True History of the Kelly Gang - Peter Carey Reviews

True History of the Kelly Gang is a historical novel by Australian writer Peter Carey. Published in 2000, it was the 2001 winner of the Booker Prize. Despite claiming to be a true history, the book is fiction, but is based loosely on actual events in Kelly's life. The story is separated into thirteen sections allegedly fashioned from original ...  Read the complete review

“I lost my own father at 12yr of age and know what it is to be raised on lies and silences my dear daughter you are presently too young to understand a word I write but this history is for you and will contain no single lie may I burn in Hell if I speak false.” And so the story of Ned Kelly begins... Born in 1855 in a ...  Read the complete review

The Booker Prize 2001 was a proverbial two-horse race between 'The True History of the Kelly Gang' and Ian McEwan's 'Atonement' and in all honesty any sense of justice would have seen a stewards enquiry after Peter Carey's novel was victorious. Compared to the elegant realism of the runner-up, Carey has both the subtlety ...  Read the complete review

As an Australian, I would just like to point out that the Ned Kelly episode had very little to do with the British or indeed Australia, and that all the players in the drama were Irish. The gang's members -- including Kelly, Byrne and Hart -- were all Irish; the policemen Kelly murdered -- Lonigan, Scanlon and Kennedy -- were all born in ...  Read the complete review

I was twenty-five when the b----rs hanged me for murder in 1880. My gang had tried to derail a train full of police reinforcements sent to capture us. I'd survived the gun battle thanks to the iron helmet and body armour I wore but one of the b------s shot me in the leg. Such is life. G'day readers I am the ghost of Ned Kelly. ...  Read the complete review