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wytherwytch's review
dark
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
I think there is a lot more to this novel than meets the eye, and it surprises me that to date I havent read a single review that really reflects on this
I found this book very intriguing. I can't help but think that this book is some how autobiographical on the part of the author. One character in particular - Kerewin Holmes - doesn't seem terribly far removed from our author, Keri Hulme. I cannot help but wonder if Keri can relate to other two characters and their experiences as well and bearing in mind the subject matter, that really does give me pause for thought. Many decry this book for its subject matter of child abuse and violence... but I suspect that this is more autobiographical than many give credit.
Bearing in that in mind, this is a beautifully crafted story. It's main themes, I would say, are family and forgiveness. That might be out of place for some in today's world but in other ways Hulme was well ahead of her time with her asexual main character for one
I know many can't handle the veer from reality to the mystical at the end but it seems to me that Hulme was also touching on something personal here. Something about forgiveness. And if so the ending might not be everyone... but also makes total sense
Personally I didn't always appreciate the poetic writing but I understand this is Hulme's voice. And as such, I respect it.
The more I reflect, the more I think this book was well deserving of the Booker
I found this book very intriguing. I can't help but think that this book is some how autobiographical on the part of the author. One character in particular - Kerewin Holmes - doesn't seem terribly far removed from our author, Keri Hulme. I cannot help but wonder if Keri can relate to other two characters and their experiences as well and bearing in mind the subject matter, that really does give me pause for thought. Many decry this book for its subject matter of child abuse and violence... but I suspect that this is more autobiographical than many give credit.
Bearing in that in mind, this is a beautifully crafted story. It's main themes, I would say, are family and forgiveness. That might be out of place for some in today's world but in other ways Hulme was well ahead of her time with her asexual main character for one
I know many can't handle the veer from reality to the mystical at the end but it seems to me that Hulme was also touching on something personal here. Something about forgiveness. And if so the ending might not be everyone... but also makes total sense
Personally I didn't always appreciate the poetic writing but I understand this is Hulme's voice. And as such, I respect it.
The more I reflect, the more I think this book was well deserving of the Booker
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Abandonment, Violence, and Child abuse
Moderate: Grief, Medical content, Suicide attempt, and Cancer
Minor: Pedophilia, Animal death, and Vomit
memezaharamole's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Amazing - challenging is probably an apt description of the book, not due to the pace, but due to themes. I had been told it was dark, so had put off reading it in a poor headspace and picked it up while feeling a little better. Was still a tough read, but found it healing, looking at the depths of humanity, the quirks that come from trauma. And how relationships are so difficult but at the core of what makes us human.
As a New Zealander living overseas, the use of Te Reo Maori and references to the homeland really helped ground me in this book. One of the best I have ever read.
As a New Zealander living overseas, the use of Te Reo Maori and references to the homeland really helped ground me in this book. One of the best I have ever read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Child abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Physical abuse, and Domestic abuse
Moderate: Cancer, Medical content, Addiction, and Pedophilia
anacereading's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Drug use, Suicide attempt, Violence, Child abuse, and Alcoholism
Moderate: Blood, Abandonment, Ableism, Vomit, Animal death, Bullying, Acephobia/Arophobia, and Medical content
Minor: Death of parent, Excrement, Confinement, Car accident, Fatphobia, Panic attacks/disorders, and Racial slurs
kellysoluri's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Child abuse, and Suicide attempt
writingcaia's review against another edition
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
This is the spiritual, brutal and poetic journey of three deeply traumatised humans.
Kere, a half Māori woman broken from her family, removed too from her art and her will to live, hides herself in her tower until one day having sneaked inside her abode she meets the mute and wild Simon, the long blond haired and sea foam eyed young kid the flotsam brought after a shipwreck, the only survivor of it, unable to speak for reasons unknown he can’t explain anything about who he was but there’re the strange markings on his body and something took his voice from him and made him fearful and wild. Unable to communicate his traumatised child thoughts and feelings and the reason he steals, breaks and enters peoples’ houses and acts so strangely he drives is “adoptive” father and rescuer, the Māori pakeha-life Joe completely crazy, especially since after he lost his wife and baby son. Unable to deal with Simon’s trauma and its consequences and his own loss and suffering violence seems Joe’s only option to deal with the havoc of it all. But, love is still very deep in them and it will bind these three characters unexpectedly, or maybe Simon wished it so.
There’s so much more to say about this book, this story, it moved me, it changed the way I see trauma and the violence of it on the mind and that is inflicted.
This is not an easy read, the writing is very introspective, very poetic, changes in narrative format all the time, plays with words, but you get to see the inner works of their traumas, and also their hopes, their love, another thing that makes it harder to follow is that the POV changes without warning, and there’s also a lot of Māori expressions (which I only found out in the end were most of them translated at the end of the book, still…), and, then, there’s the brutality, the unfiltered violence.
I fell in love with this tale very quickly although it took me longer than usual to get through it. I won’t recommend it to squeamish, easily disturbed people, everyone else yes, it’s such an ode to the Māori survival among the pakeha, the borderline between being one and the other, loving the roots and respecting them, while adapting to the pakeha world, it is also an ode to different people, mixed and broken, to love of all types even aromantic and asexual, which I found amazing in a book released in 1984. This was a novel debut by a Māori poet, immediately booker prize winner and a classic in the making. I definitely wish I can reread it soon. So, yeah, go read it.
Kere, a half Māori woman broken from her family, removed too from her art and her will to live, hides herself in her tower until one day having sneaked inside her abode she meets the mute and wild Simon, the long blond haired and sea foam eyed young kid the flotsam brought after a shipwreck, the only survivor of it, unable to speak for reasons unknown he can’t explain anything about who he was but there’re the strange markings on his body and something took his voice from him and made him fearful and wild. Unable to communicate his traumatised child thoughts and feelings and the reason he steals, breaks and enters peoples’ houses and acts so strangely he drives is “adoptive” father and rescuer, the Māori pakeha-life Joe completely crazy, especially since after he lost his wife and baby son. Unable to deal with Simon’s trauma and its consequences and his own loss and suffering violence seems Joe’s only option to deal with the havoc of it all. But, love is still very deep in them and it will bind these three characters unexpectedly, or maybe Simon wished it so.
There’s so much more to say about this book, this story, it moved me, it changed the way I see trauma and the violence of it on the mind and that is inflicted.
This is not an easy read, the writing is very introspective, very poetic, changes in narrative format all the time, plays with words, but you get to see the inner works of their traumas, and also their hopes, their love, another thing that makes it harder to follow is that the POV changes without warning, and there’s also a lot of Māori expressions (which I only found out in the end were most of them translated at the end of the book, still…), and, then, there’s the brutality, the unfiltered violence.
I fell in love with this tale very quickly although it took me longer than usual to get through it. I won’t recommend it to squeamish, easily disturbed people, everyone else yes, it’s such an ode to the Māori survival among the pakeha, the borderline between being one and the other, loving the roots and respecting them, while adapting to the pakeha world, it is also an ode to different people, mixed and broken, to love of all types even aromantic and asexual, which I found amazing in a book released in 1984. This was a novel debut by a Māori poet, immediately booker prize winner and a classic in the making. I definitely wish I can reread it soon. So, yeah, go read it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Toxic relationship, Violence, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Alcoholism, Blood, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, and Self harm
Moderate: Acephobia/Arophobia, Colonisation, and Sexism
Minor: Drug abuse, Animal death, Cancer, and Child death
serenedancer's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
This is definitely an odd book. I picked it up because my library had it wrapped up with the three tags aro-ace character, set in the 60s, in New Zealand. That's definitely true.
I don't really know how to describe it other than a woman meets a man and his son and they go through life.
One of the main character is aro-ace, which is interesting and well done representation. There is some aro-ace phobia, but it's portrayed as wrong.
There is child abuse in the story and it's not skippable since it's integral to the story. The character doing it is portrayed as wrong, but they are still an important character and if it's any kind of a trigger I'd recommend skipping the book.
Overall, I'd recommend it if you're looking for a story set in New Zealand and with a family component.
I don't really know how to describe it other than a woman meets a man and his son and they go through life.
One of the main character is aro-ace, which is interesting and well done representation. There is some aro-ace phobia, but it's portrayed as wrong.
There is child abuse in the story and it's not skippable since it's integral to the story. The character doing it is portrayed as wrong, but they are still an important character and if it's any kind of a trigger I'd recommend skipping the book.
Overall, I'd recommend it if you're looking for a story set in New Zealand and with a family component.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Terminal illness, Physical abuse, and Ableism
tauboi's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Violence, Emotional abuse, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Cancer, Chronic illness, Ableism, Vomit, Suicide attempt, and Suicidal thoughts
yavin_iv's review against another edition
challenging
dark
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Child abuse, Violence, Suicide attempt, Physical abuse, Medical trauma, and Cancer
Moderate: Ableism, Homophobia, Racism, Forced institutionalization, Drug use, Drug abuse, Death of parent, and Child death
Minor: Pedophilia, Acephobia/Arophobia, and Cannibalism
ceallaighsbooks's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
“If I was an honest uncompromising soul, if I wasn’t riddled by this disease called hope, I’d climb into the middle of my pyre and light a phoenixfire from there… On the other hand, my cardinal virtue is hope. Forlorn hope, hope in extremity. Not Christian hope, but an innate rebellion against the inevitable dooms of suffering, death, and despair. A senseless hope… If I hadn’t my hope, I might have lasted ten seconds there… the air is all gone from round it… splendid dragon… the glory of the salamander…”
TITLE—The Bone People
AUTHOR—Keri Hulme
PUBLISHED—1984
GENRE—literary fiction
SETTING—Aotearoa
MAIN THEMES/SUBJECTS—spiritually, relationships, identity, abuse, love, modern Maori culture, identity, & society, aro/ace, justice, redemption
WRITING STYLE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
CHARACTERS—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️—Kerewin is one of my alltime favorite characters. I resonated with her SO much.
PLOT—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️—<SPOILER>I almost didn’t believe that this story could possibly have a happy ending but 😭. This book is quite literally perfect.</SPOILER>
BONUS ELEMENT/S—the New Zealand setting is its own force and character in this novel’s story and it’s just phenomenally executed; also all the philosophical and spiritual discussions in this book are just so profound and insightful. ❤️
PHILOSOPHY—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
“To unearth anything, we begin by digging.”
I really loved this book but it was also very hard to read. I had this book on my tbr for three years, ever since my first trip to NZ in 2017, and on my shelf for a year, when I first started reading it last year, and even still, I struggled a lot with some of the content in the story—even had nightmares—and ended up needing to step away from the book after finishing part 3 and took another yearlong break before picking it up again this summer to finish reading. 😰
But in spite of all of that, I still loved this book SO much—I would even call it an alltime favorite because the suffering in the book really feels like something that is real and I don’t regret finding it in me to sit with it in order to experience everything the book and its author had to offer.
I think the only way to talk about this book is to acknowledge that every reader’s reading of and reaction to the themes and subject matter, their perception and opinion of the events, characters, and the characters’ actions, is going to be *very* personal and very visceral. The themes that stood out to my particular personal perspective were the themes of judgment, mental illness, community/family, personal identity, love, nature, natural & spiritual heritage, and justice/redemption.
Hulme’s writing style is incredibly beautiful, somehow elegant and irreverent, sacred and lighthearted all at once. She manages to represent just how fucking complicated people are / life is—how it’s exhausting and painful to the point of a kind of unhinged hilarity—in a way that you can’t help but relate to and respect. My list of favorite quotes from this book reads like a list of mantras and proverbs. I suppose it’s appropriate on some level that a book so beautiful, important, and impactful is also so difficult and painful to read—a true parallel to the actual experience of living in this world.
“I can’t see that,” nodding back towards the hidden well, “ever waking now. The whole order of the world would have to change, all of humanity, and I can’t see that happening, e pou, not ever.”
“Eternity is a long time,” says the kaumatua comfortably. “Everything changes, even that which supposes itself to be unalterable. All we can do is look after the precious matters which are our heritage, and wait, and hope.”
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
“It’s past, but we live with it forever.”
[Alice Walker blurbed the copy I have and said: “This book is just amazingly, wondrously great.” And I 100% agree.]
TW // This is SO important. Like I said, I put off reading this book for a few years after I discovered it because of the content warnings I’d read about it, and even so I still had to step away from it for another year! after finishing part 3 because of how hard it was to read. I was literally having nightmares because of it. 😞 If you’re at an emotionally unstable place in your life right now I strongly recommend thinking carefully about reading this book and maybe putting it off until you feel more prepared to handle the content. Because whew. This is the roughest book I’ve ever read. Ok the TWs are: extremely graphic and violent depictions of child abuse, child autism, alcoholism, trauma, poverty, isolationism, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt, cancer
Further Reading—
- White Magic, by Elissa Washuta
- The Night Between the Days, by Ailo Gaup
- Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Freshwater, by Akwaeke Emezi
- The Whale Rider, by Witi Ihimaera—TBR
- Ace, by Angela Chen—TBR
Favorite Quotes...
“In the beginning, it was darkness, and more fear, and a howling wind across the sea.”
“She had debated, in the frivolity of the beginning, whether to build a hole or a tower; a hole, because she was fond of hobbits, or a tower—well, a tower for many reasons, but chiefly because she liked spiral stairways.”
“No need of people, because she was self-fulfilling, delighted with the pre-eminence of her art, and the future or her knowing hands.”
“This ship that sets its sails forever
rigid on my coin
is named Endeavour.
She buys a drink to bar the dreams
of the long nights lying.
The world is never what it seems
and the sun is dying…”
“Goodbye soulwringing night. Good morning sinshine, and a fat happy day.”
“I am in limbo, and in limbo there are no races, no prizes, no changes, no chances. There are merely degrees of endurance, and endurance never was my strong point.”
“It’s becoming too precious. Too important. To care for anything deeply is to invite disaster.”
“Frae ghosties an ghoulies
an longlegged beasties
an things that gae bump!
in the night,
guid God deliver us…”
“Between waking and being awake there is a moment full of doubt and dream, when you struggle to remember what the place and when the time and whether you really are. A peevish moment of wonderment as to where the real world lies.”
“To unearth anything, we begin by digging,” but she isn’t very keen on the idea.
“She is a slow and methodical eater, not from convictions regarding health but because she enjoys food of all kinds immensely.”
“I’m going to have wander round my garden. See how the weeds are doing.”
“It was reckoned that the old people found inspiration for the double spirals they carved so skilfully, in uncurling fernfronds: perhaps. But it was an old symbol of rebirth, and the outward-inward nature of things…”
“Spirals make more sense than crosses, joys more than sorrows…”
“…whereas by blood, flesh and inheritance, I am but an eighth Maori, by heart, spirit, and inclination, I feel all Maori.”
“Calm down, o soul. Be reasonable, a serene and rational being.”
“The horror was still at home in him.
It was almost always there.
The only defense he could raise against the dark and the horror and the laughing terrible voice were his golden singers, the sounds and patterns of words from the past that he had fitted to his own web of music. They often broke apart, but he could always make them new.”
“What sort of dreams does he have that are so terrible? Jetsam, she ponders. The old meaning was goods thrown overboard to lighten a ship… dreams of being left, bereaved, dreams of drowning while your people sink in the hungry waves?”
“O all the world is a little queer, except thee and me, and sometimes, I wonder about thee.”
“I know about me. I am the moon’s sister, a tidal child
stranded on land. The sea always in my ear, a surf of
eternal discontent in my blood.
You’re talking bullshit as usual.”
“She thought of the tools she had gathered together, and painstakingly learned to use. Futureprobes, Tarot and I Ching and the wide wispfingers from the stars… all these to scry and ferret and vex the smokethick future.”
“A broad general knowledge, encompassing bits of history, psychology, ethology, religious theory and practices of many kinds. Her charts of self-knowledge. Her library. The inner thirst for information about everything that had lived or lives on Earth that she’d kept alive long after childhood had ended. None of them helped make sense of living.”
“I am worn, down to the raw nub of my soul.
Now is the time, o bitter beer, soothe my spirit;
smooth mouth of whisky, tell me lies of truth;
but better still, sweet wine, be harbinger of deep and dreamless sleep…”
“For what does five years of accumulating snippets of wisdom add up to? Knowledge that I’m a changeable sort of person…”
“Because all these were other people’s ideas… nothing wrong with them, but they didn’t really fit me.”
“She knew too much. The smarter you are, the more you know, the less reason you have to trust or love or confide.”
“The childhood years are the best years of your life…” Whoever coined that was an unmitigated fuckwit, a bullshit artist supreme. Life gets better the older you grow, until you grow too old of course.”
“Winning means winning over the mind of discord in yourself.”
“Love is the guardian deity of everything. Nothing can exist without it.”
“Heaven and hell, you never knew what people had in their past.”
“You just get someone neatly arranged in a slot that appears to fit them, and they wriggle on their pins and spoil it all.”
“The waves march in. Three herring gulls lift with each breaker, settle back on the sand again as the sea streams out. An old blackback carks and skrees, fossicking along the tideline. The shags sit by their hollow mud nests on Maukiekie. Nothing else is moving. Sometimes, the waves grow hushed, but the sea is always there, touching, caressing, eating the earth…”
“The clouds are long and black and ragged, like the wings of stormbattered dragons.”
“Betelgeuse, Achenar. Orion. Aquila. Centre the Cross
and you have a steady compass.
But there’s no compass for my disoriented soul, only
ever-beckoning ghostlights.
In the one sure direction, to the one sure end.”
“Maybe there are such things as second chances, even if dreams go unanswered…”
“I salute the breath of life in thee, the same life that is breathed by me, warm flesh to warm flesh, oily press of nose to nose, the hardness of foreheads meeting. I salute that which gives us life.”
“Normally, she dislikes killing mice. There is something about their beady-eyed furtivity, their wholesale preying on humans, that appeals to her outlaw instincts.”
“If only was the tapu phrase.
If only I had
If only I hadn’t”
“If I was an honest uncompromising soul, if I wasn’t riddled by this disease called hope, I’d climb into the middle of my pyre and light a phoenixfire from there… On the other hand, my cardinal virtue is hope. Forlorn hope, hope in extremity. Not Christian hope, but an innate rebellion against the inevitable dooms of suffering, death, and despair. A senseless hope… If I hadn’t my hope, I might have lasted ten seconds there… the air is all gone from round it… splendid dragon… the glory of the salamander…”
“Aue, the roots of the tree are long and descend into darkness. The show is wavebeaten, and there is nothing beyond but the unceasing immeasurable sea.”
“You want to know about anybody? See what books they read, and how they’ve been read…”
“O man, he thinks, you are still very young, and while your life has broken you, you can still heal yourself.”
“Remember, it was a time of flux and chaos when she sought her knowledge. No-one can be blamed for giving her information that she maybe should never have known. And she can be praised for having that staunch courage and intelligence to preserve something she believed, as I believe, to be of unusual value. Incalculable value. How do you weigh the value of this country’s soul?”
“I can’t see that,” nodding back towards the hidden well, “ever waking now. The whole order of the world would have to change, all of humanity, and I can’t see that happening, e pou, not ever.”
“Eternity is a long time,” says the kaumatua comfortably. “Everything changes, even that which supposes itself to be unalterable. All we can do is look after the precious matters which are our heritage, and wait, and hope.”
“She was very upset when she learned how you were hurt, but more upset that they’ve separated you. She kept saying, “But Joe loves his boy, this was just an accident.” It don’t look that way to other people though. Not to the police or the doctors… but they only get to hear the bad parts. I’ve been hearing all about the good parts. There were a lot of good parts, right?”
“One must name cats, people, whoever whatever comes close, even though they carry their real names hidden inside them.”
“It’s past, but we live with it forever.”
“TE MUTUNG—RANEI TE TAKE” (The end—or the beginning.)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Blood, Cancer, Child abuse, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide attempt
lilcoppertop's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Forced institutionalization, Grief, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Drug abuse, Drug use, and Suicide attempt
Minor: Cannibalism, Car accident, Child death, Death of parent, Homophobia, Pedophilia, and Suicidal thoughts