AustLit

'At what point a foetus takes on the properties of a human individual is a knotty problem, but whether the answer be medical or metaphysical, it is unlikely to be precise. No such uncertainty affects the narrator of Thomas Keneally's novel. He springs into awareness at the instant a laser beam penetrates the womb to determine whether the configuation of his brain was all it should be: "It didn't happen violently and I suffered no shock. But the rose or weed of knowledge opened in my hand, and I, as it were, fingered all its petals." From then on the foetus has access to the reservoir of his mother's consciousness, sees through his mother's eyes, and yet cherishes his own quizzical and fiercely independent personality. With the detached resignation of an observer who recognizes he can do little to help, he watches as his parents' marriage founders, his mother is manoeuvred into a mental home, her rescue is secured by the enigmatic and gnome-like Warwick Jones and together mother, foetus and Jones flee to Australia. Until at last the foetus, not in utter nakedness, still less in entire forgetfulness, bursts upon the world it has surveyed for so long.' (Source: dustjacket, 1979 Collins edition)