How my mysterious childhood became a best-selling novel
Trent Dalton's debut novel was about a boy raised by drug dealers, babysat by a convicted murderer, who finds a secret underground room in his house. But all that wasn't fiction.
Back in the 1980s, when Trent Dalton was a kid growing up in Australia, he discovered that there was a secret underground room behind his stepfather's wardrobe. There were plenty of other strange things happening to him too. Like when he found a bundle of cash in the pocket of his bathrobe. Or there were the rumours that his babysitter was a murderer. It took Trent many years before he untangled these mysteries and found out the reality of his childhood. He used his life story as inspiration for his debut novel Boy Swallows Universe, which became the fastest selling in Australian history.
Presenter: Saskia Collette
Producer: Saskia Collette
Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com or WhatsApp +44 330 678 2707
(Photo: Trent Dalton. Credit: David Kelly)
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