Coram Boy is a difficult book to explain. It is split in to
two halves. The first half follows a boy called Alex as he grows up and becomes
a man. He loves music and wants to become a musician. His father wants to train
him to run the family estate when he is too old to do it. Alex wants to follow
his dream but is torn because he has fallen in love as well. The second half
follows a boy called Aaron. He is an orphan and lives in an orphanage with his
best friend Toby. Alex loves music and wants to be a musician. Toby isn’t sure
what he wants to do. He does know he doesn’t want to be a slave, as his mother
is. Where will their futures take them?
Throughout the story there are themes of love, family,
slavery, growing up and morality. The book makes you think about how you would
react if you were in their shoes. Alex lives a privileged life but isn’t happy.
He has a big decision to make about what he values more; love or happiness. He
isn’t too worried about his family as he knows they will still love him,
although he isn’t sure about his dad. Aaron’s family are the people at the
Coram Hospital and he is close to all of them and treated well. He doesn’t get
to choose his future. Toby was born at sea on the way from Africa to Britain he
has no memory of slavery but sees it often at the docks. Another character,
Meshak, has the biggest moral problem. His father buys children. Meshak can’t
speak up because he isn’t mentally capable.
The story is set between Gloucestershire and London. The
atmosphere of London is well described but I had trouble picturing the layout
of the estate. I think that’s more my fault than the author’s. The story jumps
around with points of view without any warning and also from no point of view.
Each character’s mind is separate enough that, once you notice it’s changed,
you can work out who’s head you are in. Once you get used to the writing style,
the book is easy to read. You can’t help but get attached to some of the
characters and hope things work out for them.
This book took a while to get in to. Nothing really seemed
to be happening, although it was an interesting history lesson. It never
occurred to me, what happened to all the unwanted and illegitimate children
that were born. For the vast majority, the answer is nothing nice. To a large
extent it depended on how old the children were when they were given up and the
luck of who took the child in. The people who took the children weren’t always
doing it to try and help the mother. A lot were doing it for their own ends.
Mainly to sell the children to make money.
When I started reading the book I didn’t like it. Some of it
was because I’ve been reading so many action filled books lately that this was
a bit of a u-turn. Even so I couldn’t get on with the first half of the book.
To a certain extent, it’s a build up to what happens in the second half.
However, I think if I read it again I would enjoy it more and be more invested
in the characters. I did enjoy the second half a lot more and really liked the
characters of Aaron and Toby. I would have liked a slightly longer epilogue to
see what happened to them. An enjoyable read and it was nice to learn about a
more hidden side to the sort of things that people would have got up to at that
time.
Overall rating 3 out of 5
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