'Sometimes a book takes you somewhere and keeps you there. Honest, brave and devastating - Out of Shadows is more than just memorable. It's impossible to look away.' Markus Zusak, author of The Book Thief
'Excellent. The latest lacerating addition to the boarding-school-as-living-hell genre...read on if you have the courage. The author attended a similar establishment at the age of 12,and gives every indication of knowing exactly what he is writing about.' The Independent on Sunday
A compelling, thought-provoking novel about race, bullying and the need to belong set in Africa.
‘If I stood you in front of a man, pressed a gun into your palm and told you to squeeze the trigger, would you do it?’
‘No, sir, no way!’
‘What if I then told you we’d gone back in time and his name was Adolf Hitler? Would you do it then?’
Zimbabwe, 1980s.
The war is over, independence has been won and Robert Mugabe has come to power offering hope, land and freedom to black Africans. It is the end of the Old Way and the start of a promising new era.
For Robert Jacklin, it’s all new: new continent, new country, new school. And very quickly he learns that for some of his classmates, the sound of guns is still loud, and their battles rage on . . . white boys who want their old country back, not this new black African government.
Boys like Ivan. Clever, cunning Ivan.
For him, there is still one last battle to fight, and he’s taking it right to the very top.
About the Author
Jason Wallace is related to Tolkein and a descendent of one of the first International English cricketers, and also of the world-renowned Victorian circus owner “Lord” George Sanger. He was born in Cheltenham in 1969 but moved to London after his parents split up. Aged 12 his life was turned upside down when his mother remarried and the family emigrated to Zimbabwe.
It was this experience in a tough boarding school during the aftermath of the war for independence that forms the foundation of his incredible novel. And he did actually meet Robert Mugabe when he visited his school. Jason is currently a web designer, living in South West London. Writing is his hobby and Out of Shadows is his debut novel.
What was the inspiration behind the novel?
In many ways it was easy. I attended a boarding school in Zimbabwe very soon after the Rhodesian Bush War/Zimbabwean War of Liberation ended and the country gained Independence. It was, and still is, an excellent school, though sometimes tough.
The country was going through mammoth changes at the time I was there, something I wasn't fully aware of because either I was too naive and only interested in what all teenagers are interested in, or because "political manoeuvring" was hidden from everyone by the government there. My school days and life in Zimbabwe was an experience I always wanted to write about some day, I just never got round to doing it.
Through the 90s and 00s - with considerable horror and sadness - I watched the decline of Zimbabwe at the hands of Robert Mugabe and his cronies, and I realised that the things I'd seen as a teenager had far louder echoes than I could ever have realised at the time, from national events down to personal opinions of people I'd known and met. The simple facts of my own life weren't enough, though, plus I wanted to write a story, not a diary, so I created a completely fictional school that served as a microcosm for some of the very worst in peoples' attitudes and beliefs (they could be from anywhere). Nobody in the book is real or based on people I knew, I simply came up with the idea of "What if...?" and took it from there.
Haven School is only similar to my school in terms of description and some of the more routine events, nothing more! The book took about a year to write, plus another six or so months for rewriting and changes.
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