- Contributor:
- Ian Gregor; Mark Kinkhead
- Publisher:
- Faber And Faber
- ISBN:
- 9780571056866
- Publication date:
- July 2004
- Length:
- 197mm
- Width:
- 126mm
- Weight:
- 218g
- Edition:
- Educational ed
- Pages:
- 272
- Readership:
- Age: From 14 to 99
- Prizes:
- Runner-up in the The BBC Big Read Top 100 (2003);Shortlisted for the BBC Big Read Top 100 (2003)
A fantasy is a singular- and singularly believable spellbinder, and within the framework of its premises- achieves a tremendous impetus and impact. During an atomic war, a group of boys aged from about six to twelve crash-land on an uninhabited tropical island. There Ralph, a responsible boy, is chosen chief- and a certain routine established; a fire is made and to be kept going as a signal, huts are to be built, and certain of the boys are to hunt wild pig?? But as the days pass in increasing discomfort, there is increasing dissension between them; the littluns are frightened by the untold terrors of the dark, and the fear of breasties and bogeys spreads; the duties are neglected; and the older boys, save Simon and Piggy and Samneric (twins) desert Ralph, appoint a new leader, and run amok hunting savagely. In their primitive regression, they feel they must propitiate the beast and a ritualistic dance precedes the murder of Simon; Piggy, his specs taken, falls to his death; and finally Ralph is left to face the pack when a cruiser lands- to rescue them all.... A first novel, originally conceived and convincingly sustained, this should find an audience as vulnerable as its young derelicts. The publishers parallel this- not without justification- with Richard Hughes' High Wind In Jamaica. (Kirkus Reviews)
