Tom Appleby Convict Boy ~ Jackie French

Audience: 12-17 High school Students

Genre: Adventure, Historical Fiction

Year Published: 2004

In a harsh land, an orphan finds adventure and the courage to survive.

After the death of Tom Appleby's father, Tom is orphaned on the streets of London at the young age of eight. The king sells him to a chimney sweep who immediatly puts him to work and feeds him scraps. After witnessing the death of a good friend, Tom commits to crime to try start a new life. Tom's convicted of stealing, and sentenced to deportation to Botany Bay on the first fleet.

Jackie French has an incredible way with description which makes it hard to put this novel down and turn away. It is hard to imagine this is what it was like to be a convict, but as a reader you begin to believe every single word.

French develops this character with so much emotion that you are connected to him and you feel sad for him even though it's hard for us to even contemplate what it was like living in ghastly conditions in a filthy, dark basement of a house or the bottom of a ship with hundreds of other smelly convicts for months at a time, with occasional glimpses of sunlight.

French wrote this novel as a captivating tale courage, determination and survival, one, young boys fight for a new life in a new land.

The novel begins 1868, Toms ninetieth birthday, he has 4000 acres of land, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. The second chapter starts the story in 1785, Tom as an eight year old and the progression of the next five years of his life. Every few chapters the novel pushes forward to 1868 again. It is with these short paragraphs in the future that we learn more about Tom and his feelings about his past.

The novel also tells us the limited view of the Indigenous Australians. The First Fleet called them 'Indians'. Tom describes the 'Indians' to be more brown than black, Tom also describes the boomerang as a 'bent stick', and is bewildered by the 'indians' lack of clothing.

The lack of knowledge of the Indigenous to the early settlers is clear throughout the novel. At one stage Tom comtemplates the heritage of the 'Indians'.

"It was strange to think that this country had a history that it hadn't started when the English ships arrived. Did the Indians have their own stories of times past? But they had no books, or dwelling places, so how could they have history too?" (pg. 187, chapter 35)

Frenchs Historical Fiction novel is an eye opener to teenagers interested in learning about our countries early heritage and what it was like to be a convict in the late 17th Century.

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