Taking Tom Murray Home
Bookclub guide
Bookclub discussion guide for
‘Taking Tom Murray Home’
A link to a PRINTABLE VERSION is at the end of this page.
With author notes! The suggested format is to discuss each question in the group first, and then read the author’s notes aloud to see if other reflections arise.
Classroom project suggestions at the end.
1. What did you like best about this book?
Tim Slee: Authors have their own favourite elements of their books. I was happiest with the dialogue. The conversations between the characters flowed very naturally in my mind as I was writing, and I think that came across on the page. At times I felt more like a ‘listener’ than a writer!
2. What did you like least about this book?
Tim Slee: I would love to have done more to create more of an image of the landscape of SE Victoria for readers who have never been there. This was one of the underdone elements of the novel in my mind and international readers have commented on it.
3. What other books did this remind you of?
Tim Slee; One of the book’s editors compared the plot to Faulkner’s ‘As I Lay Dying’; a ‘Southern Gothic’ genre novel which is also about a family travelling in a horse and cart (as they did in those days), to bury their mother in 1930s USA. I’ve never read Faulkner, so Tom Murray certainly wasn’t inspired by that story or genre, though I can see the basic plot similarity. I didn’t set out to write a book in any particular style, or inspired by any particular novel or writer.
4. Which characters in the book did you like best?
Tim Slee: I have my own favourites, which I’ll keep to myself! An interesting note may be that there was a much bigger role for Pop in my first draft of the novel. He slipped Jack small letters that Tom had written to him while he was in the Army and which provided some more detail on Tom Murray, and his own back story and motivations. I wanted to give the reader more insight into why he would do such a drastic thing, but in the end I found these just distracted from the main storyline and cut them out.
5. Which characters did you like least?
Tim Slee: I was least happy with how the various police officers came across in the book. Karsi and an officer at the Sorrento-Queenscliff ferry were very sympathetic, others less so. I felt I was falling into the trap of stereotyping the Victorian police, but in the end some like Karsi were heroes, others weren’t, so there was at least a balance!
6. If you were making a movie of this book, who would you cast?
Tim Slee: for me the most important casting decision would be who to cast as Dawn. I write her as physically big and broad, strong but vulnerable, quiet but determined. She doesn’t get the funny lines, so a comedy actor would have to make a big career change to embrace the role of DAWN. There’s nothing that says Dawn has to be a big lady though, so my vote? Rachel Griffiths!
7. Share a favorite quote from the book. Why did this quote stand out?
Tim Slee: I love the Ned Kelly quote about the Victoria Police. “A parcel of big ugly, fat-necked, wombat-headed, big-bellied, magpie-legged, narrow hipped, splay-footed sons of Irish Bailiffs and English Landlords”. I have wanted to find a way to use that one since I started writing, and putting it in a modern context in this novel was pure indulgence. Of my own writing, the part that gave me the biggest emotional response writing it, was the scene where Dawn slaps Jenny and Jenny says ‘Go ahead, hit me again if it makes you feel better. I can’t feel it anyway!’. I agonized over that for days. Would Dawn really do that? Had she pushed herself, had people around her pushed her far enough, for that to happen? But I think I captured what I wanted, which was to show how close to the edge Dawn was getting, and how the whole situation had driven her to a place she had never gone before, even with all the other stress she and Tom had been under. Hence, ‘Mum holds a hand up to her mouth, as though she’s the one who’s been slapped. And Jenny keeps standing there, like she’s daring her, staring her down, until Mum turns away and walks off towards the washrooms, arms wrapped around herself.’ I cried after I wrote that.
8. What other books by this author have you read? How did they compare to this book?
Tim Slee: This is my first published novel, though when I set my mind on being a writer, I did write eight manuscripts in two years based on the notes and ideas I’d compiled over the years. I got an agent, and submitted several of them to publishers, but Tom Murray was the last I wrote, and the first that got a publisher interested. They are all explorations in different genres (sci-fi, crime, historical fiction), though one did win a major US fiction prize for unpublished authors. The manuscript that is closest in style and voice to Tom Murray is called ‘New Town’, a story about a nun who is accused of murdering priests. It is available for free download via my author page or ask me questions at https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17734254.Tim_Slee
10. What feelings did this book evoke for you?
Tim Slee: writing the book, I wanted to take the reader on a similar journey to Jack, Jenny and Dawn. A rollercoaster ride from shock and grief, to drama and mirth and ultimately to a new beginning. If the reader laughs and cries while reading it, that’s great, because I laughed and cried while writing it!
11. What did you think of the book’s length? If it’s too long, what would you cut? If too short, what would you add?
Tim Slee: Amazon pays by the ‘page read’, so in the manuscripts I have put online via Amazon I have always maximized the plot elements to produce longer novels. An example of this is my thriller ‘Bering Strait’ (published to raise money for charity under the pen name FX Holden, if you are looking for it) which comes in at 550 pages or 150,000 words! It has been called a ‘tense and exciting page turner’ so writing to this length while still engaging the reader is not a matter of padding, but of thoughtful plotting and pacing. Tom Murray was a novel I wanted to be read in a single weekend. I wanted the intensity of the reader’s journey to be condensed and compact. So I kept the prose lean, and cut out a number of story lines that I felt took the reader away from a strong focus on what was happening between Jack, Jenny and Dawn. One thing I learned in a writing course many years ago was ‘ask yourself, if this was a film, what would the film makers cut out, to make it fit 90 minutes? Then, cut it!’ Tom Murray is an example of that approach. I think it would make a great film or series!
A final note. I cut a chapter out of the book where the procession was held up by police in Geelong for an extra day and grilled about the fires. I wanted to show the police were taking it very seriously, so much so that the procession was in danger of being derailed and Don charged with arson. But this a) made the police look too much like bad guys for my taste, and b) would have created a dilemma for the real arsonist that I didn’t want to resolve or reveal at that point in the book, so I cut out that extra day/night in Geelong. Which meant that the trip was shorter and Danny Boy had to travel the 400km unrealistically fast! Some horse owners have commented on this, but kindly forgiven the use of artistic license. In reality, a trip of that length with a laden wagon pulled by a single Clydesdale would take at least two weeks, not one.
12. What songs does this book make you think of? Create a book group playlist together!
Tim Slee: I have a playlist of artists who were my go-to ‘writing music’ for Tom Murray, as I needed to put myself in an Australian frame of mind when writing for the Banjo Prize. They included: Nick Cave, Paul Kelly, Hilltop Hoods, Pnau, Sia (earlier work), Tame Impala, Amy Shark, Courtney Barnett, Tash Sultana, Angus and Julia Stone, Gurrumul and Matt Corby.
13. If you got the chance to ask Tim Slee one question, what would it be?
Tim Slee: The one I get asked the most: Did you HAVE to kill Danny Boy? The answer: sorry, Danny was a goner from the day I started writing. It was just a matter of when he was going to peg out, not whether. Danny was a metaphor both for an olde era with olde values, but also for the family’s old life being left behind, and them making a new beginning. But feel free to go to my FB page www.facebook.com/timjslee and ask me some questions in advance of your reading group!
14. Which character in the book would you most like to meet?
Tim Slee: If I got pulled over for speeding, I would want it to be Karsi.
15. Which places in the book would you most like to visit?
Tim Slee: In researching the book, I travelled the exact route followed by Dawn and her family, from Heywood, through Portland, Port Fairy, Colac, to Geelong, over with the ferry via the Bellarine Peninsula and up to Melbourne. I wouldn’t suggest doing it by horse and cart, but it makes for a nice week as a car trip!
16. What do you think of the title’ Taking Tom Murray Home’? How does it relate to the book’s contents? What other title might you choose?
Tim Slee: It’s a matter of public record that I originally titled the manuscript ‘BURN’. In fact, I called it #BURN, a reflection of both the pain the family was feeling, the mystery regarding the arsonist, and the kids’ use of social media. I prefer the new title, obviously!
17. What do you think of the book’s cover? How well does it convey what the book is about?
Tim Slee: I loved this cover at first sight because it was eye catching, but also showed the quirky nature of the book. Fittingly, the artist was a Victorian, Laura Thomas, Coburg.
18. What do you think Tim Slee’s purpose was in writing this book? What ideas was he or she trying to get across?
Tim Slee: In all my work there is one theme I seem always to explore: Pain. Jack and Jenny Murray being afflicted with analgesia allowed me to explore it from a unique angle – how would you experience emotional pain, if you can’t express it by tears, by crying? How would the kids deal with their grief, if their mother didn’t give them time and space to grieve. How would Dawn deal with the pain of the senseless loss of her husband? I let each of the characters explore this in their own way – Jack through denial, Jenny expressing her grief and anger in arson, and Dawn by turning her personal grief into a public event and sharing it with the world. You can find more on other themes in the book (Community, and Rebellion) on this website.
19. How original and unique was this book?
Tim Slee: the idea of a horse drawn funeral is far from unique, and in fact there are funeral services that offer it today. I was acutely aware that if I just put the family on the road with a horse and a few people from the town as a protest, it would be a fairly thin yarn. I wanted an element of intrigue to accompany the procession, and I wanted a unique narrator. ‘Teen as narrator’ is not unique (most recently it was used by Trent Dalton in Boy Swallows Universe), but reading a medical paper about analgesia, and the thought process this sparked around the link between physical and emotional trauma, is what I felt gave Jack a unique voice.
20. Did you feel the narrator Jack, had an authentic voice? If you could hear this same story from another person’s point of view, who would you choose?
Tim Slee: I consciously looked at three potential narrators for the story. Dawn, Jack and Pop. I ruled out Dawn early, because I wanted it to be told about Dawn, not told by her. Jack was problematic because writing authentically in the voice of a teen always is, even though I have teens at home to remind me of how teen boys think (or in fact, often don’t). My editors would sometime ask at points in the book ‘what is Jack thinking about this, what is he feeling’ and my honest answer was, probably not much. We often underestimate the well documented ability/disability of the male teen brain to only look at events and feelings in hindsight, not in the moment.
Pop might have made an interesting narrator, but I wanted to tell the story of the kids’ analgesia from their perspective, which Pop couldn’t have done.
Classroom discussion /project guide
Inspiration for classroom discussions and projects, with extra resource suggestions, especially around the themes in the novel can be found on the 'themes' pages on this website.
SIMPLE
The author writes the novel in first person, present tense.
TASK (writing/analysis): Take a paragraph of the book and rewrite it in third person, past tense. What are the story telling advantages and disadvantages of this approach. If the story had been written in third person, past tense, how would it have been different/ better/ worse?The author tells this story from a boy's perspective, Jack Murray.
TASK (writing/discussion): imagine the narrator in this story was not Jack Murray, but one of the other characters. How would it be different if it had been written from the perspective of Jenny Murray, or their mother Dawn? Or one of the town’s people such as Pop?The events in Taking Tom Murray Home take place in a country community.
TASK (social studies/discussion) could something like this happen in our community? Why, why not? What issue would be enough to unite people in this community to make such a protest?
ADVANCED
The writer claims there are three main themes explored in Taking Tom Murray Home: Pain, and how we experience and express it; Community and how a unique Australian sense of community helps us deal with grief and loss; and Rebellion, as a feature of Australian culture and these days, very much a female/youth led phenomenon.
TASK (analysis): Read the authors’ notes on one or other of the themes in the novel. Using characters or events in the novel, choose one or more themes and show how it is/they are expressed.The writer describes a community which unites in a protest that spreads from being very local, to being national
TASK (social studies): research the yellow vests movement in France. What are the similarities and differences between the yellow vests movement and the protest described in Tom Murray? Could a yellow vests style movement arise in Australia? Discuss why or why not.The writer paints a picture of Australian agriculture under pressure from climate change and declining income, using the dairy industry as an example.
TASK (social studies/creative writing): write a short story set on a farm in Australia, twenty years from now, considering how farming might be impacted by one of the following: climate change, online shopping, trends to eating less meat and dairy, fewer and fewer people living outside the big cities.
TASK (social studies/analysis): based on the novel and other current news sources, pick a current trend or issue (climate change, online shopping and the power of big retailers such as supermarkets or Amazon, trends to eating less meat and dairy, fewer and fewer people living outside the big cities discuss the situation of Australian agriculture today), describe it using reference(s), and then discuss how this trend will affect farming in the future. Finally, discuss whether ‘Taking Tom Murray Home’ still will be relevant in ten years’ time?