What do you think?
Rate this book
The Green Singers
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 18, 2026
Set against the vast, unforgiving beauty of the Australian bush in the 1920s, this novel follows a cast of ordinary men and women as they navigate the challenges and quiet joys of colonial life. The story unfolds through their personal struggles, relationships, and adaptations to a land that is as harsh as it is captivating. The cicadas’ hypnotic buzzing permeates every scene, symbolizing nature’s enduring presence amid human endeavors.
The sensory details of the scorching heat, the dust, the wildlife, and the community bonds are woven into a narrative that feels less like a plotted tale and more like a lived experience.
It’s as though the book’s central character is the Australian landscape. It emerges as vivid, immersive, and almost tangible.
The lyrical prose is well grounded, rich in sensory imagery that makes the cicadas’ song feel like a living heartbeat. I connected with the flawed, resilient, and deeply human characters with their small triumphs and everyday challenges.
It’s not an adventure book but one of quiet depth. I appreciate its atmosphere and emotional authenticity.
As a fan of atmospheric historical fiction, nature infused narratives, and stories of early 20th century Australia, this book certainly met the mark.
The sensory details of the scorching heat, the dust, the wildlife, and the community bonds are woven into a narrative that feels less like a plotted tale and more like a lived experience.
It’s as though the book’s central character is the Australian landscape. It emerges as vivid, immersive, and almost tangible.
The lyrical prose is well grounded, rich in sensory imagery that makes the cicadas’ song feel like a living heartbeat. I connected with the flawed, resilient, and deeply human characters with their small triumphs and everyday challenges.
It’s not an adventure book but one of quiet depth. I appreciate its atmosphere and emotional authenticity.
As a fan of atmospheric historical fiction, nature infused narratives, and stories of early 20th century Australia, this book certainly met the mark.
Read
July 26, 2026- still in the process of writing -
From the flyleaf of the jacket of the 1958 hardback edition from Hutchinson:
'"Stark, frank and often beautiful,' said Punch of David Stuart Leslie's first novel, 'The Devil Boat'. Of 'The Man on the Beach' The Times Literary Supplement wrote, 'Astonishingly convincing-Mr. Leslie is a master both of scene-painting and of dialogue.'
"'The Green Singers', showing those qualities in combination and, moreover, outstripping both previous books in sheer good writing, vindicates this high praise. The setting is outback Australia in the late 1920's seen through the eyes of an English boy,. For him, in what seemed a strange, uncouth country, there began a secret adventure fraught with perils of which the self-engrossed adults knew little. His widowed mother's efforts to adapt her capricious gentility to small-town life were as nothing compared with her son's fight to be accepted by his cousins and schoolfellows. As he stuggles towards manhood, the people and the world around him are revealed to the reader with crystaline clarity."
About the author from the book:
'David Stewart Leslie was born in London in 1921, the son of a doctor. He was educated in Australia, and returned to serve with the R.A.F. during the war. It was during his service overseas that he visited the Azores, in which his first novel is set. Since his first job as a lift boy, his life, in his own words, has been a 'bracing series of ups and downs', in which he has been variously employed as a shipping clerk, English tutor, club secretary, drama tutor, shop assistantt, and ship's steward; and he also worked for sometime on the London stage.'
From the flyleaf of the jacket of the 1958 hardback edition from Hutchinson:
'"Stark, frank and often beautiful,' said Punch of David Stuart Leslie's first novel, 'The Devil Boat'. Of 'The Man on the Beach' The Times Literary Supplement wrote, 'Astonishingly convincing-Mr. Leslie is a master both of scene-painting and of dialogue.'
"'The Green Singers', showing those qualities in combination and, moreover, outstripping both previous books in sheer good writing, vindicates this high praise. The setting is outback Australia in the late 1920's seen through the eyes of an English boy,. For him, in what seemed a strange, uncouth country, there began a secret adventure fraught with perils of which the self-engrossed adults knew little. His widowed mother's efforts to adapt her capricious gentility to small-town life were as nothing compared with her son's fight to be accepted by his cousins and schoolfellows. As he stuggles towards manhood, the people and the world around him are revealed to the reader with crystaline clarity."
About the author from the book:
'David Stewart Leslie was born in London in 1921, the son of a doctor. He was educated in Australia, and returned to serve with the R.A.F. during the war. It was during his service overseas that he visited the Azores, in which his first novel is set. Since his first job as a lift boy, his life, in his own words, has been a 'bracing series of ups and downs', in which he has been variously employed as a shipping clerk, English tutor, club secretary, drama tutor, shop assistantt, and ship's steward; and he also worked for sometime on the London stage.'
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews