Boy, Lost

Kristina Olsson’s mother lost her infant son, Peter, when he was snatched from her arms at a train station in the hot summer of 1950. She was young and frightened, trying to escape a brutal marriage, and in no way prepared for this final blow. Yvonne would not see her son again for nearly 40 years. Kristina was the first child of her mother’s subsequent marriage and, like her siblings, grew up unaware of the reasons behind her mother’s sorrow, though Peter’s absence resounded through the family. Yvonne dreamt of her son by day and by night, while Peter grew up a thousand miles away, dreaming of his missing mother. The family memoir Boy, Lost tells how their lives proceeded from that shattering moment, the grief and shame that stalked them, what they lost and what they salvaged. It is the story of a family, the cascade of grief and guilt through generations, and the endurance of memory and faith.

Kristina Olsson is the author of the novels In One Skin and The China Garden, as well as the biography Kilroy Was Here. She has worked as a creative writing and journalism teacher, and as an advisor to the Australian government. Her journalism and non-fiction have been published in The Australian, The Courier-Mail, The Sydney Sunday Telegraph and Griffith Review. She has worked extensively as a teacher of creative writing and journalism at tertiary level and in the community, and as an advisor to government.