The Good Child: a review of upcoming Australian historical fiction

Posted on by Clare
THE GOOD CHILD

Do you ever wish you could go back in time and warn your younger self? Get ready to have that feeling as you follow the adventures of Lucille and Quin in the forthcoming Australian historical fiction:

The Good Child by SC Karakaltsas

An enthralling read, The Good Child tells the story of two women whose lives are linked – and damaged – by the one man.

Unfolding through a series of flashbacks interspersed with current happenings of the 1990s, the story introduces us first to Lucille and Quin. They’ve both lost everything. The two women meet on a country train headed to Melbourne. They’re on their way to attend a trial. Although they don’t know it for a while, they both have their lives invested in the man in the dock.

Lucille, like many of our mothers or grandmothers, was born between the wars. She lived through the hungry 1930s and blossomed in the 1940s. She suffered some awful tragedies, the sort that rip the heart out of women. Then WWII stamped all over her life.

Maybe her grandmother’s warning was right:

“Marry the wrong man and your life will be nothing but misery.”

When at last Lucille raises Tom, a golden boy, everything seems better. Perhaps life will be kind after all. Maybe the mistakes and heartaches will disappear into the mists of time.

A well-loved child, Tom leaps on the ‘greed is good’ train of the 1980s, spreading his charm and his captivating energy with a generous hand.

How could anything go wrong with his ambitious financial scheming? Well, what about shady dealings? Or the mates’ rates he shares glibly? And what about his greedy, grabby habits?

Ah well, if you lived through the 80s you’ll know what can go wrong.

Quin was one of Tom’s star workers, writing up loans, sealing deals, helping as he schmoozed up customers.

She knows that some of what she did enabled Tom’s rapacious dealings, but she wasn’t prepared for the double cross that sacrificed her to the wolves when the going got tough.

Quin would love to right her own wrongs and see Tom pay for his crimes. Her budding relationship with Lucille promises to heal some of the wounds of the past.

Finally, the compassionate insight of women bypasses the slick and deadly traps of masculine over-confidence.

This story is very generous in detail

The Good Child recreates its diverse time periods with such a keen attention to everyday life that readers are immediately immersed in the settings.

It’s almost possible to smell the kitchen of the 1940s, touch the dresses of the 1950s, hear the hubbub of the 1960s six-o’clock swill, and taste the extravagance of the 1980s.

Author S.C. Karakaltsas has a thorough understanding of the periods covered in this wide-ranging novel, as well as a keen eye and a happy gift with dialogue. Perhaps most remarkable is her ability to bring out the green shoots of hope in a story that charts so many tragedies.

It’s easy to get lost in the world of The Good Child, riding the emotional lows and brief highs as the story inevitably unfolds to its very satisfying end. If you love Australian historical fiction with a feminist slant, this one is for you.

A story that rings true in every scene, and

one that will make you glad that you read it.

See more great fiction from SC Karakaltsas

Website: https://sckarakaltsas.com

Pre-order link:

https://www.amazon.com.au/Good-Child-S-C-Karakaltsas-ebook/dp/B09FJ818D6/

 

History speaks through S.C. Karakaltsas

Posted on by Clare

Sylvia Karakaltsas writes cracking historical novels – you can see my review of her fabulous and moving book A Perfect Stone here. I’m thrilled to have the chance to meet up with her, especially as we have discovered that we both live in Melbourne and can now be coffee mates!

Welcome, Sylvia. Can you tell us something about yourself that you think anyone who reads your book/s really ought to know?

I guess the main thing is that I write historical fiction and short stories. My short stories are not, however, historical. If anything they tend to be contemporary fiction based on current day observations. 

The two historical fiction novels I have written are both set in 1948 so I guess you could say, I like 1948. It’s not so much the year that’s fascinating but the time just after the war when there was still so much turmoil in the world and I find it rich for stories.

I think you have a great grasp of the period. What is your favourite scene from your own writing? Why?

I don’t necessarily have a favourite scene as such but there are scenes which have moved me.. In Climbing the Coconut Tree, two Australians were murdered on a Pacific island and the funeral scene for me was quite emotional to write. 

In A Perfect Stone, there are scenes where young children are killed and writing them moved me to tears. Putting myself right in the scene affects me so much that the scenes are, I think, very powerful. 

If the author is moved, then the scene has power indeed. Now, if I told one of your characters (you get to choose which one) that they were imaginary, how would they respond?

I think Jim from A Perfect Stone would growl and tell me in no uncertain terms how ludicrous I am.  After all he can be cantankerous. He’d probably then add that he liked my new haircut.

He definitely would! He’s such a character! Can you think of any books and/or writers who inspired you on your path to be an author? Can you tell us about that?

I’ve always loved reading. When I was a young girl, I devoured anything by Enid Blyton – who hasn’t? My goal had never been to be a writer, I had other things I wanted to do and the only constant was my love of reading. 

 I came to writing just over five years ago and dug into the books and the authors I had loved to study the art of writing. Inspiration came from Anthony Doer, Sonya Hartnett, Emily Bitto, Hannah Kent, Sophie Laguna and Nicole Hayes. Nicole in particular guided me with all three of my books I have the utmost admiration for her incredible skills. 

That’s a great road for an author. Take yourself back ten years – what would you like to tell yourself?

Getting older is so much better than everyone said and that you never stop learning and growing.

How lovely to hear. What’s next for you in the world of writing?

I am well into my next novel. The character, Lucille, seems to be writing her own story despite me trying to send her in lots of directions. She pulls me right back where she wants to go and guess what, we’ve landed again in 1948. I just shake my head and wonder where she’ll take me next. 

And finally:Who would you be if you were a fictional character – one of yours, or someone else’s?

I’d probably be Helen from my novel A Perfect Stone. Although she’s probably more tolerant and nicer to her father Jim than me. 

There’s a lot of Helen in you, I think. Or maybe vice versa! Thank you so much for sharing with us on Last Word of the Week. Coffee next week?

S.C. Karakaltsas Links

Sylvia’s website: https://sckarakaltsas.wordpress.com/

A Perfect Stone: https://sckarakaltsas.com/my-books/a-perfect-stone/

Climbing the Coconut Tree: https://sckarakaltsas.com/my-books/climbing-the-coconut-tree/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/skarakaltsas/

Twitter: @SKarakaltsas

A Perfect Stone by SC Karakaltsas

Posted on by Clare

“It’s for every child who was, and is, a refugee seeking the right to a better life”, says SC Karakalsas of her latest novel. Seeking any life at all, one might say.
Elderly Australian Jim is grieving for his wife Anna, and finding life more and more difficult to manage despite the help of his daughter Helen. When a stroke causes Jim to lose his ability to speak English, his secret history as a Macedonian child refugee during the Greek Civil War (1946-1949) becomes impossible to hide any longer.
“A Perfect Stone” is a vivid and engaging novel that brims with believable characters and a great deal of observational wisdom. Jim – Dimitri – as an older character is a little muddled in his thinking, and the tenderness of the narration makes us understand perfectly why he might seem cantankerous to those around him. Without his wife Anna, he has less direction and certainty about the world, but somehow he has to let Helen know the truth of her heritage.
As a child, Dimitri and his friends suffer the privations and dislocations of a country at war with itself, with whole families never entirely safe from the demands and decrees of the opposing warring parties. Families are separated and children are evacuated to neighbouring countries, travelling with great hardship through difficult territory that is being fought over by partisans and government troops. Add to that the unsettled status of Macedonian families in the new Greek state, and the awful situations of otherness/refugees/them-us/poverty/disenfranchisement appear endemic.
Jim/Dimitri and his wife Anna face their difficulties with courage and sheer hard work. Their contributions to the sanctity of life and to their new country are a wonder and an inspiration. The ending of the book was handled with great care too.
This book will be enjoyed by readers who love history, family stories, migration stories, and historical mysteries. This is also a great book for everyone who’d like to know a little bit more about where we all come from.

Something to Say: S.C. Karakaltsas

Posted on by Clare

Today I’m pleased to host S.C. Karakaltsas on Something to Say, an occasional blog series in which I chat with creatives who have a timely event or launch to talk about.

S.C. Karakaltsas is the author of two historical fiction novels, Climbing the Coconut Tree, and A Perfect Stone. Sylvia has also written a contemporary short story collection, Out of Nowhere. She has received awards for two of her short stories and has work published in the Lane Cove Literary Awards Anthology and Monash Writers Anthology. In her spare time, Sylvia also blogs and reviews many amazing books at https://sckarakaltsas.com/

Welcome to STS Sylvia. What project are you talking about today?

Thanks for having me. My current project is my new novel called A Perfect Stone.

author pic

A Perfect Stone is set for release today, I see. Congratulations! Is there one aspect of the novel that you relate to most – a favourite character, scene, or effect? Can you tell us more about that?

A Perfect Stone is a dual timeline historical fiction novel set in 1948 during the Greek Civil War and Melbourne in 2016. Released 10 October and launching 18 October, I am very excited about this project.

It’s a story told from the point of view of  eighty-year-old Jim, who finds something which triggers the memories of the childhood he’s hidden, not just from himself but from his overprotective daughter. When Jim has a stroke and begins speaking in another language, his daughter is shocked and confused. Jim must confront what happened when, as a ten-year-old, he was forced at gunpoint to leave his family and trek barefoot through the mountains of Northern Greece to escape the Greek Civil War in 1948.

I fell in love with my character Jim. He’s endearing and vulnerable but also quite eccentric in some ways. He makes me laugh and he makes me cry and he reminds me of a few older men I know, including my own father.

That sounds really interesting. What do you think drives you to pursue your creativity? Is it family history or the past in general, for example?

With my novels, I’m inspired to tell little known stories. In my first novel Climbing the Coconut Tree, I was inspired by the double murder of two Australians living on a phosphate mining island. In A Perfect Stone I was inspired by the fact that 38,000 children from the ages of 2–14 were forced to leave their homes without their parents during the Greek Civil War. Of the ones who survived, many ended up behind the Iron Curtain and some never saw their families again.

A Perfect Stone Ebook Cover-01-01 Final 2 email

I write short stories as well which are mostly contemporary looks at life in suburbia, poking fun or digging at the unexpected things that happen. I wrote a short story collection which was published last year called Out of Nowhere which was well received.

Many writers describe their processes using analogies – the famous Hemingway one, for example, in which he says that writing is simply a matter of sitting in front of the typewriter and staring at a blank page until you start to sweat blood. Others speak of stitching scenes together, following characters on a journey, immersing themselves in a storyline. What can you say about your process?

My process is purely and simply sitting down and writing to see what comes out and it often shocks me. I only started writing four years ago after having spent years in the corporate world and I’m staggered that I can string at least a sentence together let alone a whole novel.

That’s amazing. Finally, what five words would you use to describe yourself as a writer?

Persistent, single minded, wide-eyed and dogged.

That sounds like a recipe for even more success. Thank you so much for joining me in Something to Say, and all the best for the release and launch of A Perfect Stone.

 

You can find the books by SC Karakaltsas  at these links:

A Perfect Stone : https://www.amazon.com.au/Perfect-Stone-S-C-Karakaltsas/dp/0994503261/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1538698782&sr=1-1

Out of Nowhere: A Collection of Short Stories : https://www.amazon.com.au/Out-Nowhere-collection-short-stories/dp/0994503245/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

Climbing the Coconut Tree : https://www.amazon.com.au/Climbing-Coconut-Tree-S-Karakaltsas/dp/0994503229/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=