This exceptional debut novel about family, love, and the innocence and
terror of childhood has caused an absolute sensation, garnering no less
than eleven leading publishers around the world.
Set in a Maltese immigrant community in Cardiff, Wales, and peopled with
sharp-edged, luminously drawn characters, The Hiding Place is the
story of Frankie Gauci, his wife Mary, and their six daughters and about
Frankie's betrayal, gambling away his family's livelihood and eventually
the family itself.
Written in magical language buoyed by grace, it is a mesmerizing
exploration of how family, like fire, can shift suddenly from something
that provides light and warmth to a dangerous conflagration, sparing no
one in its path. The Gaucis' story is seen through the eyes of Dolores,
the youngest daughter and, in her father's estimation, the embodiment of
bad luck, condemned to bear the mark of a family that is rapidly
singeing at the edges. With a lyricism that belies the horrors she so
often recounts ("children burnt and children bartered: Someone must be
to blame"), Dolores presents an unsparing portrayal of the fear and
hopelessness of childhood amid grim poverty and neglect, of children
growing up without safety nets and on sunken foundations.
The Hiding Place conjures the coarse sensuality of life among the
docks, the smoky cafes and bars, the crumbling homes, and gambling rooms
of Tiger Bay. Sustained by a tightrope tension and combining the stark,
youthful wisdom and the uncanny, perfect pitch of Susan Minot's
Monkeys with the redemptive liveliness of the downtrodden in Angela's
Ashes, The Hiding Place is a breathtaking, radiant debut.
