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Darren Groth is the author of seven novels including Kindling (Hachette Australia, 2010), Are You Seeing Me? (Orca, 2017), Munro vs. the Coyote (Orca, 2017) and Infinite Blue (Orca, 2018). He won the 2016 Adelaide Festival Award for Young Adult Literature and has been nominated for numerous other prestigious prizes, among them the Governor General’s Literary Awards, the BC Book Prizes, the OLA White Pine Award, the CBCA Book of the Year (Australia), and the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards (Australia). Groth is a passionate advocate for the representation of neurodiversity and intellectual disability in literature, and is the proud father of a son with autistic spectrum disorder. When he’s not watching American Ninja Warrior with his beautiful wife, he’s eating Fatburger with his wondrous twins. He lives in Vancouver, BC.
AWARDS:
Shortlisted in the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards Young Adult Book category for Most Valuable Potential, August 2004
Official Selection 'Books From Our Backyard: 100 Must-Read Books From Queensland', Most Valuable Potential, September 2006
Shortlisted (with brother Simon) in The Text Prize of Australia for Concentrate, August 2009
Book of the Month at Booktopia for Kindling, July 2010
Book of the Month in Notebook Magazine for Kindling, August 2010
Selection 'Best Reads of 2012? in Reading Rewards for Kindling, December 2012
Book of the Month at Riverbend Books for Are You Seeing Me?, August 2014
Bookseller's Pick at Abbey's Bookshop for Are You Seeing Me?, August 2014
Top 12 YA Reads of 2014 at Booktopia for Are You Seeing Me?, November 2014
2014 Books of the Year at Booktopia for Are You Seeing Me?, December 2014
Outstanding Book in International Board on Books for Young Adults' (IBBY) Collection for Are You Seeing Me?, January 2015
Shortlisted, Children's Book Council of Australia 2015 Older Readers Book of the Year for 'Are You Seeing Me?', April 2015
Shortlisted, NSW Premier's Literary Awards, Ethel Turner Prize for Young Adult's Literature for 'Are You Seeing Me?', April 2015.
Shortlisted, Sheila A. Egoff children's literature prize for 'Are you seeing me?', March 2016.
Finalist, Amy Mathers Teen Book Award 2020
BOOKS:
The Procrastinator, published by Jacobyte Books, November 2000 and by Poseidon, April 2006
Most Valuable Potential, published by Ninderry Press, October 2003
The Articulate Conception, published as The Umbilical Word by IP, June 2008 and by Exciting Press, December 2013
Kindling, published by Hachette, July 2010 and by Exciting Press, April 2013
Concentrate (Brothers Groth), published by TBG, April 2012
Are You Seeing Me?, published by Random House Australia, August 2014; also Orca 2015 9781459810792 $12.95
Munro vs. The Coyote (Orca, 2017) $19.95 / 9781459814097
Infinite Blue (Orca, 2018) $14.95 978-14598-1513-1. Co-writer is Simon Groth who lives in Brisbane, Australia
Munro vs. the Coyote (Orca, 2020) $12.95 978-1-4598238-5-3
Boy in the Blue Hammock (Nightwood Editions, 2022) $22.95 9780889714267
[BCBW 2022]
+++
Boy in the Blue Hammock by Darren Groth
(Nightwood Editions $22.95)
Review by Erin F. Chan
Tao, a failed service dog, is now the loyal pet to “Family”—composed of “Woman,” “Man,” “Girl,” and “Boy.” Tao, though, has never understood Boy’s place in the pack. It seems straightforward to Tao: Boy is a “soft, vulnerable breed” and thus should be the lowest member in the hierarchy. Yet, Family always grants Boy special privileges—prioritizing him—and Boy shows “no deference, no apology, no fear” to Tao’s attempt at dominance. Tao’s dismissal of Boy, however, must come to an end when the other members of the pack are slain—leaving Tao as Boy’s only protector in their newly dystopian world.
This is the set-up for Darren Groth’s speculative fiction title, Boy in the Blue Hammock, and we learn that “Boy” is Kasper—an intellectually disabled fifteen-year-old boy with a limited ability to speak—now the last surviving (human) member of the family. Groth, an advocate for neurodiversity and intellectual disability representation in literature, based Kasper and Tao on his son and their own failed service dog. The novel follows the duo as they are forced to leave their devastated home—and for Kasper, forced to leave behind one of his greatest comforts, his blue hammock—in search of safety away from the “hounds,” the forces of the ruling regime.
Told partly from Tao’s limited point of view, Boy in the Blue Hammock reveals through the (curiously high) understanding of a dog the violence inflicted by the hounds on the family and their small Pacific Northwest town of Gilder. “The hounds pass by again, shadows darting like dragonflies,” writes Groth. “One slows, stops at the door. Tao can hear the breathing—deep, deliberate inhalations. Then the hoarse scrape of metal dragging across concrete. Tao smells body odour and tobacco. He senses joy borne by malevolence, a peach with maggots for a stone.”
Groth’s writing captures big themes, thoughts and emotions, and cruelties with a crisp and visceral quality. Many of the small, strung-together moments of Tao and Boy’s journey hold a poetic beauty: “Steps are the measure of time, each one bringing closer a midnight unknown. Walk awhile. Rest. Drift like lifeboats at sea. Duck beneath the swaying feet of a man hanged from a makeshift gallows. Lap at the last dribbles of a broken fire hydrant run dry.”
Neither Tao nor Kasper are able to communicate with, or understand what remains of the crumbling, cruel world in a way that will ease their path to survival. Their perspectives challenge the reader to consider other ways of communication, even those involving silence. But this does not stop the people that Tao and Kasper encounter on their journey from speaking to them. While Tao attempts to determine these strangers’ intentions because he cannot understand their words, their dialogue reveals their true character—and, importantly, how they view Kasper—to the reader.
Alongside the suspense of the duo’s arduous journey are interspersed flashbacks to the family’s past—all from the perspective of Kasper’s mother. Since the premise of the novel foretells the family’s impending end, these glimpses of the past flesh out Tao and Kasper’s present. They also reveal more of Groth’s dystopian worldbuilding and how the ongoing crises affected each family member’s daily life—especially Kasper’s. From seemingly small things, such as Kasper’s favourite crackers being out of stock for weeks, to not having electricity or batteries to play the song that would calm him down, disruptions to the family’s routines present a terrifying problem. Kasper’s parents fear what the future holds for their son when he can neither conform nor advocate for himself. “Kasper’s refusal to go quietly into the night was a blow struck for resistance,” writes Groth. “Protestors witnessing his meltdown would’ve applauded. A pyrrhic victory, of course. There weren’t any exceptions with this regime. Disability wasn’t a licence to rage. An IQ below seventy-five didn’t give you a free pass for dissent. After curfew, a meltdown was just another prompt for an anonymous call to the authorities. The irony—Kasper treated the same as everyone else.”
Against a background of mass inhumanity, Boy in the Blue Hammock is timely in its attention to disability and ableism, speaking to present realities and the increasingly complex lives of disabled people in a world that continually devalues them.
Despite his failure as a service dog and initial reluctance in accepting Boy’s place in the pack, Tao steps up to protect the most vulnerable member of his family. Their story emphasizes loss and loyalty, capability and trust, and pointedly imparts the need for disabled lives to be respected as inherently valuable.
9780889714267
Erin F. Chan (she/her) is a cyborg and graduate student in the Master of Publishing program at SFU and currently lives and works as a publishing assistant, copy editor, and designer on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.
AWARDS:
Shortlisted in the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards Young Adult Book category for Most Valuable Potential, August 2004
Official Selection 'Books From Our Backyard: 100 Must-Read Books From Queensland', Most Valuable Potential, September 2006
Shortlisted (with brother Simon) in The Text Prize of Australia for Concentrate, August 2009
Book of the Month at Booktopia for Kindling, July 2010
Book of the Month in Notebook Magazine for Kindling, August 2010
Selection 'Best Reads of 2012? in Reading Rewards for Kindling, December 2012
Book of the Month at Riverbend Books for Are You Seeing Me?, August 2014
Bookseller's Pick at Abbey's Bookshop for Are You Seeing Me?, August 2014
Top 12 YA Reads of 2014 at Booktopia for Are You Seeing Me?, November 2014
2014 Books of the Year at Booktopia for Are You Seeing Me?, December 2014
Outstanding Book in International Board on Books for Young Adults' (IBBY) Collection for Are You Seeing Me?, January 2015
Shortlisted, Children's Book Council of Australia 2015 Older Readers Book of the Year for 'Are You Seeing Me?', April 2015
Shortlisted, NSW Premier's Literary Awards, Ethel Turner Prize for Young Adult's Literature for 'Are You Seeing Me?', April 2015.
Shortlisted, Sheila A. Egoff children's literature prize for 'Are you seeing me?', March 2016.
Finalist, Amy Mathers Teen Book Award 2020
BOOKS:
The Procrastinator, published by Jacobyte Books, November 2000 and by Poseidon, April 2006
Most Valuable Potential, published by Ninderry Press, October 2003
The Articulate Conception, published as The Umbilical Word by IP, June 2008 and by Exciting Press, December 2013
Kindling, published by Hachette, July 2010 and by Exciting Press, April 2013
Concentrate (Brothers Groth), published by TBG, April 2012
Are You Seeing Me?, published by Random House Australia, August 2014; also Orca 2015 9781459810792 $12.95
Munro vs. The Coyote (Orca, 2017) $19.95 / 9781459814097
Infinite Blue (Orca, 2018) $14.95 978-14598-1513-1. Co-writer is Simon Groth who lives in Brisbane, Australia
Munro vs. the Coyote (Orca, 2020) $12.95 978-1-4598238-5-3
Boy in the Blue Hammock (Nightwood Editions, 2022) $22.95 9780889714267
[BCBW 2022]
+++
Boy in the Blue Hammock by Darren Groth
(Nightwood Editions $22.95)
Review by Erin F. Chan
Tao, a failed service dog, is now the loyal pet to “Family”—composed of “Woman,” “Man,” “Girl,” and “Boy.” Tao, though, has never understood Boy’s place in the pack. It seems straightforward to Tao: Boy is a “soft, vulnerable breed” and thus should be the lowest member in the hierarchy. Yet, Family always grants Boy special privileges—prioritizing him—and Boy shows “no deference, no apology, no fear” to Tao’s attempt at dominance. Tao’s dismissal of Boy, however, must come to an end when the other members of the pack are slain—leaving Tao as Boy’s only protector in their newly dystopian world.
This is the set-up for Darren Groth’s speculative fiction title, Boy in the Blue Hammock, and we learn that “Boy” is Kasper—an intellectually disabled fifteen-year-old boy with a limited ability to speak—now the last surviving (human) member of the family. Groth, an advocate for neurodiversity and intellectual disability representation in literature, based Kasper and Tao on his son and their own failed service dog. The novel follows the duo as they are forced to leave their devastated home—and for Kasper, forced to leave behind one of his greatest comforts, his blue hammock—in search of safety away from the “hounds,” the forces of the ruling regime.
Told partly from Tao’s limited point of view, Boy in the Blue Hammock reveals through the (curiously high) understanding of a dog the violence inflicted by the hounds on the family and their small Pacific Northwest town of Gilder. “The hounds pass by again, shadows darting like dragonflies,” writes Groth. “One slows, stops at the door. Tao can hear the breathing—deep, deliberate inhalations. Then the hoarse scrape of metal dragging across concrete. Tao smells body odour and tobacco. He senses joy borne by malevolence, a peach with maggots for a stone.”
Groth’s writing captures big themes, thoughts and emotions, and cruelties with a crisp and visceral quality. Many of the small, strung-together moments of Tao and Boy’s journey hold a poetic beauty: “Steps are the measure of time, each one bringing closer a midnight unknown. Walk awhile. Rest. Drift like lifeboats at sea. Duck beneath the swaying feet of a man hanged from a makeshift gallows. Lap at the last dribbles of a broken fire hydrant run dry.”
Neither Tao nor Kasper are able to communicate with, or understand what remains of the crumbling, cruel world in a way that will ease their path to survival. Their perspectives challenge the reader to consider other ways of communication, even those involving silence. But this does not stop the people that Tao and Kasper encounter on their journey from speaking to them. While Tao attempts to determine these strangers’ intentions because he cannot understand their words, their dialogue reveals their true character—and, importantly, how they view Kasper—to the reader.
Alongside the suspense of the duo’s arduous journey are interspersed flashbacks to the family’s past—all from the perspective of Kasper’s mother. Since the premise of the novel foretells the family’s impending end, these glimpses of the past flesh out Tao and Kasper’s present. They also reveal more of Groth’s dystopian worldbuilding and how the ongoing crises affected each family member’s daily life—especially Kasper’s. From seemingly small things, such as Kasper’s favourite crackers being out of stock for weeks, to not having electricity or batteries to play the song that would calm him down, disruptions to the family’s routines present a terrifying problem. Kasper’s parents fear what the future holds for their son when he can neither conform nor advocate for himself. “Kasper’s refusal to go quietly into the night was a blow struck for resistance,” writes Groth. “Protestors witnessing his meltdown would’ve applauded. A pyrrhic victory, of course. There weren’t any exceptions with this regime. Disability wasn’t a licence to rage. An IQ below seventy-five didn’t give you a free pass for dissent. After curfew, a meltdown was just another prompt for an anonymous call to the authorities. The irony—Kasper treated the same as everyone else.”
Against a background of mass inhumanity, Boy in the Blue Hammock is timely in its attention to disability and ableism, speaking to present realities and the increasingly complex lives of disabled people in a world that continually devalues them.
Despite his failure as a service dog and initial reluctance in accepting Boy’s place in the pack, Tao steps up to protect the most vulnerable member of his family. Their story emphasizes loss and loyalty, capability and trust, and pointedly imparts the need for disabled lives to be respected as inherently valuable.
9780889714267
Erin F. Chan (she/her) is a cyborg and graduate student in the Master of Publishing program at SFU and currently lives and works as a publishing assistant, copy editor, and designer on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.
Articles: 2 Articles for this author
Are You Seeing Me?
Review 2015
ASD brother, where art thou?
by Cherie Thiessen
"What is it about sea monsters?"; nineteen-year-old Justine Richter asks her twin brother. "Why are you into them so much?";
The twins are in the Okanagan, about to fulfill one of Perry's dreams-on the lookout for Ogopogo.
Perry's two-fold answer is slow in coming. The first reason is because sea monsters are excellent in hiding. They've survived for thousands of years without being caught. The second reason is because sea monsters have learned to survive in a difficult and changing world.
Any reader who has been paying attention will realize that high functioning, autistic Perry is describing himself.
As a child born with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), unlike his sister, Perry is subject to 'inappropriate behaviours' and he has problems mixing with people.
To further complicate matters, for over a year, since their father's death, Justine has been his sole caregiver. Their mother left them when they were four.
That's the set-up for Darren Groth's engaging and heartfelt Are You Seeing Me? (Orca $19.95).
Thanks to their father's life insurance policy, the twins have made their first plane trip from their Australian home to meet up with their mother, now living in Vancouver. The mother and her other daughter have nervously awaited the visit. Perry is unaware of the tension. He mostly wants to see Ogopogo.
Perry is also passionate about Jackie Chan movies and earthquakes. He is rarely without his earthquake monitoring equipment: a portable seismograph, notebook, and seismometer that come out whenever he feels uneasy.
Perry is uneasy often. Like when they're going through Canada Customs. Justine has learned how to cope with her brother's volatility. But she is not dealing so well with a very new problem: Perry says he wants to leave her and go into the independent specialized housing.
Their father had started researching a care facility for Perry before his death. Justine is perplexed: Is her brother doing this for himself? or for her?
The only hint that this enjoyable and engaging novel is written for young adults comes towards to the end. Plot rules, plausibility not so much. While 'Saint' Justine is sometimes too good to be true, her twin brother is an intriguing, wise, and ultimately lovable character.
"He was a joy to write,"; says Groth, "much easier than his 'normal' sister. There's a certain fictional freedom that comes with exploring the mind of a unique person. I wanted to produce an authentic voice for the story and be honest to the characters and their circumstances.";
Groth says the original manuscript took about a year to write. Most of the research he had to do was not about Autism Spectrum Disorder but about earthquakes, Ogopogo and Jackie Chan.
"Following the publication of my previous novel, Kindling,"; he says, "I started playing with the ideas that would become Are You Seeing Me? It all hung around in my head for a couple of months before I started to put words on the page.";
A former special education teacher and the father of a son with ASD, Groth had previously taught several children with ASD. "It was a real life-shaping experience,"; he says, "and, as Fate would have it, quite a useful preparation for being a parent.";
Groth's own twins are now 14. On his website [Darrengroth.com] Groth smiles with his son as they both hold up a sign that reads: "We need DiverseBooks because disability is too often portrayed in fiction as 'other' rather than 'another.' ";
In an interview with BCBW, Groth articulated the underlying message of Are You Seeing Me?
"Don't subscribe to the whole 'perception is reality' myth. For people like my son and Perry, the distance between assumption and truth can be huge, so avoid snap judgments and instant opinions. If you can do that-if you can pause, wait, pay attention-you might notice a reason or hear an explanation. And you'll be a better person for it, guaranteed.";
Originally from Brisbane, Australia, Darren Groth moved to Vancouver in 2007 with his Canadian wife and their then five-year-old twins. Are You Seeing Me? has also been published by Random House Australia.
978-1-45981-079-2
[BCBW 2015]
Munro vs. The Coyote
Review (2017)
REVIEW: Munro vs. The Coyote
By Darren Groth
Victoria: Orca Books, 2017. $19.95 / 9781459814097
Reviewed by Carol Anne Shaw
*
Sixteen-year old Munro Maddux has been having a rough time. Ever since the sudden death of his sister, he has been angry, depressed, and confused. Even worse, he can't seem to get rid of the horrible voice in his head -- the one he calls "The Coyote.";
The Coyote's cup is always half-empty, and every time Munro takes a step toward healing his broken heart, the Coyote is there to tell him not to bother. After all, he's really just a loser. And let's face it: he's partly to blame for Evie's death.
Grief-stricken and at a loss as to how to help their son, Munro's parents decide to send him on a six-month student exchange to Brisbane, Australia, hoping a change might do him good. Munro isn't exactly thrilled at the idea; after all, the name of the program is YOLO and the pamphlet is chock-full of all-caps text and far too many exclamation marks.
But soon after the plane lands in Australia, Munro begins to settle in. His host family is pretty cool, and he quickly makes friends with a group of kids at his new school, including Caro, whose eyes are big and wide, and whose mouth looks ready to break out in a smile, even when its filled with ramen noodles.
But just like always, as soon as things begin to show signs of improvement, The Coyote shows up, doing his best to alienate Munro from his new friends.
To make matters worse, Munro learns there is a volunteer component of his exchange experience -- one that will see him working as a "Living Partner"; to a group of special needs residents at the Fair Go Community Village in Brisbane. "No way!"; he thinks.
"I've got to get reassigned!"; It's too much. Evie had Down Syndrome, and this is just a little bit too close to home.
But to his surprise, Munro discovers that Fair Go is the one place where The Coyote actually keeps his mouth shut. Maybe this isn't going to be so bad after all. And it isn't. In fact, it's kind of great. Munro soon makes solid connections with his group of residents, including Blake, a Down Syndrome girl with a spirit almost as bright as Evie's had been.
As his volunteer hours grow, Munro finds himself spending more and more time with his group. He is especially determined to connect with Shah, a group member who managed to escape the atrocities of civil war in the Middle East in the back of truck, only to become separated from his family.
Shah is understandably distant and guarded, but to his delight, Munro slowly earns the boy's trust through brief conversations they share over a chessboard.
But when two members of Munro's group suddenly leave Fair Go, Munro's old nemesis, The Coyote, makes a fearful return and Munro suffers a setback. What was he thinking? He should have known this was all a mistake. He's let down two members of his group, just the way he let down Evie. He couldn't save her, and he can't fix things for Blake and Shah, either.
He's useless, according to The Coyote, and the sooner he realizes it, the better. Unless, of course, he can begin to trust the people around him -- the people who want to help him find the old Munro again.
With loving support and a strength he didn't know he had, Munro learns that often it isn't just one person's fault: sometimes life takes on a life of its own. And sometimes, the best thing you can do is get out of your own head and help someone else.
Darren Groth is a brilliant storyteller, his characters are rich and layered, and this book was a delight to review. Readers will surely identify with the voice of The Coyote -- that alter-ego naysayer so many of us come up against during challenging times.
And younger readers will certainly enjoy the growing romance that develops between Munro and the lovely Caro, too.
Throughout the novel, I found the dialogue between the teens both engaging and completely authentic a feat that is sometimes a difficult thing for us grown-ups to pull off successfully. Mr. Groth has clearly spent considerable time in the company of young people!
All this adds up to a page-turner of a book. The story moves quickly and we meet a whole host of characters along the way. I fell in love with the members of Munro's Fair Go group, all of them delightfully unique, while the adults who pepper the pages of the story are also wonderfully human.
In addition to real laugh-out-loud moments, this novel has some heart-wrenching moments that might have you wiping your eyes a time or two. However, the sentiment is never sloppy or gratuitous, and I reached the end of the novel having experienced "all the feels.";
While Munro vs. the Coyote is a book about loss, grief, despair, and the messiness of a sixteen year old's broken heart, ultimately it is an account of true healing. It is a book about love, the tenacity of the human spirit, and our capacity to mend.
This is the first book I have read by Darren Groth. It certainly won't be the last.
*
Carol Anne Shaw is the author of the "Hannah"; books, all from Ronsdale Press: Hannah & the Spindle Whorl (2010), Hannah & the Salish Sea (2013), and Hannah & the Wild Woods (2015). She lives at Cobble Hill on Vancouver Island.
*
The Ormsby Review. More Readers. More Reviews. More Often.
[BCBW 2-17]
