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His Illegal Self
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More About the Author
Product Description
Peter Kemp, Sunday Times
'A return to form ... His Illegal Self brims with robustly unsentimental likeability.'
John Preston, Daily Telegraph
'A richly absorbing novel which can be relished for the beauties of its prose and the pertinence of its themes, as well as for the progressively taut pull that it exerts on the emotions.'
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
26 of 26 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I mostly love Peter Carey, but sometimes he foxes me a bit. This book has a brilliant beginning, as a small boy (whose radical activist parents are in hiding) is kidnapped back off his grandma to "go and see his mum". He ends up in a hippy commune in Australia, a fact which many reviewers have already remarked upon as faintly ludicrous.
The writing is beautiful but finally didn't hold me as tight as the wonderful "Theft". I loved the descriptions of the boy's longing for his father - the Australian rainforest - the struggles between members of the commune. But the book felt lightweight: I didn't end up feeling I'd been swept up into a drama, rather that I'd stood on the edge of something, feeling rather confused about what was going on. I might read it again and see whether it improves on a second time.
The writing is beautiful but finally didn't hold me as tight as the wonderful "Theft". I loved the descriptions of the boy's longing for his father - the Australian rainforest - the struggles between members of the commune. But the book felt lightweight: I didn't end up feeling I'd been swept up into a drama, rather that I'd stood on the edge of something, feeling rather confused about what was going on. I might read it again and see whether it improves on a second time.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
"With our protagonists no longer on the run, it finally becomes apparent what this novel is really about. It is a love letter to nature, and to the Australian wilderness in particular. Through the characters of this boy and woman, both cosseted urbanites who find themselves forced to live against their will in a tough, back-to-the-soil community, both of whom slowly and reluctantly come to terms with their changed circumstances, Carey pays moving homage to the kind of "hippy" lifestyle that is more commonly given comic or dismissive treatment." William Sutcliffe
Peter Carey has written a novel that is difficult to interpret. While engrossed in the reading, I kept thinking "Is this all there is"? Something is missing here. And, I never found that something. The writing is pure prose, brilliant, sweet and uplifting and coarse and gritty. The story centers around Che, or Jay as his grandmother calls him, Selnick. A seven year old living with his grandmiother in the glass windows of New York. They have money and security, but the boy is cut off from the world. He cannot watch television. He is told by a next door neighbor that his mother and father are radicals from Harvard, part of the SDS movement and on the lam. Grandmother won't mention them. Che is left with a vision, long lost of his father. On one fine day, the front door opens and a woman called 'Dial' comes into his life, and off they go to adventure. His world has opened. First on the subway and then to Philadelphia and it is there that Dial discovers that Che's mother has blown herself up attepting to make a bomb. Plans change, a trip to the west coast and then they are sent to Australia.
Along the way we learn that Dial was a babysitter for Che when his mom was at Harvard. Dial has left her job as assistant professor at Vassar to help her old friends. Why? Che thinks of Dial as his mother and as time moves on that is what she becomes. She is a little naive- not understanding what Australia is about or what life outside of the US is all about. And, why Australia, wouldn't Canada seem more logical? Life in Australia in a commune is the life that Che grows up with. Some communication is made to grandmother via a lawyer who is sent to NYC to make things ok again. Time heals all wounds, we are told. Really? We are looking for the timebomb and all along the real hero is Che. Che taken willingly from what he knows with grandmother, to a new world on the other side of the ocean. He absorbs all of this and the new culture he finds he is ready, able and willing. He has struggled to make sense of this new world and it is his.
"Carey's emotional choreography isn't sure-footed enough to make Che's story live up to its dramatic opening. As you'd expect, he does a good job of creating a lively - and carefully Americanised - idiom for his central characters. And having lived in one himself, he clearly knows a lot about alternative communities in Queensland. Yet, coming as it does on the heels of such books as True History of the Kelly Gang, the new novel seems badly paced and weirdly dull. Carey is a formidable writer, and this isn't a complete disaster by any means, but it's hard not to see it getting filed under "occasional misfires". Christopher Taylor
What is this story all about? The 1970's and radicalism is but a part of the plot that entices. The trip to Australia and the story told from Che's point of view, and then from Dials viewpoint intercept and the real story is left with Che. The writing of Peter Carey is the best there is, the writing of a master.
Recommended. prisrob 03-01-08
Theft
My Life as a Fake
Peter Carey has written a novel that is difficult to interpret. While engrossed in the reading, I kept thinking "Is this all there is"? Something is missing here. And, I never found that something. The writing is pure prose, brilliant, sweet and uplifting and coarse and gritty. The story centers around Che, or Jay as his grandmother calls him, Selnick. A seven year old living with his grandmiother in the glass windows of New York. They have money and security, but the boy is cut off from the world. He cannot watch television. He is told by a next door neighbor that his mother and father are radicals from Harvard, part of the SDS movement and on the lam. Grandmother won't mention them. Che is left with a vision, long lost of his father. On one fine day, the front door opens and a woman called 'Dial' comes into his life, and off they go to adventure. His world has opened. First on the subway and then to Philadelphia and it is there that Dial discovers that Che's mother has blown herself up attepting to make a bomb. Plans change, a trip to the west coast and then they are sent to Australia.
Along the way we learn that Dial was a babysitter for Che when his mom was at Harvard. Dial has left her job as assistant professor at Vassar to help her old friends. Why? Che thinks of Dial as his mother and as time moves on that is what she becomes. She is a little naive- not understanding what Australia is about or what life outside of the US is all about. And, why Australia, wouldn't Canada seem more logical? Life in Australia in a commune is the life that Che grows up with. Some communication is made to grandmother via a lawyer who is sent to NYC to make things ok again. Time heals all wounds, we are told. Really? We are looking for the timebomb and all along the real hero is Che. Che taken willingly from what he knows with grandmother, to a new world on the other side of the ocean. He absorbs all of this and the new culture he finds he is ready, able and willing. He has struggled to make sense of this new world and it is his.
"Carey's emotional choreography isn't sure-footed enough to make Che's story live up to its dramatic opening. As you'd expect, he does a good job of creating a lively - and carefully Americanised - idiom for his central characters. And having lived in one himself, he clearly knows a lot about alternative communities in Queensland. Yet, coming as it does on the heels of such books as True History of the Kelly Gang, the new novel seems badly paced and weirdly dull. Carey is a formidable writer, and this isn't a complete disaster by any means, but it's hard not to see it getting filed under "occasional misfires". Christopher Taylor
What is this story all about? The 1970's and radicalism is but a part of the plot that entices. The trip to Australia and the story told from Che's point of view, and then from Dials viewpoint intercept and the real story is left with Che. The writing of Peter Carey is the best there is, the writing of a master.
Recommended. prisrob 03-01-08
Theft
My Life as a Fake
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I am still reading this book, but felt compelled to write a review specifically for the kindle edition. It is so poorly edited that I can't believe anyone proofed it at all. Many words are run together (I think where hyphens or m and n dashes should occur), almost all the apostrophes are missing as well. It was completely spoiling the book for me, and I have had to borrow a hard copy of the book to carry on with it.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
His Australian Summer
This is a book about a boy rolling in the mud somewhere in Australia. There he finds friends and also grows up a bit. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Victor Bourenkov
Poor Kindle eBook editing/formatting
This is not a review of the novel itself, but of the editing and formatting of Kindle eBook.
There is a glaring missing apostrophe in the first sentence which I thought... Read more
There is a glaring missing apostrophe in the first sentence which I thought... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Tom
One of his very best!
And Carey's best are unbeatable! This one's up there with "The True History of The Kelly Gang" and "Theft". Read more
Published 15 months ago by J. M. Gardner
"That's Dial, she's into cats, she's cool..."
Peter Carey has always done well with the prizegivers, winning the Booker twice and has won the prestigious Miles Franklin award in his native Australia five times, plus numerous... Read more
Published 18 months ago by Eileen Shaw
Too clever
This book is one that has a good idea at its heart and would have been excellent had the author not overcomplicated the prose. Read more
Published on 19 Sep 2008 by Ms. V. A. Coumbe
quite confusing
I found this quite a confusing book to read. There were many times when I simply didn't understand what was happening. Read more
Published on 29 Aug 2008 by R. Robertson
Awkward Pacing Dooms This Dud
I've read a few of Carey's novels and generally found them to be quite good, even gripping in ways I hadn't expected. Read more
Published on 25 Jun 2008 by A. Ross
Fool For Love
HIS ILLEGAL SELF (HIS) is my fifth Peter Carey novel. (The others were JACK MAGGS: A NOVEL, TRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG, MY LIFE AS A FAKE, and THEFT. They're all terrific. Read more
Published on 1 Mar 2008 by Ethan Cooper
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