We caught up with BARRY JONSBERG to discuss Darkest Night, Brightest Star, a life-affirming novel about fractured families, tough talk, masculinity, finding friendship and overturning expectations.
What are you reading now?
I’m currently reading Perfectly Ordinary People by Nick Alexander.
If you were stranded on a desert island and you could only have five books – what would they be?
Phew. Tricky. The Complete Works of Shakespeare goes without saying. The Lord of the Rings [all of them – would that count as one book?]. The Gormenghast trilogy by Mervyn Peake [you can see how I’m trying to cheat here!]. The Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck. Great Expectations by Dickens.
Where is your favourite place to read?
Definitely in bed. But I’ll read anywhere.
Do you read one book at a time or multiple?
Oh, one book at a time. Too confusing otherwise, plus it’s disrespectful to not be focussed entirely on one author’s story.
Do you use a bookmark or fold the corners of pages?
Ninety per cent of the time I’m reading on my Kindle. I’ve tried folding its corners but it’s really hard.
What sparked the idea for your novel Darkest Night, Brightest Star?
As always, a small idea or thought. This time it was following a conversation I had with my wife. She had just come home from work [she’s an English teacher] and she told me that one of her male students had said to her, ‘I have always tried to please my father, but I don’t think I ever will.’ Nothing more was said, but both of us agreed that this was rather sad and moving. It prompted us to have a conversation about how parents can exert subtle and not so subtle pressure on their children to perform in ways that the parents might find satisfying, but might not be the best for the kids. My wife recounted the time she came home from school when she was about 10 or 11 and told her father that she had got 97 per cent on a maths test. He asked her what had happened to the other three per cent. Maybe he was joking. Maybe not. But that remark stayed with her for close to 50 years. So I thought that a story about a boy trying to live up to his father’s expectations might make a good book. I started Darkest Night, Brightest Star the following day.
What can you tell us about Morgan and the challenges he will face?
Morgan is 13 years old, has virtually no friends and lives in a male dominated household. His mother left when he was very small and now he lives with his father, a gardener who runs his own business, and his brother Mitch. It’s a ‘blokey’ environment, as some men might categorise it, or toxic as many others would judge. Morgan’s father demands that his son excel at sport – it doesn’t really matter which one. Morgan chooses football [soccer] as it seems less dangerous to him than rugby or AFL. So Morgan’s father becomes his coach and it’s a vicious regime that Morgan has to undergo if he is to become the best his father demands.
Then he makes a friend at school who challenges the views of the world that he has been brought up with. The whole book is about how it is possible to break the cycle of toxic masculinity. But it’s not easy and it doesn’t come without pain.
Your novel follows Morgan as he struggles to meet his father’s expectations. What messages are you hoping to convey to readers about masculinity?
Like many people I am really concerned about the rise of influence of people like Andrew Tate and, of course, the macho man in residence at the White House. Being masculine doesn’t mean you are superior, that women are in some ways subservient. Human history has been built upon this falsehood and, frankly, all it’s produced is pain and suffering. How many wars have been started by women? Men need to do better – a whole lot better. And just because some values have been passed down from generation to generation, it doesn’t mean it has to be that way. And I know that nothing I have said in this answer is original. People have been pointing this out for years and years. But very little has changed. God, I hope young people can do better. I have two young granddaughters and I worry for their future.
What book character would you be, and why?
The Invisible Man from H.G. Wells. You could have a lot of fun [nothing sinister, I swear] and it would give people the opportunity to make that old joke. ‘Barry Jonsberg is outside.’ ‘Tell him I can’t see him.’
If you could meet one author (living or dead) – who would it be and why?
Oh, shoot me for being unoriginal, but old Bill Shakespeare. I could find out all sorts of information that history has kept hidden. And, you know, some of his writing tips might just be worth listening to.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Barry Jonsberg has won numerous awards for his books, both nationally and internationally. He has been published in 20 countries and translated into many languages. His bestselling novel, My Life As An Alphabet, was made into an award-winning film, H is For Happiness, released throughout the world to great critical acclaim.
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