Few Australian books have been devoured and re-read by young people quite like those of John Marsden, who died this week, aged 74.
For many of us, his work was a revelation: reading can be this good?!
Marsden wrote more than 40 books in his lifetime, so narrowing the list to cherry-pick our favourites wasn’t easy, but here are his books that most moved ABC Arts reviewers.
Dear Miffy (1997)
For complex, and painfully uncomplex reasons, when I was 10 or so, I wolfed down Marsden’s worlds of violence, confusion and loneliness.
Dear Miffy could be one of Marsden’s darkest novels.
Their characters were often teens harbouring an idea that they were already irreparable, giving voice to this thought for the first time in letters or a diary. By articulating it, they risk someone confirming their greatest fear.
Marsden’s books told me that no-one — not even Dear Miffy’s Tony, perhaps Marsden’s most violent protagonist — was irredeemable.
Dear Miffy is arguably Marsden’s darkest book, a series of unsent letters from Tony, an abandoned teen in a psychiatric hospital, to Miffy, supposedly his ex-girlfriend. Pages are scattered with violence, innuendo and self-loathing as Tony dances around the awful reveal.
Did reading Dear Miffy help codify the harmful myth of mental illness as inherently violent? Maybe. Does giving Tony the central voice centre perpetrators rather than victims? Yes.
But throughout his books, Marsden treated kids as equals capable of understanding moral complexity, knowing many of us would recognise shades of his shadows.
— Jared Richards
The Rabbits (1998)
John Marsden conceived the idea for The Rabbits while driving in regional Victoria at night, shocked by the hordes of furry invaders captured in his headlights.
In 2015, The Rabbits was adapted into a musical theatre work with music by Kate Miller-Heidke and libretto by Lally Katz. (Supplied: Hachette)
When he got home, he wrote the first draft of a picture book. Told from the perspective of a native animal, it’s a simple and stunning tale of rabbits arriving on a land, and consuming it.
The allegory for colonialism and the impact on First Nations people is amplified by mesmerising illustrations by Shaun Tan.
The pages start off with mesmerising images of a peaceful, ancient land of deep-orange rock and bright-blue sky. After the arrival of the imperious rabbits, the colours in the book gradually change to browns and blacks, as the pillaged earth suffers.
It’s a perfect match between the two artists, who both produce work that’s a bit dark, richly creative and immediately captivating.
There’s something I love about this book not having a warm and fuzzy ending — no punches are pulled, and the images still burn in my mind.
The simple words across the complex visions of colonialism break my heart:
“The Rabbits spread across the country. Nothing could stop them; no desert, no river.
“They ate our grass, chopped down our trees and scared away our friends … and stole our children.”
— Katherine Smyrk
Tomorrow, When the War Began (1993)
When Marsden set out to write Tomorrow, When the War Began — the first instalment of what would become his seven-part Tomorrow series — he reportedly wanted to show that young people had the same capacity for grit and resilience that previous generations showed when they were called up to war.
In this, he was successful. The first Tomorrow book, published in 1993, is an adventure story that presents teenagers as independent, courageous and capable in the face of crisis.
In 2018, Marsden has said he wouldn’t have written the Tomorrow books today “because of my own horror at the way refugees who have come to Australia have been treated”. (Supplied)
Set in the fictional rural Victorian town of Wirrawee, the story follows a group of seven teenagers who emerge from a weekend camping in the bush to discover their town occupied by foreign soldiers and the residents interned at the showground. They soon launch guerilla-style attacks on the occupying forces from the safety of their base, a hideout known as Hell.
As a young reader, I loved the action — the crew blow up everything from a ride-on lawnmower to a petrol tanker to an entire harbour in the third book, The Third Day, The Frost, an image that has stayed with me three decades after reading it.
But the books don’t shy away from adult themes — the narrator Ellie and her friends kill enemy soldiers and come to experience PTSD symptoms as the series progresses. And then there’s the love story between Ellie and her boyfriend, Lee…
Tomorrow, When the War Began was wildly popular, selling more than 3 million copies, and I remember stalking my local bookstore in my excitement to get my hands on the sequels, foreshadowing the hype that accompanied each Harry Potter release day a few years later.
While elements of the story are problematic — namely the racist implications of basing the narrative action around a non-Anglo invading force — it was a series that helped embed my love of reading.
— Nicola Heath
Letters from the Inside (1991)
When 15-year-old pen pals Mandy and Tracey begin corresponding after Tracey places an ad in a magazine, the two teenagers, who have never met, begin to learn about each other and themselves.
Letters from the Inside nailed the language of teenagers.
As the story unfolds, we discover Tracey is locked up in a juvenile detention centre.
Letters from the Inside was as compelling to me as it was shocking.
As a school kid in the 1990s, and an avid letter writer, this novel demonstrated how the humour I injected into my epistles — to my friends, my overseas aunty, my pen pal in Sydney — could provide light; how my words could be comforting; how my musings could be illuminating.
Reading this novel as a teen helped me wise up.
It was also one of the cues that awakened the writer in me. From diary entries, to letters, to news copy, to my own book, Marsden’s words provided a crucial footnote to my youth.
— Mawunyo Gbogbo
So Much to Tell You (1987)
Marsden’s first novel is seared into my brain.
In 2012, So Much to Tell You — which has been widely translated — was re-released in celebration of its 25th anniversary. (Supplied)
As a kid, reading this was one of the first times in my life that a novel sucked me into its world and overtook me. A masterclass in writing for young people, it doesn’t speak down or condescend, and it never avoids grittiness.
The story felt so real to me, I still carry the feeling that 14-year-old Marina, the protagonist, is someone I once met, not someone whose fictionalised diary I once devoured.
The voice of Marina — who has experienced trauma and now either will not or cannot speak aloud — felt like it was directed to me alone. Reading So Much To Tell You was a joy that felt utterly personal.
This is Marden’s great strength: his characters find you, speak directly to you, and let you feel things that, as a young person, you didn’t know you were allowed to.
And that moment at the end when Marina finally speaks? Whoa.
— Anna Kelsey-Sugg
This post was originally published on here
