PositiveFinancial Times (UK)Keneally...retells Plorn’s story in incredible detail. Perhaps the book is at its best when recreating the hard landscape of the Australian Outback, and the everyday lives of the drovers and the Paakantji Aboriginal tribe that live on the Momba sheep station ... In the novel we get a lot of information about Australian sheep-farming practices in the 19th century (after a weirdly gruesome scene where a lamb gets castrated, it was perhaps more than I wanted to know) and all that detail comes at the expense of pace. Keneally is also guilty of some awkward-sounding Victorianese ... Nevertheless, the rich world that is evoked makes The Dickens Boy an engrossing and transporting read.
