Julian Home

The story opens on a bright Speech‑Day in the bustling market town of Harton, where horse‑drawn carriages stream in and families crowd the streets to admire the old school and its chapel’s glittering windows. Parents and relatives wander past cricket fields and bathing‑places, eager to see the place that produced poets, statesmen and, now, the next generation of hopeful scholars. Inside the school hall, a distinguished audience gathers around a table piled with prize‑books, while a young prince sits at the head of the room, and a platform holds the monitors who will soon address the crowd.

Amid the ceremony, a playful rivalry sparks between a father and his two children as they try to guess which boy will shine brightest. Their attention lands on Julian Home, a boy with delicate features and a quiet intensity, and on the charismatic monitor Bruce, who bursts into a powerful recitation of Burke. The tension between modest talent and flamboyant confidence hints at the friendships and ambitions that will shape their lives as the day unfolds.