The book
“A stark, harrowing, yet deeply courageous work of immense power and magnitude.”—Quadrant
Homeless and alone, a disturbed youth drifts between town and the Australian outback, growing increasingly isolated and distrustful in a society lacking the means and seemingly the will to help him. He is coerced by strange voices and haunted by a history of family violence. This compelling coming-of-age novel tells Peter Kocan’s own story, offering us an intimate portrait of the dark forces at work in the evolution of a loner. “No more authentic study of this type of loner exists,” wrote the Times, naming Fresh Fields book of the year in 2005. “Taxi Driver is a melodrama by comparison.”
The author
Peter Kocan
Peter Kocan was born in Newcastle, New South Wales, in 1947 and grew up in Melbourne. He left school at fourteen to work on country New South Wales properties and in factory jobs. He served a decade in custody for a shooting offence and it was then that he began to write. He has published three previous novels and five collections of verse.
Press
- Jun 13 2007
Library Journal: "Kocan (The Treatment), who spent years in prison and mental hospitals for the attempted assassination of an Australian politician, has crafted a dark, Dickensian work based on the events of his own rough-and-tumble youth." - Mar 15 2007
Kirkus Reviews: "[The protagonist] cries a lot—the least thing sets him off—and he's never had a girlfriend." - Mar 13 2007
Publishers Weekly (starred review): "Kocan indulges in neither sentimentality nor rage, and his unnamed protagonist's story is a fine achievement." - Aug 3 2006
Quadrant: "Peter Kocan’s new novel, Fresh Fields, is a stark, harrowing, yet deeply courageous work of immense power and magnitude." - Aug 3 2006
Les Murray, The Melbourne Age: "No novel I read this year, from anywhere, equalled Peter Kocan's bleak Fresh Fields." - May 14 2006
The Melbourne Age: "Kocan's new novel, Fresh Fields, tells the story of his life before the crime. It sheds new light on the state of mind and the circumstances that could propel a disturbed young man into such an act of violence."