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roseleaf24's review against another edition
5.0
Black Juice is a collection of short stories. They are all of excellent quality, though some resonated with me more than others, including the oft-anthologized "Singing My Sister Down," which was easily my favorite. They are all gripping and fully realized. I read this quickly, but I had to take breaks in between some of the stories. Lanagan writes somewhere between fantasy and science fiction, and each of these stories is set in a different world. I love her work as short stories; I have read a novel, and it was a bit intense for me, but these bites of intensity were just perfect.
geegee_74's review against another edition
2.0
Not really my thing as the worlds took so long to become used to that I didn't feel most of them fitted a short story format, but that's just me - I prefer novels usually. However I did like the first story in the collection 'Singing my sister down' and 'yowlinin' was good too although I would have liked it to be expanded a little more personally.
wrentheblurry's review against another edition
3.0
The stories contained within are all odd and bizarre, and the reader is thrown into the action from the start. I believe this is the first time I have read a story from the point of view of an elephant (Horton doesn't count), though I do wish I understand some of the stories better.
GENRE: Fiction: Short stories: historical fiction, fantasy.
SUBJECT/THEMES: Death, murder, loss, betrayal, loyalty, punishment, hierarchical societies.
SUMMARY: Black Juice is a collection of short stories that delve deep into the psyche of both human and animal. One story follows a herd of elephants as they search for their handler who has been taken from them. In another the reader witnesses a tribe’s harsh punishment for murder: the guilty party must stand upon a tar pit, while they sink slowly and their family sits nearby, until they are completely covered. In another a young, financially broke woman drives to a small town to attend her grandmother’s funeral, remembering what she’s learned from her relative along the way.
EVALUATION: This collection contains some of the strangest stories I have ever read. The premise in many of them is bizarre, the situations are often foreign, and the language and speech patterns of a number of the characters are very unusual. Yet the odd and weird hold a strong appeal for me and this book did not disappoint. This is a slower read than most, for there is much to process in the stories, both directly and from what is merely alluded to. While it took me longer to get into this book, it was well worth it, for Lanagan has crafted ten wonderful stories. For the record, I think my favorite was the elephant herd story (“Sweet Pippit”), and that was the first time, aside from perhaps Horton, that I read a story from the perspective of an elephant.
WHY I WOULD INCLUDE IT: This title is perfect for the teen reader that has an open mind, and wishes to be challenged a bit with their reading. After the reader has read through all of the stories once, they could read through it again and uncover new things, and perhaps find new ties and connections between the stories. This is certainly the mark of a well-written book.
GENRE: Fiction: Short stories: historical fiction, fantasy.
SUBJECT/THEMES: Death, murder, loss, betrayal, loyalty, punishment, hierarchical societies.
SUMMARY: Black Juice is a collection of short stories that delve deep into the psyche of both human and animal. One story follows a herd of elephants as they search for their handler who has been taken from them. In another the reader witnesses a tribe’s harsh punishment for murder: the guilty party must stand upon a tar pit, while they sink slowly and their family sits nearby, until they are completely covered. In another a young, financially broke woman drives to a small town to attend her grandmother’s funeral, remembering what she’s learned from her relative along the way.
EVALUATION: This collection contains some of the strangest stories I have ever read. The premise in many of them is bizarre, the situations are often foreign, and the language and speech patterns of a number of the characters are very unusual. Yet the odd and weird hold a strong appeal for me and this book did not disappoint. This is a slower read than most, for there is much to process in the stories, both directly and from what is merely alluded to. While it took me longer to get into this book, it was well worth it, for Lanagan has crafted ten wonderful stories. For the record, I think my favorite was the elephant herd story (“Sweet Pippit”), and that was the first time, aside from perhaps Horton, that I read a story from the perspective of an elephant.
WHY I WOULD INCLUDE IT: This title is perfect for the teen reader that has an open mind, and wishes to be challenged a bit with their reading. After the reader has read through all of the stories once, they could read through it again and uncover new things, and perhaps find new ties and connections between the stories. This is certainly the mark of a well-written book.
mslmdavis's review against another edition
1.0
I just couldn't get into this book. It contains several short stories that were a little too fantastical for me. The stories provide little information about the characters and try to give you the moral of the story in one sentence.
lisawreading's review against another edition
4.0
Wow, what a strange collection of stories. Margo Lanagan has a unique voice, creating rough-hewn characters with their own distinctive dialects, in worlds foreign yet vaguely familiar. The stories in Black Juice cover a bizarre range of subjects, including an assassination spree aimed at clowns and a family whose obligation it is to physically change the seasons. My favorite of all -- and the one that will stay with me for a long time -- is "Singing My Sister Down", which simply has to be read, even if you choose to skip the rest of the book. Overall, I'd say Black Juice is weird, often creepy, and really quite good.
nianyigexiaodu's review against another edition
dark
reflective
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
carstensena's review against another edition
3.0
Objectively, I see the excellence in these stories. They are simply not my personal cup of tea.
venusfawn's review against another edition
3.0
I’m really not even sure what to say about this collection of weirdness. I certainly can’t deny that Lanagan has a distinct style and writes in a way I can only describe as striking. These stories all came quite vividly to life, but unfortunately, they felt incomplete. I was completely confused through the majority of them, and the stories never felt really explained or properly wrapped up. I found myself reaching the end of each one and thinking, “where’s the rest? What did I miss?” None of them felt truly started or ended, which caused me some frustration and conflicted feelings toward the book. Based on her style, I think I might enjoy her full length novels, but I’m a little baffled and put off by this anthology.
shrrawat's review against another edition
2.0
If I hadn't known that this was Margo Lanagan's first venture into the North American book world, I would be a little disappointed in what I had read. Not that it wasn't good, Lanagan, as I have seen in her other short story collections, never delivers anything short of good. But it wasn't brilliant either.
Although some of her stories, such as "Singing My Sister Down" and "Red Nose Day" had that same dark and sensual charm that I am used to seeing in her writings, the other stories didn't quite cut it. I could see that they were meant to be dark, but I couldn't quite feel it. Maybe because she had already portrayed her best works in the collection right from the start, or maybe for another reason. Either way, I consider this book to be enjoyable, but not worth reading again.
Although some of her stories, such as "Singing My Sister Down" and "Red Nose Day" had that same dark and sensual charm that I am used to seeing in her writings, the other stories didn't quite cut it. I could see that they were meant to be dark, but I couldn't quite feel it. Maybe because she had already portrayed her best works in the collection right from the start, or maybe for another reason. Either way, I consider this book to be enjoyable, but not worth reading again.
alexsiddall's review
4.0
What an imagination. She takes shreds of nightmares and twists and cajoles them into unsettling stories. Angular and polished, brutiful and stirring. Like a wounded kitten, they provoke pity and sympathy and sometimes horror.