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essjay1's review against another edition
5.0
Brilliant on many levels, but most of all, this is a great story. We are right by Jaxie’s side from the opening sentence, dragged out into the parched red dirt of the West Australian outback.
This is one of those rare books that you finish and just flip straight back to Chapter 1 for another go. And that opening chapter - good enough the first time, perfect the second.
Winton has always had a gift for language that draws you in and he seems to get better with every book. I love that he doesn’t shy away from the unpolished, less beautiful things in life, that he gives voice to characters who most people will never encounter, or even believe exist. He understands isolation, and sees strength of character where others are too scared to look, or perhaps too narrow minded.
I like that Winton rarely tries to tell his readers what to think - he simply gives us Jaxie with all his 15 yr old angst and wisdom, and old Fintan with his Irish philosophy and deep secrets, and let’s us figure it out for ourselves. There is plenty of symbolism to discuss like the goat on the gamble or the salt pan mirage, plenty of commentary to be made around themes of toxic masculinity, domestic violence to name two, and ethical quandaries to deliberate.
Or we can just think about that tricky dance between hope and hopelessness that both men perform. I’ll leave you with a quote:
“You could burn a skyscraper down with what’s in me.”
This is one of those rare books that you finish and just flip straight back to Chapter 1 for another go. And that opening chapter - good enough the first time, perfect the second.
Winton has always had a gift for language that draws you in and he seems to get better with every book. I love that he doesn’t shy away from the unpolished, less beautiful things in life, that he gives voice to characters who most people will never encounter, or even believe exist. He understands isolation, and sees strength of character where others are too scared to look, or perhaps too narrow minded.
I like that Winton rarely tries to tell his readers what to think - he simply gives us Jaxie with all his 15 yr old angst and wisdom, and old Fintan with his Irish philosophy and deep secrets, and let’s us figure it out for ourselves. There is plenty of symbolism to discuss like the goat on the gamble or the salt pan mirage, plenty of commentary to be made around themes of toxic masculinity, domestic violence to name two, and ethical quandaries to deliberate.
Or we can just think about that tricky dance between hope and hopelessness that both men perform. I’ll leave you with a quote:
“You could burn a skyscraper down with what’s in me.”
krasf's review against another edition
4.0
Whenever I read a young character in a Winton novel, I wonder if that's really how they talk. I can cop the swearing, it strikes me as authentic, bit I can't help but feel like some of the slang is a little off. I love it all any way.
It didn't make me like the central character, teenager Jaxie Clackton any less. Although there are plenty of sections in this book that made me recoil. Clackton finds his abusive father dead not long after his mother dies of cancer. He skips town, afraid that he'll be the prime suspect I. His father's death.
When he stumbles across disgraced priest Fintan Macguillas, doing his own penance in a hut in the middle of nowhere. And so comes the exploration of salvation, the nature and presence of God, and sin. The exchanges between the old Irish priest and the young runaway are as eloquent as they can be blunt, retold through Jaxie's memories. But they are stretches of prose that I wished would go on forever.
It didn't make me like the central character, teenager Jaxie Clackton any less. Although there are plenty of sections in this book that made me recoil. Clackton finds his abusive father dead not long after his mother dies of cancer. He skips town, afraid that he'll be the prime suspect I. His father's death.
When he stumbles across disgraced priest Fintan Macguillas, doing his own penance in a hut in the middle of nowhere. And so comes the exploration of salvation, the nature and presence of God, and sin. The exchanges between the old Irish priest and the young runaway are as eloquent as they can be blunt, retold through Jaxie's memories. But they are stretches of prose that I wished would go on forever.
bianca89279's review against another edition
5.0
It is a big event in the Australian publishing world whenever Tim Winton comes up with a new book. This highly anticipated novel didn’t disappoint. The more I think about it, the more I’m impressed. I mean, I shouldn’t be, because it’s Tim Freakin’ Winton. Every author has the right to come up with duds now and then. You probably heard people-in-the-know bemoaning the dying literary novel etc. It may be so, but don’t tell that to the many people who buy Tim Winton’s novels. Case in point, a few weeks after its release, this is still in the top 10 bestseller list.
On the surface, The Sheperd’s Hut is a simple novel about an abused fifteen-year-old, Jaxie Clackton, fleeing his hometown. He thinks the police is after him, so he hides in the outback, although he’s unprepared.
Jaxie’s is a story of survival, both spiritual and physical. He's such an interesting bloke. To be honest, when I heard this was a first person POV novel, I feared I won’t like it, especially given my previous experience with much loved Australian novels which also featured kids/teenagers (Jasper Jones, The Choke). So, I didn’t expect to be so taken with Jaxie, to care so much.
I must applaud Winton for having the audacity to use the language he did, although if anyone can get away with it, it’s him. The language is rough, Australian slang and expletives heavy – but it felt authentic. In spite of the low brow language in use, Winton succeded to write a very atmospheric novel. And all this about the outback, a mostly arid and flat landscape.
The novel has only two protagonists, Jaxie and the old, Irish recluse he meets in the outback. Their relationship was interesting and unexpected. Winton steered clear from sentimentality, I admire that a great deal.
The Sheperd’s Hut is a masterfully crafted novel, unique, with unforgettable characters and it's quintessentially Australian. In my view, this novel has the makings of an Australian classic novel, just like Cloudstreet.
This novel goes towards my Australian Author Challenge on www.bookloverbooksreviews.com.
On the surface, The Sheperd’s Hut is a simple novel about an abused fifteen-year-old, Jaxie Clackton, fleeing his hometown. He thinks the police is after him, so he hides in the outback, although he’s unprepared.
Jaxie’s is a story of survival, both spiritual and physical. He's such an interesting bloke. To be honest, when I heard this was a first person POV novel, I feared I won’t like it, especially given my previous experience with much loved Australian novels which also featured kids/teenagers (Jasper Jones, The Choke). So, I didn’t expect to be so taken with Jaxie, to care so much.
I must applaud Winton for having the audacity to use the language he did, although if anyone can get away with it, it’s him. The language is rough, Australian slang and expletives heavy – but it felt authentic. In spite of the low brow language in use, Winton succeded to write a very atmospheric novel. And all this about the outback, a mostly arid and flat landscape.
The novel has only two protagonists, Jaxie and the old, Irish recluse he meets in the outback. Their relationship was interesting and unexpected. Winton steered clear from sentimentality, I admire that a great deal.
The Sheperd’s Hut is a masterfully crafted novel, unique, with unforgettable characters and it's quintessentially Australian. In my view, this novel has the makings of an Australian classic novel, just like Cloudstreet.
This novel goes towards my Australian Author Challenge on www.bookloverbooksreviews.com.
lyndajdickson's review against another edition
4.0
Jaxie Clackton, our fifteen-year-old narrator, speaks directly to the reader in his distinctive Aussie voice, full or vernacular and swearing. His dad gets drunk and beats him up, to the extent that Jaxie wishes him dead. “All a person wants is feeling safe. Peace, that’s all I’m after.” And then one day a freak accident kills his dad. Jaxie thinks he might get blamed and, with barely any supplies, sets off from Monkton, Western Australia, heading north to Magnet to meet his cousin Lee, the only person he loves and trusts.
During the trip, he reminisces, and we find out that his dad abandoned them when his mum was dying of cancer, which should have been a relief but was somehow worse. “No one should have to watch their mum die on their own.” Because of his dad, he was the laughing stock of the school and fought back, earning a reputation as well as detention. He remembers the good times, camping out with his mum and dad, fossicking for gold. He recalls the terrain from when he went hunting for goats and kangaroos with his dad. And he tells us how he spent time in his dad’s butcher shop learning the trade. All of this serves to explain how Jaxie comes to have the skills he needs to survive in the harsh landscape on his own.
A string of good luck leads Jaxie to find a place to stay and a means of preserving his kill. “So don’t ever feel sorry for Jaxie Clackton. Because I’m one lucky bastard, I kid you not.” Then, after spending some time on his own, Jaxie comes across Fintan MacGillis, an old man holed up in a derelict shepherd’s hut, hiding from his past. Fintan convinces Jaxie to stay for a while. But soon Jaxie starts feeling trapped, like one of Fintan’s goats, which leads to him making a disastrous decision.
Initially, the book is hard to read because of all the colloquialisms and poor grammar used by our narrator. But, with the whole first part being a monologue, you soon get used to it. There are times when Jaxie tends to lose his voice, with inconsistencies in the use of me/my and meself/myself being the most obvious. There is no dialogue until the second part of the book - when Jaxie meets Fintan - and then it’s sometimes difficult to read because of the lack of quotation marks. There are also some pretty foul descriptions and images, making this a book that might appeal to young blokes around Jaxie’s age.
The story begins in the present and shifts to the past, slowly letting us know how Jaxie comes to be where he is now. At the end, we end up right back to where we started. Along the way, Jaxie drops hints about what is to come, a trick that keeps us reading to find out how things eventuate. This is an extraordinary feat of writing, mainly because there isn’t much plot. The book is more a character study of Jaxie’s journey into manhood, his coming of age story. His father wasn’t a good role model, but we see how Jaxie changes after meeting Fintan, a good man who has a positive effect on his life. Fintan is an intriguing character who always remains a mystery. And let’s not forget the harsh Aussie landscape, which is a character in its own right.
A moving coming of age story.
Warnings: coarse language, sexual references, violence.
I got this book on loan from the library.
Full blog post (1 April): https://www.booksdirectonline.com/2019/04/the-shepherds-hut-by-tim-winton.html
During the trip, he reminisces, and we find out that his dad abandoned them when his mum was dying of cancer, which should have been a relief but was somehow worse. “No one should have to watch their mum die on their own.” Because of his dad, he was the laughing stock of the school and fought back, earning a reputation as well as detention. He remembers the good times, camping out with his mum and dad, fossicking for gold. He recalls the terrain from when he went hunting for goats and kangaroos with his dad. And he tells us how he spent time in his dad’s butcher shop learning the trade. All of this serves to explain how Jaxie comes to have the skills he needs to survive in the harsh landscape on his own.
A string of good luck leads Jaxie to find a place to stay and a means of preserving his kill. “So don’t ever feel sorry for Jaxie Clackton. Because I’m one lucky bastard, I kid you not.” Then, after spending some time on his own, Jaxie comes across Fintan MacGillis, an old man holed up in a derelict shepherd’s hut, hiding from his past. Fintan convinces Jaxie to stay for a while. But soon Jaxie starts feeling trapped, like one of Fintan’s goats, which leads to him making a disastrous decision.
Initially, the book is hard to read because of all the colloquialisms and poor grammar used by our narrator. But, with the whole first part being a monologue, you soon get used to it. There are times when Jaxie tends to lose his voice, with inconsistencies in the use of me/my and meself/myself being the most obvious. There is no dialogue until the second part of the book - when Jaxie meets Fintan - and then it’s sometimes difficult to read because of the lack of quotation marks. There are also some pretty foul descriptions and images, making this a book that might appeal to young blokes around Jaxie’s age.
The story begins in the present and shifts to the past, slowly letting us know how Jaxie comes to be where he is now. At the end, we end up right back to where we started. Along the way, Jaxie drops hints about what is to come, a trick that keeps us reading to find out how things eventuate. This is an extraordinary feat of writing, mainly because there isn’t much plot. The book is more a character study of Jaxie’s journey into manhood, his coming of age story. His father wasn’t a good role model, but we see how Jaxie changes after meeting Fintan, a good man who has a positive effect on his life. Fintan is an intriguing character who always remains a mystery. And let’s not forget the harsh Aussie landscape, which is a character in its own right.
A moving coming of age story.
Warnings: coarse language, sexual references, violence.
I got this book on loan from the library.
Full blog post (1 April): https://www.booksdirectonline.com/2019/04/the-shepherds-hut-by-tim-winton.html
desterman's review against another edition
4.0
I’ve always loved Tim Winton’s writing – fiction and non-fiction. His novels aren’t always perfect, but they are always beautiful, complex and thought provoking. The Shepherd’s Hut is no exception and is probably one of Winton’s most faced paced novels yet. The story opens at the end, with teenage protagonist Jaxie Clackton driving a stolen car towards freedom and love. Needless to say, the journey to get there is fraught. He tells it to us in an extended flashback, reflecting powerfully on the brutal path through fire he has walked in the hope of something better, something more.
In true Winton style, Jaxie is an outsider. Having lost his mother to cancer, he lives in a small town with his brutally violent father. He is troubled at school and ignored by the community, despite their knowledge that his father beats him regularly. A terrible twist of fate offers Jaxie the opportunity to leave it all behind. He heads to the salt flats and the wilderness to hide out before making his escape. It is in the midst of this sparse, unforgiving landscape that Jaxie comes across disgraced priest Fintan MacGillis. Fintan has been defrocked and banished by the Church, not for what you would think, but essentially to keep him quiet and under control. He’s visited every six to twelve months and given supplies, but there is no guarantee how long this arrangement will last. It’s obvious that Fintan has experienced great grief and trauma, and sees his isolationism as some sort of penance or teaching moment from God. Despite all of this he nevertheless welcomes Jaxie into his small patch of earth. They are both wary of one another at first, particularly Jaxie who has only ever been damaged by adults he’s encountered. Their stay together initially focuses on the day to day activities of hunting, cooking, looking after the property, but soon they begin to confide in one another. Both realise they are each looking for the same things – a sense of purpose, hope and redemption. The tension and intrigue build to a thrilling crescendo with a final act that sees both men achieving that for which they yearn.
The book explores a wide range of interesting ideas mostly related to faith and salvation, both common Winton subjects. It specifically examines whether faith is a part of our humanity – not necessarily faith in a god or god figure, but in the greater good or the belief that one can become better. It also examines the role of toxic masculinity in shaping young men. Jaxie is not just bruised by his father’s beatings, but also by the message that sensitivity, emotional vulnerability and deep thinking is weak. Jaxie’s only example of manhood is silence and rejection. Part of the deliverance offered to him by Fintan is a strong example of the opposite of this – the benefits of talk, the strength to be gained from self-reflection, the permission to be emotionally honest. Fintan gifts Jaxie with an alternate understanding of what being a man, and a good man, is about and convinces Jaxie that this is still possible for him.
The qualities that makes Winton’s writing so good is both his visceral evocation of place and, in the words of critic Rachel Seiffert, “his gift for making the vernacular lyrical”. The landscape is presented as both awe inspiring and terrifying. At once threatening and unforgiving, and then loving and supportive. Similarly, despite Jaxie’s uneducated laconic reflections and observations, there is exquisite poetry in how Winton presents his world view.
With this novel, Winton achieves well what he does so often – making the uniquely Australian seem universal. He’s a beautiful story teller.
In true Winton style, Jaxie is an outsider. Having lost his mother to cancer, he lives in a small town with his brutally violent father. He is troubled at school and ignored by the community, despite their knowledge that his father beats him regularly. A terrible twist of fate offers Jaxie the opportunity to leave it all behind. He heads to the salt flats and the wilderness to hide out before making his escape. It is in the midst of this sparse, unforgiving landscape that Jaxie comes across disgraced priest Fintan MacGillis. Fintan has been defrocked and banished by the Church, not for what you would think, but essentially to keep him quiet and under control. He’s visited every six to twelve months and given supplies, but there is no guarantee how long this arrangement will last. It’s obvious that Fintan has experienced great grief and trauma, and sees his isolationism as some sort of penance or teaching moment from God. Despite all of this he nevertheless welcomes Jaxie into his small patch of earth. They are both wary of one another at first, particularly Jaxie who has only ever been damaged by adults he’s encountered. Their stay together initially focuses on the day to day activities of hunting, cooking, looking after the property, but soon they begin to confide in one another. Both realise they are each looking for the same things – a sense of purpose, hope and redemption. The tension and intrigue build to a thrilling crescendo with a final act that sees both men achieving that for which they yearn.
The book explores a wide range of interesting ideas mostly related to faith and salvation, both common Winton subjects. It specifically examines whether faith is a part of our humanity – not necessarily faith in a god or god figure, but in the greater good or the belief that one can become better. It also examines the role of toxic masculinity in shaping young men. Jaxie is not just bruised by his father’s beatings, but also by the message that sensitivity, emotional vulnerability and deep thinking is weak. Jaxie’s only example of manhood is silence and rejection. Part of the deliverance offered to him by Fintan is a strong example of the opposite of this – the benefits of talk, the strength to be gained from self-reflection, the permission to be emotionally honest. Fintan gifts Jaxie with an alternate understanding of what being a man, and a good man, is about and convinces Jaxie that this is still possible for him.
The qualities that makes Winton’s writing so good is both his visceral evocation of place and, in the words of critic Rachel Seiffert, “his gift for making the vernacular lyrical”. The landscape is presented as both awe inspiring and terrifying. At once threatening and unforgiving, and then loving and supportive. Similarly, despite Jaxie’s uneducated laconic reflections and observations, there is exquisite poetry in how Winton presents his world view.
With this novel, Winton achieves well what he does so often – making the uniquely Australian seem universal. He’s a beautiful story teller.
pam_fuze's review against another edition
5.0
Oh wow, how good is this book! I've read most of Winton, but this is quite a departure from his other work. Written in first person, it's the story of a young man fleeing a shit home situation in WA across desert salt-mining country, where he hooks up with a disgraced priest living in the bush.
I read it at every opportunity (a proper page turner I haven't had since The Beach) - one of those books where you have to stop your eyes from flicking to the bottom of the page to see what's coming next.
Brilliant - Winton has outdone himself. 5 stars! More like this please!
I read it at every opportunity (a proper page turner I haven't had since The Beach) - one of those books where you have to stop your eyes from flicking to the bottom of the page to see what's coming next.
Brilliant - Winton has outdone himself. 5 stars! More like this please!
meghar's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Violence, Physical abuse, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Domestic abuse, Death of parent, Death, Excrement, Gun violence, Physical abuse, and Cancer
eroga's review against another edition
5.0
Wow. Just wow. This is tim Winton at his finest. I have just finished this and I’m still processing. In short, an abused teenager, Jaxie, comes home to find his father dead (this isn’t a spoiler, it happens within the first couple of chapters). He then takes off into the bush and comes across an isolated older man.
As in all tim winton’s books, the landscape of Western Australia is a character in its own right. Harsh, brutal but luminescent, the desolation and loneliness underpins the book. Apart from the landscape there are only two major characters, jaxie and the older man, who I don’t want to give too much detail about (spoilers sweetie!) however tim Winton develops them brilliantly, showing Jaxie’s development and growth from a neglected, abused and angry teen into someone who wrestles with doing the right thing and loyalty and family, when he hasn’t had an example of this in his home life. He also explores growing older and regrets and paying for our past sins, and the way this plays on our minds obsessively.
As in all good literature, this book questions what does it mean to be human? What do we want in life? And how do we cope when what we want doesn’t eventuate? When life and circumstances throw a spanner in the works? What is truly important to us as humans?
At times brutal, heartbreaking, tender and humourous, sometimes all at once, the minutia of survival under the odds, whether physical or emotional, is stripped down to the bones. I hope it works out well for jaxie, and he finds what he is looking for.
As in all tim winton’s books, the landscape of Western Australia is a character in its own right. Harsh, brutal but luminescent, the desolation and loneliness underpins the book. Apart from the landscape there are only two major characters, jaxie and the older man, who I don’t want to give too much detail about (spoilers sweetie!) however tim Winton develops them brilliantly, showing Jaxie’s development and growth from a neglected, abused and angry teen into someone who wrestles with doing the right thing and loyalty and family, when he hasn’t had an example of this in his home life. He also explores growing older and regrets and paying for our past sins, and the way this plays on our minds obsessively.
As in all good literature, this book questions what does it mean to be human? What do we want in life? And how do we cope when what we want doesn’t eventuate? When life and circumstances throw a spanner in the works? What is truly important to us as humans?
At times brutal, heartbreaking, tender and humourous, sometimes all at once, the minutia of survival under the odds, whether physical or emotional, is stripped down to the bones. I hope it works out well for jaxie, and he finds what he is looking for.