Boy Swallows Universe is the debut novel of Australian author and journalist Trent Dalton, who shared with audiences during the promotional tour of his novel (now a 7 episode Netflix series) that the book was semi-autobiographical, 50/50 fact and fiction.

Eli “does a lot of what I would have [done if I could]. It was all wishful thinking.”

While much of what occurs is true, it reads like a crime, suspense and thriller novel, with unforgettable characters. It is set in a suburb of Brisbane in 1985 and follows a boy through dark, dangerous and at times magical teenage years, intent on changing his family’s lives.

Coming of Age Amid Drug Wars, Corruption and Crim’s

Your end is a dead blue wren.

Boys Swallows Universe begins with this cryptic opening line, one of many that appear throughout the text, clues that are eventually resolved in this unique family saviour mystery.

Eli Bell is the main character, he is 13 years old; his brother August, a year older does not talk, he spells words in the air with his finger. He has not spoken since something happened in the past that Eli doesn’t remember. To do with their father. Who he also does not remember.

I can see my brother, August, through the crack in the windscreen. He sits on our brown brick fence writing his life story in fluid cursive with his right forefinger, etching words into thin air.

Finding Meaning and Escape in the Details

Their occasional babysitter Slim, a man who spent a quarter century in jail for the alleged murder of a taxi driver, has taught Eli the importance of details. It’s how he survived the hole. Creating double meanings for here (in the jail) and there (the boundless universe in his head and heart).

When he grows up Eli wants to be a crime reporter for the local newspaper. Slim writes lots of letters to his mates still in prison (using a false name) and suggests Eli can practice by writing letters as well. He has a penpal Alexander Bermudez, once sergeant-at-arms of the Rebels outlaw motorcycle gang.

Slim says a good way for me to remember the small details of my life is to associate moments and visions with things on my person or things in my regular waking life that I see and smell and touch often. Body things, bedroom things, kitchen things. This way I will have two reminders of any given detail for the price of one.

A Stupid Plan, A Secret Plan and a Well Meaning Busybody

The boys live with their mother Frankie Bell and her boyfriend Lyle. The boys get on with Lyle, although Eli has not forgiven him for getting his mother addicted to heroin. Lyle wants to save them all and has a fast track, risky idea about how to do it.

When Lyle’s plan backfires, Eli and August are thrust into survival mode and Eli takes this further with his own big secret plan by going into full on rescue mode, investigative detective, naive peacemaker, all with the aim of trying to get his family back together and his future career on track. Ironically for all the calculated risks it requires, it is his schoolteacher getting too interested in their welfare that worries him.

Mrs Birkbeck leans in closer across her desk. There’s something pious in the way she sits.

‘What I’m trying to say, Eli, is that trauma and the effects of trauma can change the way people think. Sometimes it can make us believe things that are not true. Sometimes it can alter the way we look at the world. Sometimes it can make us do things we normally would not do.’

Sly Mrs Birkbeck. Woman wants to suck me dry. She wants me to throw her a bone about my missing bone.

‘Yeah, trauma is pretty weird, I guess,’ I say.

Eli’s experience of trauma results in him having a highly intuitive subconscious, that combined with a fearless instinct for asking straight up questions push him forward on his quest. The red telephone in the secret dugout room of Lyle’s house is something of an enigma, why does it always ring when he is in there and who is the voice that responds?

A Funny, Thoughtful, Hair-Raising Life Adventure

Boy Swallows Universe is an exceptionally well told tale of a young boy Eli Bell surviving a tumultuous childhood, exposed to the effect of adults involved in drug dealing, of violent school mates, an unusual babysitter and some other hopeful, inspirational characters that make it all worthwhile.

“All of me is in here. Everything I’ve ever seen. Everything I’ve ever done. Every girl I ever kissed on a wagged school day, every punch I ever threw, every tooth I ever lost in a Housing Commission street scrap and every flawed, conflicted, sometimes even dangerous Queenslander I’ve ever come across, as the son of two of the most incredible and beautiful and sometimes troubled parents a kid could ever be born to.” Trent Dalton

This is no story of misery, it is about solidarity between brothers and the tenacity of a boy who won’t accept the way things are, he questions everything and everyone, asking forbidden questions, training himself in observing the details and taking action. Never giving up.

He is trying to save his mother, his mute brother August and himself from the terrible trauma cycles they are all stuck in. He is determined to grow up and become a crime reporter for a local newspaper and to meet the enigmatic Caitlyn Spies.

“The key characters all draw on the people I love most in the world. The most beautiful and complex people I’ve ever known, and I never even had to walk out the door of my house to find them. I just wanted to give the world a story. To turn all these crazy and sad and tragic and beautiful things I’ve seen into a crazy, sad, tragic and beautiful story.”

Brilliantly told, unforgettable characters, a wonderful balance between grounded in the dark reality of a dysfunctional family, a seedy underworld and the ethereal escape of two boys with an ability to dream and imagine their way through the darkest moments of an unsettling childhood.

So many highlighted passages, one of the reading highlights of 2024 for me. Highly Recommended.

I am looking forward to reading his nonfiction book of short stories Love Stories, created when he sat on a busy street corner with a sky-blue Olivetti typewriter and asked the world a simple question: Can you please tell me a love story?

Further Reading

New York Times review: ‘Boy Follows Universe’ follows a Gritty Coming-of-Age in 1980’s Australia by Amelia Lester, May 2019

Trent Dalton on : Why I Wrote ‘Boy Swallows Universe’ Harper Collins

This book is for the never believers and the believers and the dreamers.  This book is for anyone around the world who has been 13 years old. This book is for a generation of Australians who were promised by their parents they would be told all the answers as soon as they were old enough. Well, now you’re old enough.

Here are my answers:

1. Every lost soul can be found again. Fates can be changed. Bad can become good.
2. True love conquers all.
3. There is a fine line between magic and madness and all should be encouraged in moderation.
4. Australian suburbia is a dark and brutal place.
5. Australian suburbia is a beautiful and magical place.
6. Home is always the first and final poem.

Author, Trent Dalton

Trent Dalton is a two-time Walkley Award-winning journalist and the international bestselling author of Boy Swallows Universe, All Our Shimmering Skies, Love Stories and Lola in the Mirror.

His books have sold over 1.3 million copies in Australia alone. He lives in Brisbane, Australia, with his wife and two daughters.