The Golden Day
*Starred Review* The classic Australian film Picnic at Hanging Rock finds its literary equivalent in fellow Aussie Dubosarsky’s dark, languid look into the inscrutable wells of secrecy to be found in little girls. In the shadow of the Vietnam War, 11 bored Australian schoolgirls are taken on a short field trip to the local gardens by their idealistic teacher. Together with the teacher’s apparent paramour, the girls are led to a seaside cave wherein the two adults vanish forever. When the girls are repeatedly questioned about the disappearance, their own self-interest compels them to stay silent and senselessly guard the truth, until the keeping of the secret, not the secret itself, becomes the most important thing. In a stunning feat of perspective, Dubosarsky inhabits all 11 girls at once, snaking through a thousand small joys and triumphs and fears and petty grudges as they absorb life’s bleakest truths as well as their own complicity in them: “Their eyes were clear but their hearts were dishonest.” Reminiscent of Janne Teller’s Nothing (2010), this is a masterful look at children’s numb surprise to the most unsavory of adult developments. Though it’s not really a surprise, is it? They knew all along that the world was full of terrible things. Grades 7-12. --Daniel Kraus