Genre:
Memoir
Description:
This
memoir, set in Queensland, Australia, begins in January 1948 when the
author was five years old and ends nine years later as
fourteen-year-old Judith awaits a train to Brisbane with her family.
To reveal the reasons for her being at that railway station, or to
explain with whom she waited for the train would be an unforgivable
spoiler. For the first time, but not the last in this review, I
recommend you read No
One’s Child and find
out for yourself. You won’t regret it.
Author:
There’s
not much in the way of publicity for this author. She wrote her life
story in two books: No
One’s Child and The
Girl With The Cardboard Port.
Her bio on Amazon offers this: Judith L. McNeil lives in Queensland,
Australia. She is now retired after decades spent working as a
caregiver for the aged, but volunteering in the community is still
very much a part of her life. Her interests other than writing are
breeding Shitzus, landscape painting, and reading.
Appraisal:
Like
all the “Pals”, I’m no learned literary expert, and normally
that causes me no qualm. I select Indie stories from Big Al’s list
as they catch my eye, read them, and give an honest opinion — my
opinion. Maybe something of what I say about a work will appeal and
make you think, “Yes, that sounds like an interesting read.” Or
maybe my take will be sufficient to convince you that the piece isn’t
for you, and you’ll move on to the next story — there are many
from which to choose.
I
confess to feeling inadequately equipped to give this story its due.
But here goes. As Forrest Gump said when he sat on that park bench
waiting for the bus he didn’t need to catch, “Mama always said
life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna
get.”
And,
for me, reading No One’s
Child, selected by chance
from Al’s list of 1500+ waiting works, was an extraordinary
experience. I cannot express how happy I am that I didn’t pass it
by.
In
1996, Frank McCourt’s memoir, Angela’s
Ashes, became a worldwide
best-seller and went on to win the Pulitzer for Autobiography. That
story has many correlations with Judith McNeil’s memoir. In fact I
can cut this review short for you: if you enjoyed Angela’s
Ashes, you’ll enjoy No
One’s Child. Mr.
McCourt was raised in Limerick, Ireland, but the poverty and
hardships endured and, more to the point, accepted as ‘just how it
is’ by Frank and Judith (Judy) have a commonality that transcends
the geographical separation of Ireland and Australia.
The
staggering recall that both authors demonstrate is what sets these
works apart. Personally, I remember only major incidents in my early
years. Judy remembers the smell of the dirt dunnys (waterless,
outside toilets). She remembers the feel of the air when the “willy
whirlies” (miniature, and in some cases full-blown tornadoes)
disturbed her world, or in one case wrecked the shanty town she lived
in. She remembers the feel of a wild nanny goat who rubbed in
friendship at her leg and allowed Judy to drink from its milk sac,
and the sting of a snake bite as she picked wood from a pile to
hand-build tomato boxes.
Risk
was something she shared her life with, risk from the natural world
she lived so close to, risk from friends who misunderstood her
intelligence, and risk from the one constant from which she could not
escape — her family. That she carried this risk on her own
shoulders from such a young age might make you think her family was
careless of her, but no, it was more that this was the way life was
lived. Judy wasn’t a slave, but she was forced into a servitude of
necessity.
Her
story begins with a short chapter in which her mother, for the first
time, opens up to her. The date is undefined, but Judith is clearly a
grown woman at the time of the conversation. The hardships her mother
endured, to an extent, put Judith’s own struggle in perspective. I
wondered, after finishing the story, whether that chapter was her way
of erasing some blame from her mother, of taking it on herself, as
she had always had. Perhaps? In the story she quotes her mother
saying, “(Once) I cried because I had no shoes, until one day I saw
a child who had no feet.” In any case, although Judith had yearned
to know her mother’s story, I found it poignant that when her
mother finally opened up, Judy couldn’t wait to break the spell, to
stop her mother talking, to escape from the knowing. Perhaps her
heart had hardened too much in survival to allow the space for that
level of forgiveness.
If you
read No One’s Child
(did I mention that I recommend you do?), prepare yourself for Judy’s
honesty. In particular she lays bare her feelings toward her father,
which fester like an infected wound, seeping, dangerous, and
ever-present. But, without her honesty and her extraordinary memory,
this story would lose its color, its depth, its layers. As with
Angela’s Ashes,
what makes this a compelling read is that, through all the hardships
endured by the author, a love of people, of community, of animals . .
. ,and of life, shines thorough.
I did
not come away from reading No
One’s Child feeling
sorry for Judith McNeil, but rather, buoyed by her humanity, and
humbled that she took the time to share her life with me.
To
quote from the book’s short epilogue: “They say lilies rise from
the mud. I know they do.”
I
believe her.
In
case I forgot to mention it, you should read No One’s Child.
FYI:
Added for Reprise Review:
No One’s Child
was a winner in the Non-Fiction category for B&P 2014 Readers'
Choice Awards. Original review ran November 10, 2013
Format/Typo
Issues:
No
typos to mention. Australian dialect, but not an issue for
comprehension.
Rating:
***** Five Stars
Reviewed
by: Pete Barber
Approximate
word count: 75-80,000
words
