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Wild Things
A controversial novel of power, prestige and pack mentality exposes the dark underbelly of college life at a prominent university
St Anton's university college is a cradle for privileged young men and women. With its Elysian lush green lawns and buildings of golden sandstone, it seems like a place where nothing bad could ever happen. One weekend, members of the college cricket team go to the mountains for a wild weekend away. things spiral rapidly out of control, and a young Malaysian student they dragged along with them as part of a cruel prank goes missing. When the boy is found by some bushwalkers on a rock ledge, barely clinging to life, most people think it's because of a fall, but the St Anton's men know better. the stress of keeping their collective secret however becomes harder and harder to bear, and even the heavy wrought-iron fences of the college can't keep out reality... Dark, dangerous, bloody and visceral, this is a story of power, prestige and the pack mentality that forms the underbelly of campus life at a prestigious university. With overtones of the Secret History meets Brett Easton Ellis, this is the debut of a thrilling new Australian writer.
St Anton's university college is a cradle for privileged young men and women. With its Elysian lush green lawns and buildings of golden sandstone, it seems like a place where nothing bad could ever happen. One weekend, members of the college cricket team go to the mountains for a wild weekend away. things spiral rapidly out of control, and a young Malaysian student they dragged along with them as part of a cruel prank goes missing. When the boy is found by some bushwalkers on a rock ledge, barely clinging to life, most people think it's because of a fall, but the St Anton's men know better. the stress of keeping their collective secret however becomes harder and harder to bear, and even the heavy wrought-iron fences of the college can't keep out reality... Dark, dangerous, bloody and visceral, this is a story of power, prestige and the pack mentality that forms the underbelly of campus life at a prestigious university. With overtones of the Secret History meets Brett Easton Ellis, this is the debut of a thrilling new Australian writer.
- GenresFictionContemporary
Paperback
First published April 22, 2014
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About the author
Brigid Delaney
5 books68 followersBrigid Delaney is the author of Wellmania, This Restless Life, Wild Things and a book explaining Stoic philosophy – Reasons Not to Worry.
She has worked as a columnist and journalist for Guardian Australia, and is currently a speechwriter for a federal Minister.
She has worked as a columnist and journalist for Guardian Australia, and is currently a speechwriter for a federal Minister.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
April 24, 2020
meh-meh.
i mean, a tag line "like "the boys are behaving badly" over a backdrop of a posh boarding school with a deliberate shout-out to both The Secret History and bret easton ellis in the blurbs, and you know i'm going to buy this and tell blair about it. she beat me to the review 1) because she is awesome and 2) because when i finished it, i was just a weak shrug. it was fine, it was good, but it doesn't even peer into The Secret History's windows. it's got the trappings of s.h. - campus full of entitled characters, secret society, murder and cover-up, but that's all just window dressing - it misses the spirit of s.h. utterly. it's kind of like this:
cute but no cigar.
not that this book is cute at all. it's dark and brutal and filled with reprehensible characters. the strength of s.h. is in its characters, and this one just has…too many. there are about ten present at the crime itself, plus a couple back on campus who orbit the aftermath, and it's all done in (third-person) POV chapters, but there is an uneven distribution, where all of a sudden you will be reading a chapter and thinking, "wait, this guy gets a POV chapter? who is he again?" and yet there are boys who were present at the crime who get no chapters at all, so you have to wonder, from a reader's perspective - why are they even characters? wouldn't it have made more sense to just streamline the cast a little if they were just going to be shadowy background lumps? is sam's perspective really that different from toby's? and hadrien is the character you most want a POV chapter from, as the albino ringleader; the embodiment of cruelty, but his thoughts and motivations remain mysterious. which is appropriate, i suppose, but i really think his perspective would have been a welcome break from the guilt-ridden "do we or don't we?" from the rest of the bunch.
a few notes on triggers.
animals. when i first started reading this, and learned about the campus tradition of having live exotic animals running all over the lawns, i felt a chekhovian frisson and worried for their safety. but phew - except for a flashback mention of a horrible situation in the past, the animals make it out okay. however - those of you with animal-cruelty triggers, there is a kangaroo who is not so fortunate. and it is horrible, horrible, horrible, and circled back to more than once.
those of you with cruelty-to-women triggers may also want to take a pass, because there's a good deal of that, too. in addition to which, the two female POV perspectives we get don't really do any favors to feminism. it's all body-dysmorphia and rape brushed off as experimentation and boys boys boys.
those of you with cruelty-to-foreign-exchange-students triggers, well, if you read this book after reading the synopsis, i suppose you only have yourself to blame.
one of my biggest gripes about it is that it is completely lacking in anything resembling academic elitism, which is a real strength in s.h. and some other s.h. wanna-bes. this is no cadre of brilliant and quirky geniuses who get themselves into trouble. education is not a priority for these characters. this is more like a drunken frat hazing gone wrong, where a bunch of vicious athletes behave like thugs and try to cover it up. it is more akin to an SVU episode than the more elegant criminality of s.h.
also, i kept forgetting that these were supposed to be characters who were mostly 19-20 years old. there's a real emotional immaturity here, and i feel that if they were younger, their behavior afterwards might be more excusable, and the act itself might be more shocking.
overall, it's fine. i'm griping a lot just because i read a lot of these books that mention The Secret History as a readalike, and so many of them fall short. it is more similar to Crime and Punishment; a book it references several times. but just as a "privileged boys behaving badly" story, it's a good read, and there are scenes that will stay with you, for better or worse.
i love you, sad kangaroo.
come to my blog!
i mean, a tag line "like "the boys are behaving badly" over a backdrop of a posh boarding school with a deliberate shout-out to both The Secret History and bret easton ellis in the blurbs, and you know i'm going to buy this and tell blair about it. she beat me to the review 1) because she is awesome and 2) because when i finished it, i was just a weak shrug. it was fine, it was good, but it doesn't even peer into The Secret History's windows. it's got the trappings of s.h. - campus full of entitled characters, secret society, murder and cover-up, but that's all just window dressing - it misses the spirit of s.h. utterly. it's kind of like this:
cute but no cigar.
not that this book is cute at all. it's dark and brutal and filled with reprehensible characters. the strength of s.h. is in its characters, and this one just has…too many. there are about ten present at the crime itself, plus a couple back on campus who orbit the aftermath, and it's all done in (third-person) POV chapters, but there is an uneven distribution, where all of a sudden you will be reading a chapter and thinking, "wait, this guy gets a POV chapter? who is he again?" and yet there are boys who were present at the crime who get no chapters at all, so you have to wonder, from a reader's perspective - why are they even characters? wouldn't it have made more sense to just streamline the cast a little if they were just going to be shadowy background lumps? is sam's perspective really that different from toby's? and hadrien is the character you most want a POV chapter from, as the albino ringleader; the embodiment of cruelty, but his thoughts and motivations remain mysterious. which is appropriate, i suppose, but i really think his perspective would have been a welcome break from the guilt-ridden "do we or don't we?" from the rest of the bunch.
a few notes on triggers.
animals. when i first started reading this, and learned about the campus tradition of having live exotic animals running all over the lawns, i felt a chekhovian frisson and worried for their safety. but phew - except for a flashback mention of a horrible situation in the past, the animals make it out okay. however - those of you with animal-cruelty triggers, there is a kangaroo who is not so fortunate. and it is horrible, horrible, horrible, and circled back to more than once.
those of you with cruelty-to-women triggers may also want to take a pass, because there's a good deal of that, too. in addition to which, the two female POV perspectives we get don't really do any favors to feminism. it's all body-dysmorphia and rape brushed off as experimentation and boys boys boys.
those of you with cruelty-to-foreign-exchange-students triggers, well, if you read this book after reading the synopsis, i suppose you only have yourself to blame.
one of my biggest gripes about it is that it is completely lacking in anything resembling academic elitism, which is a real strength in s.h. and some other s.h. wanna-bes. this is no cadre of brilliant and quirky geniuses who get themselves into trouble. education is not a priority for these characters. this is more like a drunken frat hazing gone wrong, where a bunch of vicious athletes behave like thugs and try to cover it up. it is more akin to an SVU episode than the more elegant criminality of s.h.
also, i kept forgetting that these were supposed to be characters who were mostly 19-20 years old. there's a real emotional immaturity here, and i feel that if they were younger, their behavior afterwards might be more excusable, and the act itself might be more shocking.
overall, it's fine. i'm griping a lot just because i read a lot of these books that mention The Secret History as a readalike, and so many of them fall short. it is more similar to Crime and Punishment; a book it references several times. but just as a "privileged boys behaving badly" story, it's a good read, and there are scenes that will stay with you, for better or worse.
i love you, sad kangaroo.
come to my blog!
February 22, 2022
(Review originally published on my blog, April 2014)
Wild Things is the debut novel from Australian journalist Brigid Delaney. Promoted as a story with 'overtones of The Secret History meets Bret Easton Ellis', it's set almost entirely at St Anton's, an exclusive college which is part of an unnamed university. Every year, the college cricket team go away for a weekend of wild partying at a mountain retreat named Evelyn, behaving like animals, running riot through the forest and often hiring prostitutes - all facts their tutors turn a blind eye to. This year, however, the 'surprise' organised for them by ringleader Hadrien, who claims to head up an ancient, secret club called the Savage Society, is a boy; an innocent Malaysian student called Alfred who is bullied into attending the gathering and subjected to a series of horrific initiation rituals. He escapes, runs away, and is later found on the mountainside, barely alive and possibly permanently brain-damaged. So begins a chronicle of the efforts of those involved to hide, and to forget, what really happened, which will send them down a number of twisted paths, and ultimately bring about their ruin in one way or another.
How do you rate a book you both loved and loathed? I'm going with a middling rating, but that doesn't really reflect the extremes I felt during the course of reading it. Delaney's prose is gorgeous, and some of the turns of phrase are breathtaking. The combination of an English-style collegiate atmosphere with the hot, comparatively exotic landscapes of Australia is a potent one (there are balmy summer evenings by the lake and unusual animals wandering around on the college lawn). The plot is fully rounded, fully realised, and feels far more 'complete' than I would expect from a debut novel. The characterisation is similarly strong, and no matter what I may have thought of the people in this book, they did feel very real - horribly real; the strange, unconventionally terrifying Hadrien, while not a major figure in the plot, is nevertheless a particular highlight.
But... I hated the main characters. And here I must insert my usual disclaimer about how I don't think unpleasant characters necessarily make an unpleasant book. I like, even love, plenty of books with detestable protagonists. But if the main hook of the plot is 'will these people get away with this terrible crime?', I feel like there needs to be some element that makes the reader want them to get away with it. Instead, I actively wanted them to get caught and suffer, not simply because of what they actually did to Alfred, but because they were just dicks. Selfish, misogynist jock bullies with a planet-sized sense of entitlement, being protected by teachers who are just grown-up versions of themselves. The girls are largely treated as sex objects and, consequently, see themselves as nothing more than that, with physical appearance more important than any academic achievement, and plastic surgery a looming inevitability even at the age of 20. Any intellectual pretensions are just that - posturing, part of an image, never a real passion. This is supposed to be a college that is well-respected academically as well as socially, but the way Delaney presents it is simply as a playground for spoilt rich kids; not one of them ever seems to do any proper studying even as they namedrop poets and philosophers.
While The Secret History and books of its ilk make their elite academic institutions seem like places to be envied and revered, Wild Things makes St Anton's into a hellish waking nightmare. This might be the first time I've read a book of this type and felt nothing but relief that I didn't study somewhere like this. There are long scenes that are hallucinatory in their awfulness, that will make you endlessly grateful you don't have to associate with these people. The narrative is so effective in creating the atmosphere of the college - a hothouse of self-obsession, lethargy, vanity and depravity - that it almost chokes you. Delaney uses an obscure, invented band (given the ludicrous moniker of 'Lance Vaine and the Musical Hellos') as a constant recurring motif, creating the impression that this music is particular to the college, reinforcing the idea that it is a uniquely and bizarrely insular environment.
While Delaney writes beautifully, the story made me feel so incredibly depressed. As an indictment of modern 'emptiness' and materialism it is both thorough and damning. I had to break it up by reading other books so that it didn't make me feel too terrible; I've rarely been so happy to leave fictional characters behind. That said, the narrative really seems to shift in maturity and tone once the focus changes to the police investigating incidents at the college, rather than the students, and the ending is note-perfect. The last few chapters, the final chapter particularly, were so well-executed that they really saved the book from a lot of the aspects I hadn't enjoyed. Absolutely worth reading, but be prepared to stomach a lot of awful behaviour, disturbing scenes and downright hateful characters along the way.
Wild Things is the debut novel from Australian journalist Brigid Delaney. Promoted as a story with 'overtones of The Secret History meets Bret Easton Ellis', it's set almost entirely at St Anton's, an exclusive college which is part of an unnamed university. Every year, the college cricket team go away for a weekend of wild partying at a mountain retreat named Evelyn, behaving like animals, running riot through the forest and often hiring prostitutes - all facts their tutors turn a blind eye to. This year, however, the 'surprise' organised for them by ringleader Hadrien, who claims to head up an ancient, secret club called the Savage Society, is a boy; an innocent Malaysian student called Alfred who is bullied into attending the gathering and subjected to a series of horrific initiation rituals. He escapes, runs away, and is later found on the mountainside, barely alive and possibly permanently brain-damaged. So begins a chronicle of the efforts of those involved to hide, and to forget, what really happened, which will send them down a number of twisted paths, and ultimately bring about their ruin in one way or another.
How do you rate a book you both loved and loathed? I'm going with a middling rating, but that doesn't really reflect the extremes I felt during the course of reading it. Delaney's prose is gorgeous, and some of the turns of phrase are breathtaking. The combination of an English-style collegiate atmosphere with the hot, comparatively exotic landscapes of Australia is a potent one (there are balmy summer evenings by the lake and unusual animals wandering around on the college lawn). The plot is fully rounded, fully realised, and feels far more 'complete' than I would expect from a debut novel. The characterisation is similarly strong, and no matter what I may have thought of the people in this book, they did feel very real - horribly real; the strange, unconventionally terrifying Hadrien, while not a major figure in the plot, is nevertheless a particular highlight.
But... I hated the main characters. And here I must insert my usual disclaimer about how I don't think unpleasant characters necessarily make an unpleasant book. I like, even love, plenty of books with detestable protagonists. But if the main hook of the plot is 'will these people get away with this terrible crime?', I feel like there needs to be some element that makes the reader want them to get away with it. Instead, I actively wanted them to get caught and suffer, not simply because of what they actually did to Alfred, but because they were just dicks. Selfish, misogynist jock bullies with a planet-sized sense of entitlement, being protected by teachers who are just grown-up versions of themselves. The girls are largely treated as sex objects and, consequently, see themselves as nothing more than that, with physical appearance more important than any academic achievement, and plastic surgery a looming inevitability even at the age of 20. Any intellectual pretensions are just that - posturing, part of an image, never a real passion. This is supposed to be a college that is well-respected academically as well as socially, but the way Delaney presents it is simply as a playground for spoilt rich kids; not one of them ever seems to do any proper studying even as they namedrop poets and philosophers.
While The Secret History and books of its ilk make their elite academic institutions seem like places to be envied and revered, Wild Things makes St Anton's into a hellish waking nightmare. This might be the first time I've read a book of this type and felt nothing but relief that I didn't study somewhere like this. There are long scenes that are hallucinatory in their awfulness, that will make you endlessly grateful you don't have to associate with these people. The narrative is so effective in creating the atmosphere of the college - a hothouse of self-obsession, lethargy, vanity and depravity - that it almost chokes you. Delaney uses an obscure, invented band (given the ludicrous moniker of 'Lance Vaine and the Musical Hellos') as a constant recurring motif, creating the impression that this music is particular to the college, reinforcing the idea that it is a uniquely and bizarrely insular environment.
While Delaney writes beautifully, the story made me feel so incredibly depressed. As an indictment of modern 'emptiness' and materialism it is both thorough and damning. I had to break it up by reading other books so that it didn't make me feel too terrible; I've rarely been so happy to leave fictional characters behind. That said, the narrative really seems to shift in maturity and tone once the focus changes to the police investigating incidents at the college, rather than the students, and the ending is note-perfect. The last few chapters, the final chapter particularly, were so well-executed that they really saved the book from a lot of the aspects I hadn't enjoyed. Absolutely worth reading, but be prepared to stomach a lot of awful behaviour, disturbing scenes and downright hateful characters along the way.
July 27, 2017
Home. Home. Far from this artificial world and this evening’s ball, where everyone was young and fit. Where no one ever had to clean their rooms or make a meal because someone did it for them …
St Anton’s (set in a thinly veiled Melbourne) is an exclusive university college amid hallowed green lawns and sandstone buildings; cabinet ministers and captains of industry among its former students. The cricket team, third year mostly law students, spend the weekend at “Evelyn” on the western side of the mountains to celebrate winning the shield.
They knew each other from private school, brought tribal initiation ceremonies with them, morphing even darker, edgier and more daring now into the prohibited “Savage Society” of the 1920’s. Hadrien, the ring-leader and two others coax Malaysian student Alfred Khoo, new to the college, to come along, and in a drug and alcohol-fuelled frenzy he is tied up, hazed and tortured. All very visceral.
While the others are outside trying to subdue a kangaroo protecting its joey, Ben releases the injured Alfred, who grabs his clothes and runs away in the darkness, to fall in the mountains. The group is divided, some forming a search party, others hoping he will never be found.
But Alfred is found by a hiker and transferred by Search and Rescue helicopter to hospital where he is placed in an induced coma. The cricket team is sworn / coerced into secrecy; to keep silent, to get away with it. A PR company is brought in to keep the college out of the news reports, but as weeks pass, Ben, Toby, Levi and Julian, wracked with guilt, but afraid for their careers if they are discovered, slowly fall apart.
In her debut novel, Brigid Delaney paints a complex picture of pack mentality, sexism and bullying at a university, where the “Master” is more concerned for the shooting of a movie starring Cate Blanchette, and the staff are doddery old academics.
The College Council were all old boys of St. Anton’s…and their decisions about the college were the decisions of men who were frozen in time…
Eventually it all starts to unravel; and another incident on the night of St Anton’s Ball, brings the police on campus to investigate a sexual assault.
This book received mixed reviews and was compared with The Secret History, which I have not read. As a fan of “Rake” the notion of getting away with a crime appeals as much as wanting Alfred to receive justice.
Though well-written, by the end I felt I had completed a jigsaw puzzle to find a piece missing. The truth is revealed through flashbacks, but to me there was an imbalance between the torment felt by Ben et al, and the wealthy Machiavellian Hadrien, of whom we learn so little. He never drinks, yet orchestrates the drunken / drug induced behaviour of the others.
St Anton’s (set in a thinly veiled Melbourne) is an exclusive university college amid hallowed green lawns and sandstone buildings; cabinet ministers and captains of industry among its former students. The cricket team, third year mostly law students, spend the weekend at “Evelyn” on the western side of the mountains to celebrate winning the shield.
They knew each other from private school, brought tribal initiation ceremonies with them, morphing even darker, edgier and more daring now into the prohibited “Savage Society” of the 1920’s. Hadrien, the ring-leader and two others coax Malaysian student Alfred Khoo, new to the college, to come along, and in a drug and alcohol-fuelled frenzy he is tied up, hazed and tortured. All very visceral.
While the others are outside trying to subdue a kangaroo protecting its joey, Ben releases the injured Alfred, who grabs his clothes and runs away in the darkness, to fall in the mountains. The group is divided, some forming a search party, others hoping he will never be found.
But Alfred is found by a hiker and transferred by Search and Rescue helicopter to hospital where he is placed in an induced coma. The cricket team is sworn / coerced into secrecy; to keep silent, to get away with it. A PR company is brought in to keep the college out of the news reports, but as weeks pass, Ben, Toby, Levi and Julian, wracked with guilt, but afraid for their careers if they are discovered, slowly fall apart.
In her debut novel, Brigid Delaney paints a complex picture of pack mentality, sexism and bullying at a university, where the “Master” is more concerned for the shooting of a movie starring Cate Blanchette, and the staff are doddery old academics.
The College Council were all old boys of St. Anton’s…and their decisions about the college were the decisions of men who were frozen in time…
Eventually it all starts to unravel; and another incident on the night of St Anton’s Ball, brings the police on campus to investigate a sexual assault.
This book received mixed reviews and was compared with The Secret History, which I have not read. As a fan of “Rake” the notion of getting away with a crime appeals as much as wanting Alfred to receive justice.
Though well-written, by the end I felt I had completed a jigsaw puzzle to find a piece missing. The truth is revealed through flashbacks, but to me there was an imbalance between the torment felt by Ben et al, and the wealthy Machiavellian Hadrien, of whom we learn so little. He never drinks, yet orchestrates the drunken / drug induced behaviour of the others.
December 29, 2014
'Wild Things' is a curiously banal, generic title – just look at the number of other books on Goodreads with the same title – and the cover tagline "the boys are behaving badly" is either an ironic or a moronic understatement, given we are talking about rape, animal cruelty and bastardisation.
This has been marketed as similar to Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History', and to the work of Brett Easton Ellis – a tale of privileged youth gone rotten and amoral. But it's really about the rottenness of elite institutions, not eccentric bad apples.
The actual material here seems much less aligned with 'cruel clique' literary fiction and more aligned with ripped-from-the-headlines narrative non-fiction about institutionally protected sexual abuse, epitomised by Helen Garner's 'The First Stone', 'Night Games' by Anna Krien, and media reports of real hazing rituals at Sydney University colleges.
There also seems to be an Australian literary zeitgeist of antagonism to the use and abuse of power in educational institutions: Christos Tsiolkas's 'Barracuda', Alice Pung's 'Laurinda' and Rebecca Starford's forthcoming memoir 'Bad Behaviour' all take aim at elite private schools.
There are moments of shrewd insight into Australian culture in this book. However, 'Wild Things' is oddly cosy and insubstantial, considering its hard-hitting subject matter. Delaney frequently underlines that St Anton's is its own little world, and plays with how that can seem both a haven and a prison. But there's a cartoonish, unreal quality to this book that I wasn't sure was deliberate.
The symbolism is kind of on the nose. The college ball is themed 'Elysian Fields'; the beautiful grounds are roamed by tame animals (not wild things!) including a lamb actually named Innocence, and its depraved bacchanals are presided over by junior monsters with Latinate names including Hadrien, Roman, Julian and Severin. The less evil, more repentant protagonists have Biblical names: Toby, Ben, Levi, Sam. One actually finds religion.
It's deliberately set in an Australian non-city where strange street names stand in for more recognisable inner-city locales, and a fictional band with the risible doo-wop name Lance Vaine and the Musical Hellos seem to pop up with a different song every chapter, whose lyrics are almost supernaturally relevant to the events at hand.
I would have enjoyed this parallel dream-Australia Delaney was creating if not for the repeated, jarring mentions of the real Australia, with Facebook and YouTube and Tumblr and Prada and Chanel and real songs and lyrics by Pharrell and Beyoncé and Bon Iver and Blur. The overall effect is unsettling: a prevailing air of unreality made me feel less engaged with the characters and plot either on a level of pure story or social commentary.
There were too many point-of-view characters, and no apparent strategic use of them: the story wanders between them. The question of what happened to Alfred out in the bush seems to emerge matter-of-factly, in dribs and drabs, rather than being a source of tension or a shocking reveal. And too much of the book is devoted to the characters' guilty psychological unravelling. We get it. Keeping this quiet is eating you guys up inside.
Delaney teases possibilities that several different characters will discover or confess all, but ultimately settles for a mix of confession and investigative revelation that is neither unexpected nor morally satisfying. And Hadrien never gets a POV; he remains objectified, a creepy posh sadist from Central Casting to the very end.
The tone, too, felt unmoored. The pompous college Master and the hapless staffer Dr Bath are described jocularly, almost satirically, in a way that jars with the searingly earnest suffering and soul-searching of the major male characters.
I was most unsettled by the contempt that Delaney seems to reserve for her female characters, who are sketched as dumb sluts, inadequate mothers, adoring worshippers and downtrodden slatterns. There's some commentary here about feminist awakenings and slut-shaming, but it seems hazy and unfocused compared to the laser precision with which the abjection of women's bodies is described. And more than this: women are depicted as foolish and deluded for tending to their bodies.
For me the most interesting part of the book was the end: the aftermath and long-term effects of the events. Perhaps I would rather have read a book set in the 'real world': one that more emphatically undermines our lingering sentimentality over these institutions of elite power. This book seemed to revel a little too much in the gilded beauty of its privileged surroundings and the familiar tropes of 'boys behaving badly'.
This has been marketed as similar to Donna Tartt's 'The Secret History', and to the work of Brett Easton Ellis – a tale of privileged youth gone rotten and amoral. But it's really about the rottenness of elite institutions, not eccentric bad apples.
The actual material here seems much less aligned with 'cruel clique' literary fiction and more aligned with ripped-from-the-headlines narrative non-fiction about institutionally protected sexual abuse, epitomised by Helen Garner's 'The First Stone', 'Night Games' by Anna Krien, and media reports of real hazing rituals at Sydney University colleges.
There also seems to be an Australian literary zeitgeist of antagonism to the use and abuse of power in educational institutions: Christos Tsiolkas's 'Barracuda', Alice Pung's 'Laurinda' and Rebecca Starford's forthcoming memoir 'Bad Behaviour' all take aim at elite private schools.
There are moments of shrewd insight into Australian culture in this book. However, 'Wild Things' is oddly cosy and insubstantial, considering its hard-hitting subject matter. Delaney frequently underlines that St Anton's is its own little world, and plays with how that can seem both a haven and a prison. But there's a cartoonish, unreal quality to this book that I wasn't sure was deliberate.
The symbolism is kind of on the nose. The college ball is themed 'Elysian Fields'; the beautiful grounds are roamed by tame animals (not wild things!) including a lamb actually named Innocence, and its depraved bacchanals are presided over by junior monsters with Latinate names including Hadrien, Roman, Julian and Severin. The less evil, more repentant protagonists have Biblical names: Toby, Ben, Levi, Sam. One actually finds religion.
It's deliberately set in an Australian non-city where strange street names stand in for more recognisable inner-city locales, and a fictional band with the risible doo-wop name Lance Vaine and the Musical Hellos seem to pop up with a different song every chapter, whose lyrics are almost supernaturally relevant to the events at hand.
I would have enjoyed this parallel dream-Australia Delaney was creating if not for the repeated, jarring mentions of the real Australia, with Facebook and YouTube and Tumblr and Prada and Chanel and real songs and lyrics by Pharrell and Beyoncé and Bon Iver and Blur. The overall effect is unsettling: a prevailing air of unreality made me feel less engaged with the characters and plot either on a level of pure story or social commentary.
There were too many point-of-view characters, and no apparent strategic use of them: the story wanders between them. The question of what happened to Alfred out in the bush seems to emerge matter-of-factly, in dribs and drabs, rather than being a source of tension or a shocking reveal. And too much of the book is devoted to the characters' guilty psychological unravelling. We get it. Keeping this quiet is eating you guys up inside.
Delaney teases possibilities that several different characters will discover or confess all, but ultimately settles for a mix of confession and investigative revelation that is neither unexpected nor morally satisfying. And Hadrien never gets a POV; he remains objectified, a creepy posh sadist from Central Casting to the very end.
The tone, too, felt unmoored. The pompous college Master and the hapless staffer Dr Bath are described jocularly, almost satirically, in a way that jars with the searingly earnest suffering and soul-searching of the major male characters.
I was most unsettled by the contempt that Delaney seems to reserve for her female characters, who are sketched as dumb sluts, inadequate mothers, adoring worshippers and downtrodden slatterns. There's some commentary here about feminist awakenings and slut-shaming, but it seems hazy and unfocused compared to the laser precision with which the abjection of women's bodies is described. And more than this: women are depicted as foolish and deluded for tending to their bodies.
For me the most interesting part of the book was the end: the aftermath and long-term effects of the events. Perhaps I would rather have read a book set in the 'real world': one that more emphatically undermines our lingering sentimentality over these institutions of elite power. This book seemed to revel a little too much in the gilded beauty of its privileged surroundings and the familiar tropes of 'boys behaving badly'.
March 23, 2025
Wild Things is a disturbing and dark novel. It fits within the Dark Academia genre, but not quite. It is the novel that made me for once and all, finally admit the necessity of a category that encompasses titles that are almost DA, in other words Dark Academia Adjacent.
Let’s start from the beginning. In an unnamed city of Australia, the St. Anton College stands as a place of debauchery and excess. Never have I read an academic novel that featured such wildness and frenzy, borderline animalistic and completely hedonistic. This campus made me disgusted and glad I will never go there. I suppose that would be one of the reasons why this title it’s almost DA, we as readers do not feel the longing that usually accompanies such stories, where we are made to feel as if we want to join the characters inside the cloisters and quadrangles of the university and find our places there with them. Wild Things goes the opposite way, showing a darker side of the campus, where the students, unconcerned about their studies or the life of the mind (again, a point for not being quite DA) but instead preoccupied with drinking, partying, running around naked, simply indulging in any impulse and desire as it appears. It is similar in certain ways to tales belonging to the Campus Novel genre, where characters are more concerned with the social aspect of the university life, but what makes me refrain from categorizing this novel as a CN is precisely the darker themes it delves into.
At the start of the novel the cricket team goes on their traditional trip to celebrate winning the championship, to a remote property, ready to embrace their wildest impulses for the weekend. Except, things don’t exactly go as planned. What was supposed to be a prank on a fresher student—and an international student at that—ends up going badly when the boy is found later by a rock ledge nearly dead. The boys have done something, and it is their job now to keep the secret. Not only the violence of this episode would be enough for me to refrain from categorizing this novel as a CN, the aftermath of it, particularly in what concerns these characters in their psychological states and the herculean guilt they feel, also closely align it with the Dark Academia, because of the strong Gothic influence on the genre.
In fact, this guilt is so abysmal, that it will profoundly change the lives of these boys, mostly for worse. The prevalence of the past is another central theme in this narrative, and it was one of the things I enjoyed most about it. Alongside with the delightful writing, I felt like the author was able to perfectly encapsulate the fragile mental states of each of these characters, and with their different personalities she was able to follow them through different paths on each of their descents into desperation. This was probably my favorite aspect of this novel, meaning we don’t get to see he boys how they were before that terrible weekend, only after, only reminiscing about what they lost, about how they have irrevocably changed. And of course alongside with that, we have the masterful ending. The final paragraphs of this novel were absolute perfection, even if the final path it took to get there tumbled a little.
There are several pov’s on this novel, and even though I don’t think some of them were necessary, mainly because some of them only appear very little and don’t seem to make that much of a difference, I did enjoy having multiple points of view. I felt like it added so much dimension to the story in spite of being a bit confusing at first. My favorites were Toby and Ben, and I expressly enjoyed how their friendship was the ne plus ultra of how much one can change and find themselves unable to withstand the weight of their previous self and all the baggage that comes with it, choosing instead a different path of themselves, no matter how much painful it might be.
Going back to my previous point of categorization, mostly it was two elements—or lack thereof—that made me reluctant to add it to my ever-growing list of DA titles. The first one is, despite the horrible acts committed multiple times, nobody actually died in this. Several times I thought someone would, but alas it never happened. The other thing is that despite the fact that this novel does portray several aspects of academic life, including questions of privilege and power which are central ones to DA narratives, it does feel like it is a bit further away from the true intent of the genre, particularly in what concerns the more intellectual aspects of the stories, there is so much violence and brutality in here, that I feel it lacks on the more mental aspects that characters of DA usually have. There’s also the interesting observation that even when the DA characters are committing or thinking about committing horrible acts, their amorphous moral compass and intellectual considerations on the matter can sometimes make the readers see them in a more sympathetic light, developing perhaps an understanding of them—if not a compassion of sorts, which is always a fascinating thing to feel, you know, like you actually care about horrible people. This couldn’t be further from what happens in Wild Things there is no redeeming qualities here, there is no sympathies whatsoever, you want them to get caught, you want to see them brough to justice, I was rooting for them to fall at every page.
Again, it is dark, and it is set in an academic institution while portraying a significant part of academic life—even if it is a horrible one. I simply feel like it is not quite there— hence, there is no better fit than the use of the adjacent term. There have been other occasions, though very very few, where I felt the need to find a term for novels that are not exactly DA even if they have so many characteristics that fit, and which also don’t feel like they are fully Campus Novels either. Truthfully, this actually is inspiring me to investigate this aspect even further in my academic research of the genre.
Alas, there is one final thing that needs to be said about this book, for as much brilliance I thought it had, I am beyond glad for it to be over, for it feels as if a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. What a dreadful, dark, little book. This was truly horrible.
★★★★
Let’s start from the beginning. In an unnamed city of Australia, the St. Anton College stands as a place of debauchery and excess. Never have I read an academic novel that featured such wildness and frenzy, borderline animalistic and completely hedonistic. This campus made me disgusted and glad I will never go there. I suppose that would be one of the reasons why this title it’s almost DA, we as readers do not feel the longing that usually accompanies such stories, where we are made to feel as if we want to join the characters inside the cloisters and quadrangles of the university and find our places there with them. Wild Things goes the opposite way, showing a darker side of the campus, where the students, unconcerned about their studies or the life of the mind (again, a point for not being quite DA) but instead preoccupied with drinking, partying, running around naked, simply indulging in any impulse and desire as it appears. It is similar in certain ways to tales belonging to the Campus Novel genre, where characters are more concerned with the social aspect of the university life, but what makes me refrain from categorizing this novel as a CN is precisely the darker themes it delves into.
At the start of the novel the cricket team goes on their traditional trip to celebrate winning the championship, to a remote property, ready to embrace their wildest impulses for the weekend. Except, things don’t exactly go as planned. What was supposed to be a prank on a fresher student—and an international student at that—ends up going badly when the boy is found later by a rock ledge nearly dead. The boys have done something, and it is their job now to keep the secret. Not only the violence of this episode would be enough for me to refrain from categorizing this novel as a CN, the aftermath of it, particularly in what concerns these characters in their psychological states and the herculean guilt they feel, also closely align it with the Dark Academia, because of the strong Gothic influence on the genre.
In fact, this guilt is so abysmal, that it will profoundly change the lives of these boys, mostly for worse. The prevalence of the past is another central theme in this narrative, and it was one of the things I enjoyed most about it. Alongside with the delightful writing, I felt like the author was able to perfectly encapsulate the fragile mental states of each of these characters, and with their different personalities she was able to follow them through different paths on each of their descents into desperation. This was probably my favorite aspect of this novel, meaning we don’t get to see he boys how they were before that terrible weekend, only after, only reminiscing about what they lost, about how they have irrevocably changed. And of course alongside with that, we have the masterful ending. The final paragraphs of this novel were absolute perfection, even if the final path it took to get there tumbled a little.
Yet still he gawped – in mad love with the place already but panicked that he did not belong here and would be found out at any moment. (…)That first afternoon unfolded like a beautiful dream: a day of miraculous sixes and a stunning catch and the late afternoon sun toasty on his back, and later a strange dark English-style pub called the Red Lion, with a low ceiling and crossed rowing oars nailed above the bar, where he and Ben sat, drinking and talking easily. The feeling that he was an intruder, a lurker on the edges, slipped away so quickly that Toby felt strangely but happily unmoored from the past. His anchor was up. Nothing significant in his life had happened, or was fondly remembered before he got here.
There are several pov’s on this novel, and even though I don’t think some of them were necessary, mainly because some of them only appear very little and don’t seem to make that much of a difference, I did enjoy having multiple points of view. I felt like it added so much dimension to the story in spite of being a bit confusing at first. My favorites were Toby and Ben, and I expressly enjoyed how their friendship was the ne plus ultra of how much one can change and find themselves unable to withstand the weight of their previous self and all the baggage that comes with it, choosing instead a different path of themselves, no matter how much painful it might be.
Going back to my previous point of categorization, mostly it was two elements—or lack thereof—that made me reluctant to add it to my ever-growing list of DA titles. The first one is, despite the horrible acts committed multiple times, nobody actually died in this. Several times I thought someone would, but alas it never happened. The other thing is that despite the fact that this novel does portray several aspects of academic life, including questions of privilege and power which are central ones to DA narratives, it does feel like it is a bit further away from the true intent of the genre, particularly in what concerns the more intellectual aspects of the stories, there is so much violence and brutality in here, that I feel it lacks on the more mental aspects that characters of DA usually have. There’s also the interesting observation that even when the DA characters are committing or thinking about committing horrible acts, their amorphous moral compass and intellectual considerations on the matter can sometimes make the readers see them in a more sympathetic light, developing perhaps an understanding of them—if not a compassion of sorts, which is always a fascinating thing to feel, you know, like you actually care about horrible people. This couldn’t be further from what happens in Wild Things there is no redeeming qualities here, there is no sympathies whatsoever, you want them to get caught, you want to see them brough to justice, I was rooting for them to fall at every page.
Again, it is dark, and it is set in an academic institution while portraying a significant part of academic life—even if it is a horrible one. I simply feel like it is not quite there— hence, there is no better fit than the use of the adjacent term. There have been other occasions, though very very few, where I felt the need to find a term for novels that are not exactly DA even if they have so many characteristics that fit, and which also don’t feel like they are fully Campus Novels either. Truthfully, this actually is inspiring me to investigate this aspect even further in my academic research of the genre.
Alas, there is one final thing that needs to be said about this book, for as much brilliance I thought it had, I am beyond glad for it to be over, for it feels as if a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. What a dreadful, dark, little book. This was truly horrible.
★★★★
May 16, 2014
I decided to read this book after reading a newspaper review and despite the excellent writing chose not to continue after the first 50 pages. While the issues this book deals with may be valid and the characters may be realistic the subject is reprehensible and the characters disgusted me. To keep me reading I would need to feel some sympathy and involvement with the characters, other than the stereotypical victim. Research indicated that this novel began as a piece of investigative journalism and the author may have maintained my interest more if she had continued with that format.
April 28, 2014
If you can overlook a couple of clichéd characters, this is an entertaining read. Scary thing is, in some colleges/schools it is probably not too far removed from the truth.
April 11, 2015
Unbelievably nasty little characters within an unbelievable nasty little plot. Mildly entertaining though.
September 19, 2015
Maybe I'll write a more thorough review when I don't feel like I've wasted my time reading a book as bad as this.
Read
March 3, 2016I’ve been reading a lot about bullying lately. It seems to be a hot topic in the media, in a number of recently released memoirs, and in fiction. In nearly every instance the bullying is underpinned by deeply ingrained assumptions about “normality” charged with intense fear and the need to reinforce power structures in both children and adults. The bullying I’ve been reading about has been a lot more serious than name-calling. In most cases it has led to PTSD and at its worst, death from injuries or even suicide. Brigid Delaney’s Wild Things is not a memoir – it’s fiction. The events in this book didn’t happen specifically, but the verisimilitude is so strong that they feel not only probable, but very real. Delaney, who used much of her research into college hazing or initiations in writing Wild Things, approaches her theme subtly, building the narrative through multiple viewpoints so that the reader becomes an uncomfortable participant on all sides, as victim, as bully, and as investigator. As in most cases, the lines between these roles shift.
The story is set in St Anton’s university college, an elite university where the endemic bullying dismissed as harmless “initiation rituals” equates to serious misogyny, substance abuse, and deep seated racism. The depravity behind closed doors is in stark contrast to the beautiful facade of the school - it’s high sandstone walls, its sporting achievements, and the gloss of privilege that (some) attendees appear to enjoy. After winning the season final, the highly lauded school cricket team decide to take a trip to Evelyn, a college owned camp in the mountains. It’s there that the besuited and creepy ringleader Hadrien brings out his subversive gift – a first year Engineering student from Malaysia named Alfred. When things go overboard with their initiations, Alfred is badly hurt, and the college closes rank. Delaney explores the aftermath from multiple points of view, moving progressively deeper into the underlying power structures and inherent sadism, not only of this college, but of society as a whole, and there are some pretty potent parallels to be found.
St Anton’s is so richly depicted it’s almost a character in itself – an antagonist that bears an obvious resemblance to Sydney University’s St John’s College (where Delaney was once a tutor), right down to the sandstone buildings, the manicured green lawn of the quadrangle, the excesses which caused St John’s some media scrutiny in 2012, and the hazing scandals: “a ''lotus-eating dreamworld'', where the ''household gods are beer, chicks and footy'' (http://www.smh.com.au/national/colleges-show-flaws-in-the-sandstone-20121109-2939j.html#ixzz41e181zK0). Delaney's writing is powerfully descriptive, and often poetically beautiful, capturing not only the deadly corruption of groupthink and self-hatred that comes with continual bullying, but also the more seductive camaraderie as it comes through shared physical exercise, shared experiences, and the natural beauty that surrounds the boys:
Though the boys involved are really men – 18, 19, 20 and older, there’s a strong sense in Wild Things that the bullying that takes place at St Antons is partly structural - driven by the tacit encouragement of the older characters – the college Master, and the pathetic tutor Dr Bath, who takes strong sleeping pills when he should be supervising the boys (he isn’t averse to practising a bit of bestiality either). Certainly the Master and teaching staff fail in their duty of care, as do many of the boy’s parents, who are more than willing to look the other way, but in the Master's deliberate ignoring of the boys attempts to confess, and in the subtle way he excuses and even encourages bad behaviour, perversion, secrecy and elitism, he perpetuates it:
Many of the boys who participate in the gristly weekend away have been institutionalized in boarding schools for a long time, and have endured their own extensive bullying. The toxic culture is not only bad for everyone at the school - trapping both bully and victim into a cycle that is exhausting and sickening on both sides, but also clearly forms these characters in ways that will spill over to their careers and adult interactions (including, one can extrapolate, governmental positions):
Though it is an intense and sometimes brutal read, Wild Things reveals its truths slowly, showing rather than telling, in the spaces between the story. The mystery of what exactly happened to Alfred is what drives the narrative forward, almost with a detective story pace,but in terms of its themes and the development of the characters, the story cuts deeply. The multi-layered narrative structure with its reversing arcs between Ben and Toby is particularly effective. The shift between protagonist and antagonist with these two best friends is complex, and their characters continue to develop in opposite directions as both try to come to terms with what the cricket team did on that terrible night.
There are some obvious, and fairly unpleasant villains: the brutally racist and misogynist Hadrian and the neglectful and self-serving Master are somewhat one-dimensional and disturbing in the pureness of their evil. It’s easy to see them as the catalysts, though their story is far less interesting than the deepening malaise of Toby and Ben. The growing schism between Toby and Ben are mirrored in the relationship between Charlotte and Lucy, both of whom also take opposing narrative arcs, and show the wide-reaching and long running nature of the corruption at St. Anton’s. Though it may be fiction, Wild Things tells a story that is all too likely, moving well beyond the confines of its sandstone towers to show how cruelty and privilege grow and become corrupting. Delaney’s exquisite prose, her obviously thorough research, and her attention to detail make this a chilling tale that will change the way readers perceive the world of exclusive schools, and indeed the whole nature of power in our modern society.
The story is set in St Anton’s university college, an elite university where the endemic bullying dismissed as harmless “initiation rituals” equates to serious misogyny, substance abuse, and deep seated racism. The depravity behind closed doors is in stark contrast to the beautiful facade of the school - it’s high sandstone walls, its sporting achievements, and the gloss of privilege that (some) attendees appear to enjoy. After winning the season final, the highly lauded school cricket team decide to take a trip to Evelyn, a college owned camp in the mountains. It’s there that the besuited and creepy ringleader Hadrien brings out his subversive gift – a first year Engineering student from Malaysia named Alfred. When things go overboard with their initiations, Alfred is badly hurt, and the college closes rank. Delaney explores the aftermath from multiple points of view, moving progressively deeper into the underlying power structures and inherent sadism, not only of this college, but of society as a whole, and there are some pretty potent parallels to be found.
St Anton’s is so richly depicted it’s almost a character in itself – an antagonist that bears an obvious resemblance to Sydney University’s St John’s College (where Delaney was once a tutor), right down to the sandstone buildings, the manicured green lawn of the quadrangle, the excesses which caused St John’s some media scrutiny in 2012, and the hazing scandals: “a ''lotus-eating dreamworld'', where the ''household gods are beer, chicks and footy'' (http://www.smh.com.au/national/colleges-show-flaws-in-the-sandstone-20121109-2939j.html#ixzz41e181zK0). Delaney's writing is powerfully descriptive, and often poetically beautiful, capturing not only the deadly corruption of groupthink and self-hatred that comes with continual bullying, but also the more seductive camaraderie as it comes through shared physical exercise, shared experiences, and the natural beauty that surrounds the boys:
Then it happened. You found your rhythm and the water yielded to the boat. And although the boys were bent over, they remembered to look up and it was dark and still, but somewhere there was a little rip in the sky where the light got in and the birds knew this and they surged and sang as the sky ripped a little bit further open, until suddenly there were holes everywhere for the light to get in, until the night was torn to shreds and the sky was streaked with pink, blue and gold. (53)
Though the boys involved are really men – 18, 19, 20 and older, there’s a strong sense in Wild Things that the bullying that takes place at St Antons is partly structural - driven by the tacit encouragement of the older characters – the college Master, and the pathetic tutor Dr Bath, who takes strong sleeping pills when he should be supervising the boys (he isn’t averse to practising a bit of bestiality either). Certainly the Master and teaching staff fail in their duty of care, as do many of the boy’s parents, who are more than willing to look the other way, but in the Master's deliberate ignoring of the boys attempts to confess, and in the subtle way he excuses and even encourages bad behaviour, perversion, secrecy and elitism, he perpetuates it:
He knew the students could be animals but he liked the term ‘wilful blindness’. He could turn away when they went feral. He chose not to know and thus remained unaccountable. What he wanted to see were his scholar princes and trust-fund princesses. Privileged, good-looking, intelligent, articulate, athletic and well-mannered. (227)
Many of the boys who participate in the gristly weekend away have been institutionalized in boarding schools for a long time, and have endured their own extensive bullying. The toxic culture is not only bad for everyone at the school - trapping both bully and victim into a cycle that is exhausting and sickening on both sides, but also clearly forms these characters in ways that will spill over to their careers and adult interactions (including, one can extrapolate, governmental positions):
Toby could suddenly see Leeson a few years from now: his scar shining an silver, completely bald, his big hulking head fully exposed, his dark eyes glinting, almost reclining on a coach, as he was now, in front of a nasty CEO in a large office, helping to plan a merger that would swallow up a smaller, more vulnerable company, or sending swarms of hooded cab labour into a union-only site, or closing down textile mills, independent bookstores, buying up farmland for ‘light-industrial commercial-redevelopment purposes’. (175-6)
Though it is an intense and sometimes brutal read, Wild Things reveals its truths slowly, showing rather than telling, in the spaces between the story. The mystery of what exactly happened to Alfred is what drives the narrative forward, almost with a detective story pace,but in terms of its themes and the development of the characters, the story cuts deeply. The multi-layered narrative structure with its reversing arcs between Ben and Toby is particularly effective. The shift between protagonist and antagonist with these two best friends is complex, and their characters continue to develop in opposite directions as both try to come to terms with what the cricket team did on that terrible night.
There are some obvious, and fairly unpleasant villains: the brutally racist and misogynist Hadrian and the neglectful and self-serving Master are somewhat one-dimensional and disturbing in the pureness of their evil. It’s easy to see them as the catalysts, though their story is far less interesting than the deepening malaise of Toby and Ben. The growing schism between Toby and Ben are mirrored in the relationship between Charlotte and Lucy, both of whom also take opposing narrative arcs, and show the wide-reaching and long running nature of the corruption at St. Anton’s. Though it may be fiction, Wild Things tells a story that is all too likely, moving well beyond the confines of its sandstone towers to show how cruelty and privilege grow and become corrupting. Delaney’s exquisite prose, her obviously thorough research, and her attention to detail make this a chilling tale that will change the way readers perceive the world of exclusive schools, and indeed the whole nature of power in our modern society.
May 13, 2014
What makes people do vicious things to each other? What's the magic in a blood-dipped hand, that binds criminals together in their acts? And why are we so fascinated by such cruelties? Brigid Delaney's breathtakingly assured first novel raises all of these questions, and the answers are troubling but alluring.
Full disclosure: Brigid is a friend. But I'd be as excited about this book even if she wasn't. It's the best Australian novel I've read in years.
It's set in a posh private boarding college at an Australian university -- dreaming spires, quadrangles, rowing teams and history teachers mumbling Gerard Manley Hopkins as they feed the resident sheep. Under the indulgent gaze of the oleaginous Master of the college, a thuggish clique of posh sportsmen rule their little world, orbited by a cluster of women struggling to achieve self-respect. Right at the start, a Malaysian student, Alfred, is beguiled into a sadistic initiation game by the cricket team, left for dead out in the bush before ending up comatose in hospital. A cover-up ensues to protect the reputation of the college and the glittering futures of his tormentors; inevitably, agonizingly, it unravels.
It's expertly written, let alone for a first novel. She's juggling more than a dozen protagonists, and depending on their disparate emotional journeys to unravel the plot. But it's a pacey read and you never feel you're dealing with stock characters: while a few members of the cricket team are only sketched in the vaguest outlines to make up the 11, the figures she dwells on are vivid and surprising.
Blair is right that the characters are mostly loathsome, despicable or pitiable, but unlike her I don't feel that turned me off the book, and I don't feel I need to be rooting for them to get away with it to keep reading.
There's the pompous Master, self-satisfied and seeming to rather enjoy the wanton carnival of college life; his PR firm is always on speed dial and his finger on the security cameras' delete button. Tragic, closeted Dr Bath, out of his depth and losing it over the love that dare not speak its name. Dissipated Charlotte, beautiful but lost in the mirrors of others' longings; Toby, whose weakness and instinct for loyalty drives him to perdition. Levi, who tries out a jockishness he wasn't born to and disgusts himself in the process; Ben, who flees in the opposite direction, from his privileged upbringing to cleanse his guilt in an ascetic Christian sect.
As with Crime and Punishment, the crime here happens right at the start, and Ben follows Raskolnikov's path through guilt, conscience, and redemption.
That's clearly no coincidence: a line from Dostoevsky's novel forms one of two epigraphs for the novel. The other, more intriguingly, is from Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn. That poem isn't about wickedness and guilt, but about the beauty of the titular urn and the strange, vanished age it depicts; and beauty is everywhere in this novel, in the gorgeous college grounds, the lean, hormonal students, in the descriptions of holidays, lost summers, the bush and the city.
There's lovely, hallucinatory scenes. Toby's perceptions as his mind grows addled on prescription drugs. The college bursting into sentimental mass hysteria when they discover the "accident" that befell Alfred. The Master being quizzed by police, hypnotised by motes of light as he drifts into disassociated disbelief to hold back the awful reality.
There's wonderful set-pieces too: a miserable family dinner at Ben's house with his terrible parents; a desolate Dr Bath finding solace, and sleep, petting the college lamb; an exhilaratingly drawn-out passage where Ben and Charlotte, both broken in different ways by their experiences, find comfort and forgetfulness in rekindling their old affection.
But above all, it's the violence seething beneath the surface that captivates. And it's a violence, the book hints, that's enscribed deep into the structure of our society. Hadrien, the ascetic, albino-blond ringleader of the tormentors, is like Julian Assange as a JG Ballard villain. As with Ballard, the cruelty has a dangerous glamour, an ability to make its perpetrators thrill with possibility.
There's an almost pagan quality to the set-up: the boys' names, Hadrien, Roman, Severin (something of Sacher-Masoch in that last one, too); the description of bare-chested, begowned and drunken rowers at a candlelit victory dinner, with a hieratic Master presiding. A distressed, disorderly Charlotte, staggering through the quad after a debauched ball on the theme of the Elysian Fields. On security camera footage she looks like Aphrodite, even her image capable of ensnaring the unwary.
Remind yourself: what were those ideal Arcadian scenes on Keats' urn, again? The ones that proclaim "truth beauty, and beauty truth"?:
"What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?"
It's that quality of myth that makes this so much more than just a uni story. William Blake, reading Paradise Lost, thought John Milton "of the devil's party, though he knew it not". Brigid is more self-aware, but she still gives the old goat his due.
At the end, there's a vertiginous flash-forward to the protagonists' lives of globe-trotting success, and the college's taming under a dour Scottish Master, who rations high table to one bottle of wine a night and a weekly snifter of port. It's written almost with a sense of loss, that something glorious has gone from the world:
"The decadence and blazing life force that had powered college life were finally extinguished. All that was left were rumours and legends."
For the people bound together by the cruel events of the book, you're left with the sense that this drunken, confused dawning of adulthood might have been the only time they truly felt something. Those savage days: were they really the best of their lives?
Full disclosure: Brigid is a friend. But I'd be as excited about this book even if she wasn't. It's the best Australian novel I've read in years.
It's set in a posh private boarding college at an Australian university -- dreaming spires, quadrangles, rowing teams and history teachers mumbling Gerard Manley Hopkins as they feed the resident sheep. Under the indulgent gaze of the oleaginous Master of the college, a thuggish clique of posh sportsmen rule their little world, orbited by a cluster of women struggling to achieve self-respect. Right at the start, a Malaysian student, Alfred, is beguiled into a sadistic initiation game by the cricket team, left for dead out in the bush before ending up comatose in hospital. A cover-up ensues to protect the reputation of the college and the glittering futures of his tormentors; inevitably, agonizingly, it unravels.
It's expertly written, let alone for a first novel. She's juggling more than a dozen protagonists, and depending on their disparate emotional journeys to unravel the plot. But it's a pacey read and you never feel you're dealing with stock characters: while a few members of the cricket team are only sketched in the vaguest outlines to make up the 11, the figures she dwells on are vivid and surprising.
Blair is right that the characters are mostly loathsome, despicable or pitiable, but unlike her I don't feel that turned me off the book, and I don't feel I need to be rooting for them to get away with it to keep reading.
There's the pompous Master, self-satisfied and seeming to rather enjoy the wanton carnival of college life; his PR firm is always on speed dial and his finger on the security cameras' delete button. Tragic, closeted Dr Bath, out of his depth and losing it over the love that dare not speak its name. Dissipated Charlotte, beautiful but lost in the mirrors of others' longings; Toby, whose weakness and instinct for loyalty drives him to perdition. Levi, who tries out a jockishness he wasn't born to and disgusts himself in the process; Ben, who flees in the opposite direction, from his privileged upbringing to cleanse his guilt in an ascetic Christian sect.
As with Crime and Punishment, the crime here happens right at the start, and Ben follows Raskolnikov's path through guilt, conscience, and redemption.
That's clearly no coincidence: a line from Dostoevsky's novel forms one of two epigraphs for the novel. The other, more intriguingly, is from Keats' Ode on a Grecian Urn. That poem isn't about wickedness and guilt, but about the beauty of the titular urn and the strange, vanished age it depicts; and beauty is everywhere in this novel, in the gorgeous college grounds, the lean, hormonal students, in the descriptions of holidays, lost summers, the bush and the city.
There's lovely, hallucinatory scenes. Toby's perceptions as his mind grows addled on prescription drugs. The college bursting into sentimental mass hysteria when they discover the "accident" that befell Alfred. The Master being quizzed by police, hypnotised by motes of light as he drifts into disassociated disbelief to hold back the awful reality.
There's wonderful set-pieces too: a miserable family dinner at Ben's house with his terrible parents; a desolate Dr Bath finding solace, and sleep, petting the college lamb; an exhilaratingly drawn-out passage where Ben and Charlotte, both broken in different ways by their experiences, find comfort and forgetfulness in rekindling their old affection.
But above all, it's the violence seething beneath the surface that captivates. And it's a violence, the book hints, that's enscribed deep into the structure of our society. Hadrien, the ascetic, albino-blond ringleader of the tormentors, is like Julian Assange as a JG Ballard villain. As with Ballard, the cruelty has a dangerous glamour, an ability to make its perpetrators thrill with possibility.
There's an almost pagan quality to the set-up: the boys' names, Hadrien, Roman, Severin (something of Sacher-Masoch in that last one, too); the description of bare-chested, begowned and drunken rowers at a candlelit victory dinner, with a hieratic Master presiding. A distressed, disorderly Charlotte, staggering through the quad after a debauched ball on the theme of the Elysian Fields. On security camera footage she looks like Aphrodite, even her image capable of ensnaring the unwary.
Remind yourself: what were those ideal Arcadian scenes on Keats' urn, again? The ones that proclaim "truth beauty, and beauty truth"?:
"What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?"
It's that quality of myth that makes this so much more than just a uni story. William Blake, reading Paradise Lost, thought John Milton "of the devil's party, though he knew it not". Brigid is more self-aware, but she still gives the old goat his due.
At the end, there's a vertiginous flash-forward to the protagonists' lives of globe-trotting success, and the college's taming under a dour Scottish Master, who rations high table to one bottle of wine a night and a weekly snifter of port. It's written almost with a sense of loss, that something glorious has gone from the world:
"The decadence and blazing life force that had powered college life were finally extinguished. All that was left were rumours and legends."
For the people bound together by the cruel events of the book, you're left with the sense that this drunken, confused dawning of adulthood might have been the only time they truly felt something. Those savage days: were they really the best of their lives?
January 3, 2020
This was an unexpectedly amazing story about something truly horrible. Who says you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear? That is exactly what Delaney has done with this book. The subject (and some of the characters) are loathsome yet the story itself is beautiful.
The fact is that most people are followers and willing do terrible things if other people do them too. Delaney’s characters are so deeply developed that you get an insight into this bloodthirsty mob mentality and the insidiousness of peer pressure.
A wonderful book but not for the faint-hearted.
The fact is that most people are followers and willing do terrible things if other people do them too. Delaney’s characters are so deeply developed that you get an insight into this bloodthirsty mob mentality and the insidiousness of peer pressure.
A wonderful book but not for the faint-hearted.
January 12, 2019
A poor man's The Riot Club with attempted allusions to The Secret History, dotted with irrelevant references to Brideshead Revisited. The passages about Ben finding religion were the only comforting parts to read.
December 19, 2021
Took me a little longer to read this book than I thought it would due to the descriptive and gory passages that made me shut the book completely. But I enjoyed the storyline and the ending although I wish the ringleaders perhaps copped a bit more.
July 15, 2023
Probably young adult? Uni students behaving very badly, unfortunately it is believable. The ending is sudden and not satisfying, I think because there are more characters than needed to carry the plot.
April 14, 2025
Disturbing because despite being a work of fiction I’m sure the graphic acts of violence under the guise of hazing and initiation were based on true accounts.
A tough read but that’s the point. Everything I heard about university colleges in my early 20s was awful.
A tough read but that’s the point. Everything I heard about university colleges in my early 20s was awful.
March 8, 2024
Unforgettable.
Reader, beware. 'Wild Things' includes graphic descriptions of male and female rape, and grotesque violence against people and animals. Most disturbing, the events of the novel and details of acts and injuries are drawn from real cases. The scenes from Chapter 20 onwards are truly sickening to read. Pops to Delaney for being able to write the gory truth plainly so that society can confront toxic boarding school and residential college culture with full understanding of what goes on behind high walls and closed doors.
'Wild Things' is set at the fictional St Albans College, a co-ed university filled with clever students, most from rich families, with a few international students, sports stars and academically-gifted scholarship students thrown in. The parties are debauched, bestial, savage and bloody in every possible way. The teachers turn a blind eye to the students' revelry and ignore the rumours of those nights, just so they can sleep soundly at night. The students are remarkably resilient, gritting their teeth through the pains they cause each other and the traumas they experience in the name of someone's idea of a good time.
The St Albans cricket team wins the comp and the boys go off to the bush to party. The ringleader brings Alfred, an international student who speaks little English, along to be initiated. At some point during the night, he goes missing. The boys make a pact not to speak of it, and return to college. Alfred is found a few days later, nearly dead, with unspeakable injuries inconsistent with a few nights alone in the bush. Several of the boys drift apart, get sick, and find destructive ways to numb the pain and shame of what they've done - sex, drugs, alcohol, and violence. Slowly, though disturbing fragments of memory, they confront their part in what happened to Alfred, and wrestle with their consciences, and with each other about whether to tell the police and risk the consequences. Another riotous party and the police are called to the college for another grotesque matter - and everything comes out into the open.
'Wild Things' is a pacey novel where you'll find yourself saying 'just one more chapter' a dozen times. You won't be able to put it down until you know what happened. It's disgusting and awful, but you won't be able to look away. You'll finally put the book down, and rub your eyes, and wish you could forget what you read, but you can't. And the worst part is, you know these crimes have happened a million times before and kids will keep doing this to one another until we change as a society.
The ending outlines that institutional changes are a good first step, but more needs to be done to eradicate the savage societies that exist in schools and colleges around the country. Reading 'Wild Things' is an important step in making ourselves aware of the true nature of these societies and how their toxic mindset permeates every school and workplace we know. There are no easy solutions. We need to do implement healthy, structured rites of passage for young people that initiates them to adolescence and adulthood in healthy, productive ways, lest they initiate themselves to dreadful and tragic consequences for our entire society. The young people we lead today become tomorrow's leaders. When we look at the young people in 'Wild things' and notice their parallels to the leaders of our nation and big businesses, that is a truly terrifying thought. Wild Things is a disturbing read, but one I think all adults, especially parents and teachers, need to read.
My only gripe with the novel is its title and tag line. "Wild Things: The boys are behaving badly" sounds like something you'd find on the cover of a seedy Mills & Boon paperback with a picture of a slick cowboy, a millionaire, or the naked torso of a chiselled man. In one sense, the title hints at society's trivialising of hazing rituals and the economic injustice that rich students who can afford top-dollar lawyers can get away with almost anything. But I felt like the title does not to justice to the horrific and disturbing events of the novel.
TW: Graphic descriptions of Rape and torture, eating disorders, abuse of alcohol and drugs. Not for the faint of heart. I warned you.
Reader, beware. 'Wild Things' includes graphic descriptions of male and female rape, and grotesque violence against people and animals. Most disturbing, the events of the novel and details of acts and injuries are drawn from real cases. The scenes from Chapter 20 onwards are truly sickening to read. Pops to Delaney for being able to write the gory truth plainly so that society can confront toxic boarding school and residential college culture with full understanding of what goes on behind high walls and closed doors.
'Wild Things' is set at the fictional St Albans College, a co-ed university filled with clever students, most from rich families, with a few international students, sports stars and academically-gifted scholarship students thrown in. The parties are debauched, bestial, savage and bloody in every possible way. The teachers turn a blind eye to the students' revelry and ignore the rumours of those nights, just so they can sleep soundly at night. The students are remarkably resilient, gritting their teeth through the pains they cause each other and the traumas they experience in the name of someone's idea of a good time.
The St Albans cricket team wins the comp and the boys go off to the bush to party. The ringleader brings Alfred, an international student who speaks little English, along to be initiated. At some point during the night, he goes missing. The boys make a pact not to speak of it, and return to college. Alfred is found a few days later, nearly dead, with unspeakable injuries inconsistent with a few nights alone in the bush. Several of the boys drift apart, get sick, and find destructive ways to numb the pain and shame of what they've done - sex, drugs, alcohol, and violence. Slowly, though disturbing fragments of memory, they confront their part in what happened to Alfred, and wrestle with their consciences, and with each other about whether to tell the police and risk the consequences. Another riotous party and the police are called to the college for another grotesque matter - and everything comes out into the open.
'Wild Things' is a pacey novel where you'll find yourself saying 'just one more chapter' a dozen times. You won't be able to put it down until you know what happened. It's disgusting and awful, but you won't be able to look away. You'll finally put the book down, and rub your eyes, and wish you could forget what you read, but you can't. And the worst part is, you know these crimes have happened a million times before and kids will keep doing this to one another until we change as a society.
The ending outlines that institutional changes are a good first step, but more needs to be done to eradicate the savage societies that exist in schools and colleges around the country. Reading 'Wild Things' is an important step in making ourselves aware of the true nature of these societies and how their toxic mindset permeates every school and workplace we know. There are no easy solutions. We need to do implement healthy, structured rites of passage for young people that initiates them to adolescence and adulthood in healthy, productive ways, lest they initiate themselves to dreadful and tragic consequences for our entire society. The young people we lead today become tomorrow's leaders. When we look at the young people in 'Wild things' and notice their parallels to the leaders of our nation and big businesses, that is a truly terrifying thought. Wild Things is a disturbing read, but one I think all adults, especially parents and teachers, need to read.
My only gripe with the novel is its title and tag line. "Wild Things: The boys are behaving badly" sounds like something you'd find on the cover of a seedy Mills & Boon paperback with a picture of a slick cowboy, a millionaire, or the naked torso of a chiselled man. In one sense, the title hints at society's trivialising of hazing rituals and the economic injustice that rich students who can afford top-dollar lawyers can get away with almost anything. But I felt like the title does not to justice to the horrific and disturbing events of the novel.
TW: Graphic descriptions of Rape and torture, eating disorders, abuse of alcohol and drugs. Not for the faint of heart. I warned you.
June 21, 2014
I have been prevaricating whether to give this book 3 or 4 stars. I wanted to give it 4 stars because, to a degree, it kept me up most of Thursday night this week, so that's got to be good right? Mind you, it's hard to tell these days whether the book kept me up or my insomnia kept me up. On reflection I've decided to give the book 3 stars because I am wrestling with it on a number of levels.
So, what's it about? Well it's a pretty dark book (not that there's anything wrong with dark books). It's set in a fictitious Australian university college where a sporting team has a weekend away to celebrate a win and things get a bit out of hand...well a lot really.
It's a different take (spoiler alert) in that it's not your conventional "footballers go wild and women get hurt" scenario (although there is certainly a lot of that). This time the victim is a male overseas student. I told you it was dark. Brave author to take on what seem to be two unfortunately endemic aspects of Australian society - sexism and racism - and explore them. Oh let's add another one for good measure - binge drinking.
This is where the book came unstuck for me. To a degree I kept reading for that awful reason that we all read about these kind of stories in the real press - what really went on that weekend? Who did what to whom? You don't want to know but you do...That can only be sustained for so long because what you really want to know is "why". Who are the characters at play here and why are they the way they are? I didn't ever really get a handle on that. I came away with lots of questions e.g Is it really like this for young women these days? Have we made so little progress?
I think the author is wrestling with really important issues here but I was disappointed with the execution. The author was very confident with the younger characters but there wasn't much depth or sympathy for the older characters in the unfolding drama. Perhaps that's just me and where I'm at in life. What do you think?
So, what's it about? Well it's a pretty dark book (not that there's anything wrong with dark books). It's set in a fictitious Australian university college where a sporting team has a weekend away to celebrate a win and things get a bit out of hand...well a lot really.
It's a different take (spoiler alert) in that it's not your conventional "footballers go wild and women get hurt" scenario (although there is certainly a lot of that). This time the victim is a male overseas student. I told you it was dark. Brave author to take on what seem to be two unfortunately endemic aspects of Australian society - sexism and racism - and explore them. Oh let's add another one for good measure - binge drinking.
This is where the book came unstuck for me. To a degree I kept reading for that awful reason that we all read about these kind of stories in the real press - what really went on that weekend? Who did what to whom? You don't want to know but you do...That can only be sustained for so long because what you really want to know is "why". Who are the characters at play here and why are they the way they are? I didn't ever really get a handle on that. I came away with lots of questions e.g Is it really like this for young women these days? Have we made so little progress?
I think the author is wrestling with really important issues here but I was disappointed with the execution. The author was very confident with the younger characters but there wasn't much depth or sympathy for the older characters in the unfolding drama. Perhaps that's just me and where I'm at in life. What do you think?
May 26, 2015
Finished reading: “Wild Things” by Brigid Delaney 26 May 2015
ISBN 9780732296872
I read this for my “Whodunits” book group. It is 'not' a whodunit. Goodness knows what the person who chose it was thinking. Comments at next book group could be quite interesting!
There is a story here that never got off the ground. What could have been good as both story and moral/ethical reflection was drowned in description – adjectives, adjectival phrases, adjectival clauses, sentences, paragraphs, on and on it went. Most of the book could usefully have been slashed. The protagonists of the story are students at a university college who, prior to that, had been educated privately. It is the story of a sense of entitlement, bullying, and belief that any wrong-doing will be “dealt with”, i.e. made to disappear. And pretty much they weren't wrong. [I could see Australia's current Prime Minister fitting right in, sad to say.] The implications of this and examination of the consequences would have made a worthwhile read.
ISBN 9780732296872
I read this for my “Whodunits” book group. It is 'not' a whodunit. Goodness knows what the person who chose it was thinking. Comments at next book group could be quite interesting!
There is a story here that never got off the ground. What could have been good as both story and moral/ethical reflection was drowned in description – adjectives, adjectival phrases, adjectival clauses, sentences, paragraphs, on and on it went. Most of the book could usefully have been slashed. The protagonists of the story are students at a university college who, prior to that, had been educated privately. It is the story of a sense of entitlement, bullying, and belief that any wrong-doing will be “dealt with”, i.e. made to disappear. And pretty much they weren't wrong. [I could see Australia's current Prime Minister fitting right in, sad to say.] The implications of this and examination of the consequences would have made a worthwhile read.
May 17, 2014
Thrilling debut novel from Brigid Delaney, it was the first novel in a long time I literally could not put down. Set in the privilege word of a private University College the novel unfolds after a brutal ritual went horribly wrong when the cricket team has a weekend away in the bush. Fascinating insight into pack mentality and the hidden rules that can lie behind these walls. What unfolds is a gripping psychological battle between those involved as they attempt to cover up the weekend events. Delaney has a beautiful style of writing and captures the mood, characters and settings incredibly well. The novel did not disappoint and she manages to tie it up with a satisfying ending. Highly recommended
June 28, 2014
I have mixed feelings about this novel. I read it soon after 'Baracuda' - which I loved - and in many ways 'Wild Things' is just missing the depth of character required to make me believe in and feel for the characters. Maybe it's the switching of narrators, in a cast of complex beings, that held me at arms length? But on other levels, the writing is it times both provocative and beautifully crafted; on several nights I've had plot related nightmares and I was compelled to keep on reading. I would have liked to have heard more from the female protagonists toward the end of the novel and can't decide whether I'm glad or annoyed that I never had to read from the main antagonists perspective.
May 17, 2014
Loved it, loved it. I too know Brigid professionally, and have always known she was a great journalist, but she has stunned me with her talents as a novelist. I loved how well-written and insightful it was; the way the reader was drawn into this hedonistic world of entitlement and the way such entitlement can breed a kind of antipathy to common decency. So beautifully realised. And while it is violent at times it is never violence for the sake of it. Take note: Brett Easton Ellis.
February 14, 2015
Great premise and plot so should have been an absolute page turner but it wasn't. Somehow it just missed the mark and I'm still not sure I can put my finger on why. Maybe because although you get quite involved with the characters and what they think and feel you never really identify with them and so find it hard to be emotionally invested in them?!?! Disappointed I didn't love it as I really wanted to ...
May 18, 2016
This story is set a university campus and boarding quarters in Australia . The plot is of the cricket and football teams going away for the weekend and getting into mischief that gets out of hand. Some boys kidnap an Asian student and initiate him on the weekend in the mountains. You see the development of each boy as they handle or mishandle their involvement. The uni culture is one of drunken, drugged,sexed weekends. What happened on the weekend deeply effected each boy in different ways.
September 2, 2014
I liked the overall plot of this book but it failed in its execution. However, in my opinion, it would make a great film.
February 17, 2015
In the vein of Lord of the Flies / Secret History - it's savage but worth the read. #aww14
September 8, 2014
Strong start and relatively good finish. Great characters. Skipped quite a number of pages to keep some pace going. Believable college storyline. A lot like Donna Tartt's The Secret History.
April 7, 2017
It took too long to get to the end and in the end I didn't care at all about any of them except the wraithlike Alfred.
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