love, crime, magic, fate and a boy’s coming of age, set in 1980s Australia and infused with the originality, charm, pathos, and heart of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.
Eli Bell’s life is complicated. His father is lost, his mother is in jail, and his stepdad is a heroin dealer.
The most steadfast adult in Eli’s life is Slim—a notorious felon and national record-holder for successful prison escapes—who watches over Eli and August, his silent genius of an older brother.
Exiled far from the rest of the world in Darra, a neglected suburb populated by Polish and Vietnamese refugees, this twelve-year-old boy with an old soul and an adult mind is just trying to follow his heart, learn what it takes to be a good man, and train for a glamorous career in journalism.
Life, however, insists on throwing obstacles in Eli’s path—most notably Tytus Broz, Brisbane’s legendary drug dealer.
But the real trouble lies ahead. Eli is about to fall in love, face off against truly bad guys, and fight to save his mother from a certain doom—all before starting high school.
A story of brotherhood, true love, family, and the most unlikely of friendships, Boy Swallows Universe is the tale of an adolescent boy on the cusp of discovering the man he will be. Powerful and kinetic, Trent Dalton’s debut is sure to be one of the most heartbreaking, joyous and exhilarating novels you will experience. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1978-79
• Raised—outside Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
• Education—N/A
• Awards—(see below)
• Currently—lives in Brisbane
Trent Dalton is an award-winning journalist at The Weekend Australian Magazine. His writing includes several short and feature-length film screenplays. In 2019 he published, Boy Swallows Universe, his debut novel, closely based on his own childhood.
He was nominated for a 2010 AFI Best Short Fiction screenplay award for his latest film, Glenn Owen Dodds, which also won the prestigious International Prix Canal award at the world's largest short film festival, the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival.
Dalton's debut feature film screenplay, In the Silence, is currently in production. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
Boy Swallows Universe hypnotizes you with wonder, and then hammers you with heartbreak.… Eli’s remarkably poetic voice and his astonishingly open heart take the day. They enable him to carve out the best of what’s possible from the worst of what is, which is the miracle that makes this novel marvelous.
Washington Post
A splashy, profane, and witty debut.
USA Today
Welcome to the weird and wonderful universe of Trent Dalton, whose first work of fiction is, without exaggeration, the best Australian novel I have read in more than a decade.… The last 100 pages of Boy Swallows Universe propel you like an express train to a conclusion that is profound and complex and unashamedly commercial.… The book is jam-packed with such witty and profound insights into what’s wrong and what’s right with Australia and the world.… I read it in two sittings and immediately want to read it again. In its deft integration of the sacred and the profane, of high ideals and low villainy, it somehow reminded me of a favorite French movie, Diva. A rollicking ride, rich in philosophy, wit, truth and pathos.
Sydney Morning Herald
It is such a pleasant shock to encounter a new Australian novel in which joy is shamelessly deployed.… It is a story in thrall to the potential the world holds for lightness, laughter, beauty, forgiveness, redemption, and love.… [Dalton] invests this unlikely cast and milieu with considerable energy, wit and charm. He delights in the play of language and imagination that a child can summon: the sense in which the clear moral eye of youth can critique and adore simultaneously without judgment or adult moral finessing.
The Australian
A wonderful surprise: sharp as a drawer full of knives in terms of subject matter; unrepentantly joyous in its child’s-eye view of the world; the best literary debut in a month of Sundays.
Weekend Australian
(Starred review) [A] splashy, stellar debut makes the typical coming-of-age novel look bland by comparison.… Dalton’s… observant eye [and] ability to temper pathos with humor… prevent the novel from breaking into sparkling pieces.… [O]utstanding.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review) A marvelously plot-rich novel, which…is filled with beautifully lyric prose…. Exceptional
Booklist
[M]agical elements promised in the novel’s early pages,… either get abandoned or turn out to be relatively pedantic matters of interpretation. A likable debut that trades its early high-flown ambitions for dramatic but familiar coming-of-age fare.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Slim’s view of the world is that: "We all got a bit o' good and a bit o' bad in us…." Discuss the ways in which characters in the novel are both good and bad at the same time.
2. What do you think is the meaning of the red telephone and the mysterious voice that speaks to Eli?
3. Do good life lessons remain valid if delivered by evil men?
4. What sort of man do you hope (or fear) Eli Bell will grow into?
5. What do you think, ultimately, Eli Bell is searching for in life and in that secret room?
6. Why do you think August chooses to be mute?
7. Does the knowledge that much of this novel is based on Trent Dalton’s own life change your reading of the book? Enhance it? Or does it not make a difference?
8. Do you think the trauma that Mrs Birbeck talks about (p. 224) is a factor in Eli’s journey?
9. Do you think the novel is optimistic or pessimistic about the world?
10. Were there similarities or differences in the book to your own memories of 1980s suburban Australia?
11. Discuss the idea that August may have knowledge of future events and how this is suggested and also at times debunked.
12. "Do your time before it does you," says Slim. What does Eli take this to mean and how does he act on it?
13. The novel presents an interesting view of adults from a child’s perspective. What does it say about adults and particularly adult men? And what does Eli learn from this?
(Questions issued by the publisher in Australia.)