'THE SCHOOL Brendan James Murray Picador/Pan Macmillan Australia Nonfiction 416pp, $34.99 Brendan James Murray’s The School focuses on a year in the life of a teacher in a low socio-economic state school in a beachside town in Victoria. It is a complex, and realistic portrayal of the contemporary Australian secondary school classroom. It is also a frightening, sad, fraught, and funny exploration of the experience of being a teacher in an Australian secondary school.' (Introduction)