A brilliant and utterly original debut novel.
Skunk Cunningham is an 11-year-old girl in a coma. She has a loving dad, an absent mother and a brother who plays more X-Box than is good for him. She also has the neighbours from hell: the five Oswald girls and their thuggish father Bob, vicious bullies all of them, whose reign of terror extends unchallenged over their otherwise quiet suburban street.
And yet terrifying though they undoubtedly are, the stiletto-wearing, cider-swilling Oswald girls are also sexy - so when Saskia asks shy, virginal Rick Buckley for a ride in his new car, he can't believe his luck. Too bad that Saskia can't keep her big mouth shut. When, after a quick fumble, she broadcasts Rick's deficiencies to anyone who will listen, it puts ideas into her younger sister's silly head - ideas that will see Rick dragged off to prison, humiliated, and ultimately, in his father's words, 'broken' by the experience.
From her hospital bed, Skunk guides us through the events that follow, as Saskia's small act of thoughtlessness slowly spreads through the neighbourhood in a web of increasing violence. Skunk watches as her shabby, hardworking father finds love, only for her courageous, idealistic teacher to lose it; as poor 'Broken' Buckley descends into madness, while across the street her brother Jed makes his first adolescent forays into sex; and as her own gentle romance with soft-hearted, tough-talking Dillon struggles to survive against a backdrop that seamlessly combines the sublime and the ridiculous. As we inch ever closer to the mystery behind her coma, Skunk's innocence becomes a beacon by which we navigate a world as comic as it is tragic, and as effortlessly engaging as it is ultimately uplifting, in this brilliant and utterly original debut novel.
Industry Reviews
"There are many good things here: it's bold, prescient, engaging and oddly touching." -- The Guardian
"Daniel Clay's debut novel is remarkably controlled and disciplined as it depicts those who spiral out of control." -- The Independent
"Colin Moody's chilling reading evokes the cruelties of the bullying Oswald family and the neighborhood and school they victimize. We see through the eyes of 11-year-old Skunk, who lies comatose in the hospital. Moody maximizes the tension as we wonder what led to her situation and then view a horrific string of events that begin as Skunk's teenage neighbor, 'Broken' Buckley, is tormented by the five Oswald sisters and beaten by their terrible deadbeat father. Skunk faces harassment in her class and questions her place, rights, and dreams in the world. You listen appalled, but addicted, held as captive to the audio as Skunk, her parents, teachers, and friends are to the Oswalds." -- AudioFile Magazine
