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The Time We Have Taken
Steven Carroll
Fourth Estate *$27.99
STEVEN Carroll's sixth novel, The Time We have Taken, is the third in his fictional account of the development of a Melbourne suburb. The Art of the Engine Driver saw the suburb opening up in a 1950s' tracery of new dirt roads spreading across thistley paddocks from the existing frontier hub of shop and factory.
Carroll gave us an awkward and somewhat melancholy trio - hard- drinking engine driver Vic, his more sophisticated wife Rita, their serious 12-year-old son Michael - all transfixed under a peach- coloured sky and a melting-tablet comet tail on their way to an engagement party at the end of their new-made street.
The Gift of Speed moved on to the tour of the West Indian cricket team that entranced aspiring fast bowler Michael in 1960, while The Time We have Taken takes a 10-year stride into the future to the Vietnam moratorium marches and the rise of Whitlam - pictured in a slightly jarring foray into surrealism as a wheeled monument.
Each novel stands on its...
