Short description
Revisiting the South Africa of half a century ago, the novelist J.M. Coetzee brings a writer's diagnostic skills to bear on his own past. With a father he could not respect, and a mother he both adored and resented, he picked his way through a world that refused to explain its rules.
Review
The best description of a childhood I have ever read. -- The Times
As funny, cruel and terrifying as life itself. It is also intense and elegant, clearly the product of the complex, subtle imagination which shapes Coetzee's outstanding fiction... As austerely beautiful as would be expected of Coetzee the artist... its aloof, edgy grace and seething passion ensure the narrative is both truthful and mysterious. -- Irish Times
A deeply-felt and utterly compelling account of a South African childhood: the narrative style is as spare and lean as the Karoo flatlands which form its backdrop. -- Daily Telegraph