At age seven, Graham Rundle was taken by his father for a ‘holiday’ to Eden Park, a Salvation Army boys’ home outside Adelaide. As soon as his father left, Graham was given old clothes to wear and told from now on he was known as ‘44’. The book vividly portrays what happened to Graham over the following eight years, from 1959 until 1968, living in fear of sexual abuse by the people who were supposed to care for him.
This extraordinary book contrasts the dark moments of unbelievable depravity with some of the sweetest and most innocent acts of kindness. As well as portraying life in the home, Graham writes of his taste of freedom at high school and at Indigenous camps at the Koorong, and of his time spent with his beloved, lifesaving Nana.
