The Outcast

For me this was a very powerful story. It’s fundamentally about a boy who at age 10 suffers the unbearable guilt of seeing his mother drown and not being able to save her, and then has to live with a father who can’t or won’t show him the love he needs to overcome his guilt. It’s also a wider story about bad parenting (mostly fathering) and domestic violence in upper class post-war Britain. It's also a story about how the justice system does nothing to really address the cause of crimes committed by a mentally disturbed young man. There were lots of times when I just had to put the book down, unable to bear the pain I felt for the main character, Lewis, but I was always drawn back in desperately hoping that Sadie Jones would show more provide Lewis with the believable and satisfying redemption that I hope can exist. show less

While The Outcast is a depressing story, I found the book to be suspenseful and beautifully written. It is a tale of devatating pain and childhood grief and disintegration behind the stilted walls of British upper-class hypocracy and dysfunction. I couldn't put it down and was completely absorbed by the key characters and the plot. The reviewer references to both Catcher in the Rye and Atonement are authentic in terms of subject matter. Sadie Jones' talent takes my breath away and left me in tears.

Sadie Jones’ debut novel is set in England in the years immediately following WWII. Lewis Aldridge lives with his mother Elizabeth and father Gilbert in a semi-rural commuter town outside of London. Gilbert served in the war and is the stiff-upper-lip type who keeps his feelings to himself. He is also strict and straitlaced (though a reluctant disciplinarian) and presides over a household to some extent held hostage to his moods. Free-spirited Elizabeth drinks. Tragedy strikes when Lewis is ten: he loses his mother in a drowning accident, an event to which he is the sole witness. Gilbert and Lewis are both devastated but exist in isolated emotional spheres and are so bottled up they are unable to provide any comfort to one another. In show more an effort to repair the damage, Gilbert quickly remarries and introduces young, needy, attention-seeking Alice to his son only a few months after Elizabeth’s death. With no outlet for his guilt and remorse, Lewis’s fragile emotional state festers; confused by resentment and anger that he can neither escape nor express, he finds solace in alcohol, self-mutilation and episodes of destructive rage. The novel’s most wrenching scenes take place in 1957, after Lewis returns home from a spell in prison for setting fire to the local church. Lewis and Gilbert strike a truce of sorts. Lewis promises to behave, and Gilbert gets him a menial position working for the company where he has built his career, which is owned by the odious Dicky Carmichael, a neighbour, whose two daughters, sultry Tamsin and gangly Kit, are childhood friends of Lewis. But Lewis, still lacking an outlet for feelings that he doesn’t understand, is ostracized by much of the community and gives in to wilfulness and destructive urges that won’t let him alone. The tone of the narration is controlled, the prose reminiscent of William Trevor at his most tersely lyrical. Sadie Jones has written a psychologically blistering novel that generates great suspense, presenting Lewis as the victim of the emotional failings of the weak and immature adults charged with his care and something of a ticking time-bomb. Though largely driven by tragedy and violence, the story concludes on an emotionally satisfying, hopeful note. Shortlisted for the Orange Prize and winner of the Costa Book Awards prize for first novel, The Outcast is a sophisticated and thoroughly convincing work of fiction that never lets the reader down. show less

This book packs a wallop and is definitely not for those who like soft, rosy stories.

It is a book that will haunt me for awhile...a long while.

As stated in the opening chapter, two people went into the woods for a picnic and only one returned!

When young Lewis witnesses the drowning of his mother, his life spins way out of control while his father and the upper crust social strata of 1940-1950's England encourages and foments denial.

When his father rapidly marries and Lewis' feelings are pushed further and further underground, he acts out in ways that harm himself and those around him.

This is a graphic novel -- not in the sense of cartoon like pictures -- but in the reality of stark images written at the hand of a very adept and show more powerfully skilled author.

Struggling to write a review about the awesome power of this book, I'll simply say it is a very compelling look at the phoniness of society. It is an incredible story of a young man struggling to find meaning in a very crazy environment.

While those around him are quite comfortable in their accouterments, lavish lifestyles, dinner parties and social status, their out-of- reality behaviors literally drive Lewis crazy!

While the adults emotionally and physically abuse their children behind closed doors, they quite comfortably drive their Rolls Royce cars out into the guilded land of la la land.

Highly recommended! show less

I avoid goodread reviews until I finish a book - and this time what a surprise! So many people advising other people not to read it. I began it with some trepidation - servants in every house, yet the book is post war and starts around the year I was born. 60 years later I don't think I've ever in my life known anyone with servants! I thought I wouldn't connect with the characters at all. But the structure kept me going and I really enjoyed it. Have another half a star.

While The Outcast is a depressing story, I found the book to be suspenseful and beautifully written. It is a tale of devatating pain and childhood grief and disintegration behind the stilted walls of British upper-class hypocracy and dysfunction. I couldn't put it down and was completely absorbed by the key characters and the plot. The reviewer references to both Catcher in the Rye and Atonement are authentic in terms of subject matter. Sadie Jones' talent takes my breath away and left me in tears.

When The Outcast opens it’s 1957 and 19 year old Lewis Aldridge has just been released from two years in prison. He is returning home, the outskirts of London, to his father and stepmother, neither of whom wants him. The rest of the book is the haunting story of Lewis’ life, before and after this point, as the author weaves the story by moving back and forth in time, developing a narrative with tension and suspense that had me holding my breath and furiously turning pages.

Lewis’ story is one of repression and loneliness. As a ten-year-old, he watches helplessly as his mother drowns in a river close to their home and without her to anchor him, he is lost. His father, Gilbert, marries a much younger woman, only a few short months show more later. Lewis struggles to fit in and control his anger, but he is a child in need of extensive counseling, and none is offered him.

In the meantime, his father’s influential boss, Dicky Carmichael, is revealed as an abusive bully who is systematically beating his younger daughter, Kit. Lewis and Kit are unwitting partners in trying to escape their individual nightmare existences. And Lewis’ stepmother, Alice, has turned into a public drunk who is making sexual advances on him.

It’s hard for a guy to keep his head up under these circumstances. Lewis does try, but the cards are stacked against him. My heart went out to him. Sadie Jones paints such a sympathetic character, flaws and all that I found myself wanting desperately for him to succeed. In the end, we’re left with hope, Lewis is left with hope. He has a future that could never have been predicted early on in the narrative.

Sadie Jones produced a knock-out debut novel. Her spare prose, told with unnerving realism make for a riveting read that reveals the strait-laced life of the fifties wasn’t all it appeared to be. Very highly recommended. show less