Bog
Child
by Sibhan Dowd [j Dowd]
Bog Child. Dowd's exceptional young
adult novel is also about family, religion, sacrifice, and Ireland's Troubles in
1981. In other words, it's far more complex than I expected. If you don't know
anything about bog bodies, Dowd's novel is a great place to start. In it,
eighteen-year-old Fergus and his Uncle Tally find a female body buried in the
bog while they're out shoveling peat. Turns out, the body has not been in the
bog for weeks or months but for years. What makes Bog
Child such an engaging and informative read is that Fergus starts having
dreams about the buried woman, whom he names Mel, and the nature of her death.
These dreams are intertwined with his muddled feelings about his brother, who is
on a hunger strike. You see, besides learning about bog bodies, I also received
many chapters-worth of education about a period known as Ireland's Troubles. In
Bog
Child, there are numerous references to soldiers, border checkpoints,
bomb-makers, Semtrax, courier recruitment, hunger strikes, and violence. On a
more personal level, Fergus (and his family) struggles to make sense of his
brother's decision to join other protesting prisoners in a hunger strike. Yet Bog
Child isn't a pro-war book. One of the most-touching friendships is between
Fergus and an enemy soldier Owain, whom Fergus discovers is just another regular
guy like him. None of the drawbacks to the book should deter you from reading Bog
Child. It is full of happiness and sadness, joys and tragedies, and is one
of the most original stories about growing-up that I've read. -- review submitted by Allison H.-F. - a customer of the Bennett Martin Public Library
Have you read this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?
Allison also submitted reviews of two youth non-fiction titles related to bogs and bog bodies -- also viewable on the Customer Reviews page, linked below...
New Customer Reviews appear regularly in the pages of the BookGuide web site. You can visit the Customer Reviews page to see them all and/or submit your own, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually as we receive them.
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