Shedding new light on the 'club' of Lillee, Marsh and the Chappells, Golden Boy examines the most tumultuous era of Australian cricket through the lens of the story of flawed genius, Kim Hughes.
Kim Hughes was one of the most majestic and daring batsmen to play
for Australia in the last 40 years. Golden curled and boyishly
handsome, his rise and fall as captain and player is unparalleled in
our cricketing history. He played at least three innings that count as
all-time classics, but it's his tearful resignation from the captaincy
that is remembered.
Insecure but arrogant, abrasive but charming; in Hughes' character
were the seeds of his own destruction. Yet was Hughes' fall partly due
to those around him, men who are themselves legends in Australia's
cricketing history? Lillee, Marsh, the Chappells, all had their
agendas, all were unhappy with his selection and performance as captain
- evidenced by Dennis Lillee's tendency to aim bouncers relentlessly at
Hughes' head during net practice.
Hughes' arrival on the Test scene coincided with the most turbulent
time Australian cricket has ever seen - first Kerry Packer's World
Series Cricket, then the rebel tours to South Africa. Both had dramatic
effects on Hughes' career. As he traces the high points and the low,
Chris Ryan sheds new and fascinating light on the cricket - and the
cricketers - of the times.
About The Author
Christian Ryan was the founding editor of the national current
affairs magazine The Monthly. He has edited Inside Edge
magazine, Wisden Cricketers' Almanack Australia, and was the
deputy editor of Wisden Cricket Monthly. Ryan has also worked
as a journalist for The Guardian newspaper.
Industry Reviews
Christian Ryan's Golden Boy has this brawny lyricism ... It's really alive, that book. Like a great Australian novel. Hughes personifies something mercurial, ethereal, this artistic flair alongside these macho, rugged, brawny bruisers like Marsh and Lillee. It's told with such lyricism and tempo. I found it absolutely enthralling and a real revelation. -- William Fiennes, member of Wisden Cricket Monthly's Best Cricket Book Ever judging panel
At once unputdownable and also unpickupable, because if you pick it up you will eventually finish it, and what are you going to do then? -- Rob Smyth * Guardian *
It made me laugh, it told me things, it reminded me why I love the subject I'm reading about and it put a series of images in my head that I won't ever forget. It's audacious, it's got chutzpah, it's done with a lyrical flourish. I didn't know cricket books could be written like this. -- Phil Walker, editor of Wisden Cricket Monthly
A cracking read ... An almost tragic but compelling tale of how Hughes tried hard - and failed - to fit his smiling personality into the hard-faced world of his country's uniquely macho and badly moustached team. * The Observer *
Graphic ... Shocking ... Devastating ... If half of what we read here is true, two Australian legends should hang their heads in shame. -- Simon Wilde * The Times *
A valuable archive of the professional cricketer's lot during the 1980s - paltry wages, petty officials, vermin-infested hotels and astonishing levels of alcohol consumption ... a fascinating account of Australian cricket's leanest years. * Times Literary Supplement *
Absolutely superb, one of the best cricket books I've read. -- John Stern * The Wisden Cricketer *
