"A serpent's tooth was King Lear's name for an ungrateful child. This autobiographical novel tries to unravel the tangled strands of love and estrangement between a son and his father against of sweep of forty years of revolutionary politics in Australia and abroad. Bruce Milliss, a pious Catholic and prosperous businessman, turns to Communism as the answer to the crisis of the 1930s. Fired by his vision of a better world, the author follows proudly in his footsteps until their paths diverge with Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalin and the Sino-Soviet split. Only on his father's death does he realise too the debt he owes him.

'Published with the assistance of the Literature Board of the Australia Council'