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likecymbeline 's review for:
The Bone People
by Keri Hulme
The confusing language and structure at the beginning of the book could easily put someone off reading it and I wouldn't blame them. I don't need things spelled out for me, but at the same time I've never been a fan of deliberate obfuscations that too-clever writers put out for their long-suffering readers (I'm looking at you as well, Eco, with that untranslatable Hebrew epigraph to [book:Foucault's Pendulum|17841]). In some regards I see what they're doing, preparing you for a read that uses language unconventionally, but I think there's more talent in clarity. I never fell in love with the writing style anyways, but keep in mind that my definition of beautiful use of language is the Neoromantic, the gilded and jewelled styles of late 19th-century Decadence, and that I have less of an interest in the post-modern.
She created scenes and settings strongly, there are a lot of images that stand out in my mind from this book. I liked that she refused to set out rigid delineations of good or bad, right or wrong, Pākehā or Māori. Obviously this is a tough book that deals with really tough themes, not glorying in the pain and hurt it portrays but not letting us look away from it either. Is the abuse is monstrous? Yes. Is the abuse is human? Yes. Oh, yes.
She created scenes and settings strongly, there are a lot of images that stand out in my mind from this book. I liked that she refused to set out rigid delineations of good or bad, right or wrong, Pākehā or Māori. Obviously this is a tough book that deals with really tough themes, not glorying in the pain and hurt it portrays but not letting us look away from it either. Is the abuse is monstrous? Yes. Is the abuse is human? Yes. Oh, yes.