Broken Hill, Broken Lives

Simon and Timothy are two brothers growing up in the Australian 'Sunburnt Circus'. This story focuses on the circus when it visits Broken Hill, in outback New South Wales. The story is not long under way, when the children make friends with a family in the town, and their time with the other children sees a whole lot of unexpected consequences for not just the boys, but their parents and the whole circus as well. Once again the characters come to life and you feel by the end of the story that you 'know' them.

The large mining town of Broken Hill sets the backdrop for this story, and the lives of some of the other Circus members, and some of the people who live in the town, become critical to the story line. Matt and Pete, the motor bike stunt riders, are about to have their lives turned upside down. They had run away from a past they wished they could forget, and they never quite expected to have it catch up with them again. However, here in Broken Hill of all places, all hell breaks loose.

Two other brothers in the circus, indigenous acrobats Dan and Kenny, also feature significantly in this story. Broken Hill is the home of their mother and brother and so they get a chance to catch up with their family. Their mother has become quite a popular artist using the indigenous dot point painting method, and yet something is not quite right about the way her paintings are being sold. Against her wishes, one of her visiting sons decides to investigate into it.

In a 'teen' novel that actually appeals to anyone between 14 and 84, a number of big ticket items come up for the reader to grapple with. Child abuse; clergy suspicion of child abuse and what they do or don't do with it; indigenous communities living on the fringe of large country towns; indigenous art; keeping animals in cages; working with the law or not, in seeking justice; grappling with impending retirement; all this and more are dealt with in this easy to read story of a group of people sharing their lives together as 'The Sunburnt Circus'.

'Broken Hill, Broken Lives' is a sequel to 'The Sunburnt Circus' story that came out some 18 months ago. It is set 2 years after the first story and so the young brothers are now both young teenagers. Despite having virtually the same cast as the first story, it is a completely stand alone story not needing you to have read the first book. If you have read the first story, you will be in on a secret that even the characters in the book are not aware of yet - a secret that did not come out for 10 years after the main story of the first book (and that was mentioned in the final chapter of the first book). But you don't need to know that secret to love this second book. The proof reader (who had not read the first book) thoroughly enjoyed the story of 'Broken Hill, Broken Lives', and clearly not knowing a particular secret about the Sunburnt Circus, did not affect her enjoyment of the story.