On Loving Josiah

by Olivia Fane

Overview

Josiah Horatio Nelson is born to unusual parents. Having met in a psychiatric hospital, they decide to bring up their child far away from the constraints of conventional society. But social services soon intervene to remove him from his idyllic home. Friendless, ostracised and bullied, Josiah is saved from despair when he meets his Latin tutor,Thomas Marius, with whom he soon forms an intense relationship. Marius takes him to Italy on an educational visit but returns to find he is suspected of child abuse...

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781908129697
Publisher:	Quercus Publishing
Publication date:	04/07/2011
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	200
File size:	350 KB
Age Range:	7 - 9 Years

About the Author

Olivia Fane was born in 1960. She studied Classics at Cambridge, trained as a probation officer and worked as a psychiatric social worker. She lives with her husband and five sons in West Sussex. This is her third novel.

Editorial Reviews

Growing up in Cambridge, England, protagonist Josiah Horatio Nelson has the cards stacked against him. Though his parents (who met in a psychiatric hospital) try to provide him with a loving home, their unusual child-rearing lead narrow-minded child protection authorities to remove him and send him to a series of foster parents until the sensitive and lonely boy eventually ends up in a government-run children’s home. More comfortable with trees than people, Josiah convinces socially awkward Cambridge professor Thomas Marius to become his Latin tutor. A loving relationship develops between them and Josiah (now 15) and Thomas sneak away for an educational trip to Italy. Upon their return, they are met by authorities who view the connection between them as criminal and exploitative. Despite many quotes from Latin poetry, reflections on the morality of the Greeks, and dense passages on beauty, desire, and other heady issues tackled by the ancients, Fane’s deft use of metaphor and inclusion of domestic details keep the narrative flowing smoothly. Far more than creating a tale of pedophilic scandal, Fane (God’s Apology) unearths thorny moral ambiguities, forcing the reader to consider circumstances in which the unthinkable may be the only sound option. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly