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3.91 AVERAGE
3.91 AVERAGE
My absolute love for Trent Dalton remains. He is poetic and mystical and writes books that speaks deeply to what makes us human. This story is the most fantastical and spectacular of his books and follows the adventure of the gravedigger girl, Molly, as she quests through the magical Northern Territory to break the ‘curse’ that’s been placed on her family. It’s dark and it’s light and I loved it very much.
“And she realises if there is treasure to be found anywhere under the shimmering skies, if there is true value beneath the high plan of heaven, then it will be the lips of lovers that will one day fire he soul and the fear that will always make her fight and friends who will take her fears away and children she will call her own and the wonders she will see on the trees and leaves and mountains and in the stone and iron and glass building that will touch the day and night skies across her world. It will be in the joy and sadness that will gather in the corners of her eyes, all that salty treasure leaking from all the life she will bury inside herself, from the glowing inside her. An epitaph with no end, leaking out of the gravedigger girl, precious drop after precious drop after precious drop”
“And she realises if there is treasure to be found anywhere under the shimmering skies, if there is true value beneath the high plan of heaven, then it will be the lips of lovers that will one day fire he soul and the fear that will always make her fight and friends who will take her fears away and children she will call her own and the wonders she will see on the trees and leaves and mountains and in the stone and iron and glass building that will touch the day and night skies across her world. It will be in the joy and sadness that will gather in the corners of her eyes, all that salty treasure leaking from all the life she will bury inside herself, from the glowing inside her. An epitaph with no end, leaking out of the gravedigger girl, precious drop after precious drop after precious drop”
Loved the writing in this book - wonderful descriptions of country, events in Darwin during the war. I liked the way the author showed the Japanese soldier as a man,not as an evil enemy. In some ways there was too much to absorb throughout and at times I felt a little confused. Molly, the main character was delightful. Her mother an enigma, her father and uncle weak, greedy alcoholics, Greta a lovely substitute mum
De beste vriend van Molly, het doodgraversmeisje, is Bert, haar schop.
Dat vindt ze zelf ook een beetje zielig. Maar wat veel erger is: ze werd getroffen door de vloek van Longcoat Bob, zodat ze niet meer kan huilen en haar hart langzaam versteent.
Wie de wenkbrauwen fronst bij bovenstaande premisse hoeft niet verder te lezen. Tenminste, niet het boek. Wel deze recensie.
Want er is meer. Veel meer.
Er is de daghemel die nooit liegt en waaruit Japanse gevechtspiloten en baby's vallen. Er is een moorddadige alcoholistische nonkel, een aboriginal die van westerns houdt en een starende krokodil. Er zijn goudmijnen, leprakolonies en grotten met lsd-trippende medicijnmannen.
Er zijn zinnen als "Molly vindt het linkerbeen van haar vader in de achtertuin".
Bliksemschichten wijzen de weg.
En jij - de onverschrokken lezer - volgt Molly's miraculeuze pad en sluit haar langzaam in je hart.
Dat vindt ze zelf ook een beetje zielig. Maar wat veel erger is: ze werd getroffen door de vloek van Longcoat Bob, zodat ze niet meer kan huilen en haar hart langzaam versteent.
Wie de wenkbrauwen fronst bij bovenstaande premisse hoeft niet verder te lezen. Tenminste, niet het boek. Wel deze recensie.
Want er is meer. Veel meer.
Er is de daghemel die nooit liegt en waaruit Japanse gevechtspiloten en baby's vallen. Er is een moorddadige alcoholistische nonkel, een aboriginal die van westerns houdt en een starende krokodil. Er zijn goudmijnen, leprakolonies en grotten met lsd-trippende medicijnmannen.
Er zijn zinnen als "Molly vindt het linkerbeen van haar vader in de achtertuin".
Bliksemschichten wijzen de weg.
En jij - de onverschrokken lezer - volgt Molly's miraculeuze pad en sluit haar langzaam in je hart.
Dismiss anything you knew about Dalton, this a a unique surreal mystical story! The unlikely trio bond together in hardship on an impossible quest for answers to life's questions. The characters are full bodied and surprising. I found myself at a loss as to where the he sorry was going on several occasions because I expected a more normal storyline however the surprises overturned any pre concepts .
2½ stars.
I was mesmerized and loved the first 20-30% of the book. Unfortunately it went downhill from there and the last 15% felt more like compulsory reading.
I was mesmerized and loved the first 20-30% of the book. Unfortunately it went downhill from there and the last 15% felt more like compulsory reading.
3 1/2 stars. I wanted to give All Our Shimmering Skies 4 stars but brutal violence is not my thing. This book IS brutal, disturbing and confronting but it is also uplifting, beautiful and moving.
Molly Hook is a fierce girl and I liked her as much as I disliked her uncle, but it is Yukio who steals the show for me. He and Molly are both migato but there is something about Yukio's delight in the new (to him) natural world he lands in that lifts him to another level.
Molly Hook is a fierce girl and I liked her as much as I disliked her uncle, but it is Yukio who steals the show for me. He and Molly are both migato but there is something about Yukio's delight in the new (to him) natural world he lands in that lifts him to another level.
I really liked this book. It was difficult to follow in parts, but once I got the hang of it, and stopped expecting whatever it was I was expecting, I really settled in and enjoyed the writing.
The description of place and dreaming was fantastic. The First Nation People's dreaming and lifestyle woven so well into the conflict and ignorance of the white-man's was masterfully done.
A beautifully written coming of age book, combined with Dreaming's of Aboriginal Australia during the gold-rush times.
Trent Dalton, always an impressive read. :)
The description of place and dreaming was fantastic. The First Nation People's dreaming and lifestyle woven so well into the conflict and ignorance of the white-man's was masterfully done.
A beautifully written coming of age book, combined with Dreaming's of Aboriginal Australia during the gold-rush times.
Trent Dalton, always an impressive read. :)
In the great tradition of the quest novel, this is the story of Molly Hook who faces enormous challenges to search out truth and understanding. Beguiling characters, intricate plotting and magnificent evocation of tropical Australia make this a captivating and magical book.
Set in Darwin in 1942, All Our Shimmering Skies is about Molly Hook, a motherless girl, daughter of a gravedigger, looking to the skies for hope. When Japanese bombs begin to fall, she sets off on a quest in the wilderness. With the most gorgeous sense of place, endearing and deeply frightening characters, it is lyrical, magical, moving, and hopeful.
Almost all reviews compare this second novel of Trent Dalton to the outstanding, charismatic, energetic and huge novel of Boy Swallows Universe. First novel - totally extraordinary story, characters, and writing, all held together by a thread, but what genius it delivers. Second novel - always a hard act to follow. How many authors do we have to wait years, decades even before they fearfully give us a second novel? Not Trent Dalton!!! Less than two years later this second glorious piece of writing from an ex journalist who will no doubt never write for a newspaper again.
Boy is probably going to be my favourite read of 2020. So I have to say before going further that, for me, and after looking at a number of other reviews, this did not take my breath away in the same way, did not seem to have the same tightness of narration and dedicated sense of purpose, and possibly had too much going on it. But, the same sense of joy, hopefulness, adoration of young Molly as we felt for Eli, and the wonder of life and adults, both good and bad, seen through a child's eyes, their determination in the face of so many obstacles is just amazing. Exactly the sort of thing we need to be reading, enjoying and learning from in the world we are currently living in. If I had read this first, I would be 5*-ing it, but I didn't. What I do want to do though, is reread Boy just to get that magic.
Molly Hook is a girl version of Eli with just as much trauma, grief and complications to deal with as Eli did. She is 12, lives with her father and uncle - both serious wastes of space, reminding me of Eli's comment in Boy that most of the problems families have, and perpetuating them onto the next generation, is due to useless fathers. Molly's family is 100% this. She is known as the gravedigger girl, because she lives at the cemetery where, with her appalling father and uncle she digs graves. Her mother died of an illness when Molly was 6 or 7, and with no one to grieve with or parent her, she has developed her own internal coping mechanisms that can only come out of a child's brain and imagination. Life is tough for Molly. She has grown up believing her family has been cursed by an Aboriginal gold prospector, Longcoat Bob, following her grandfather supposedly stealing a lot of gold from him. Her mission in life is to find a way to lift this curse, so that her family, and herself can be happy again. Her mother always told her to keep looking up, looking to the sky, all the good things come from the sky, and so that is what Molly does - the sky is her inspiration and her saviour.
Then WWII intervenes. Set in Darwin, I had no idea that this town as it was in 1942, was badly bombed by the Japanese, its strategic location seen as essential for the Japanese to disable. Along with dozens of others, Molly and her uncle's girlfriend Greta - also with her own tragic life story - flee Darwin into the Northern Territory bush, with nowhere to go but find Longcoat Bob. Along the way they pick up Yukio, a young Japanese pilot who deserted the cause of bombing Darwin to bits, deciding to take his chances by crash-landing his plane in the middle of nowhere.
Naturally various adventures ensue, numerous near misses occur, there is magic and illusion, dreams, probably hallucinations due to dehydration and hunger, and as we go along a few other things. Things do fall from the sky, incongruous and odd, but nevertheless tell Molly that she is succeeding, and so she keeps going, even though it seems all the odds are stacking up against her, Greta and Yukio. By crikey that girl has some grit.
It is magnificent, wonderful, expansive, frightening and amazing, even if it is slightly in the shadow of number 1, do not let that stop you from taking this on.
Boy is probably going to be my favourite read of 2020. So I have to say before going further that, for me, and after looking at a number of other reviews, this did not take my breath away in the same way, did not seem to have the same tightness of narration and dedicated sense of purpose, and possibly had too much going on it. But, the same sense of joy, hopefulness, adoration of young Molly as we felt for Eli, and the wonder of life and adults, both good and bad, seen through a child's eyes, their determination in the face of so many obstacles is just amazing. Exactly the sort of thing we need to be reading, enjoying and learning from in the world we are currently living in. If I had read this first, I would be 5*-ing it, but I didn't. What I do want to do though, is reread Boy just to get that magic.
Molly Hook is a girl version of Eli with just as much trauma, grief and complications to deal with as Eli did. She is 12, lives with her father and uncle - both serious wastes of space, reminding me of Eli's comment in Boy that most of the problems families have, and perpetuating them onto the next generation, is due to useless fathers. Molly's family is 100% this. She is known as the gravedigger girl, because she lives at the cemetery where, with her appalling father and uncle she digs graves. Her mother died of an illness when Molly was 6 or 7, and with no one to grieve with or parent her, she has developed her own internal coping mechanisms that can only come out of a child's brain and imagination. Life is tough for Molly. She has grown up believing her family has been cursed by an Aboriginal gold prospector, Longcoat Bob, following her grandfather supposedly stealing a lot of gold from him. Her mission in life is to find a way to lift this curse, so that her family, and herself can be happy again. Her mother always told her to keep looking up, looking to the sky, all the good things come from the sky, and so that is what Molly does - the sky is her inspiration and her saviour.
Then WWII intervenes. Set in Darwin, I had no idea that this town as it was in 1942, was badly bombed by the Japanese, its strategic location seen as essential for the Japanese to disable. Along with dozens of others, Molly and her uncle's girlfriend Greta - also with her own tragic life story - flee Darwin into the Northern Territory bush, with nowhere to go but find Longcoat Bob. Along the way they pick up Yukio, a young Japanese pilot who deserted the cause of bombing Darwin to bits, deciding to take his chances by crash-landing his plane in the middle of nowhere.
Naturally various adventures ensue, numerous near misses occur, there is magic and illusion, dreams, probably hallucinations due to dehydration and hunger, and as we go along a few other things. Things do fall from the sky, incongruous and odd, but nevertheless tell Molly that she is succeeding, and so she keeps going, even though it seems all the odds are stacking up against her, Greta and Yukio. By crikey that girl has some grit.
It is magnificent, wonderful, expansive, frightening and amazing, even if it is slightly in the shadow of number 1, do not let that stop you from taking this on.