"Taboo" by Kim Scott

Started reading: 27/01/2019

Finished: 11/02/2019

My score: 8/10

Two of the books that I read that had the most impact on me in the last year or so were "Dark Emu, Black Seeds" a non-fiction book by Bruce Pascoe about the evidence and history of the oldest human agriculture on earth by Australia's First People, and the novel "Terra Nullius" by Claire G Coleman. Both are by Indigenous Australian authors, and both blew my mind in different ways, and started to help make me aware of how ignorant and unaware I was/am about so many aspects of the amazing culture and people who have been on this land for so many thousands of years and how horrific colonisation was and is in their experience, and how little we understand and appreciate it. So this year I am deliberatly seeking out more books by Indigenous Australian authors to help continue learning more from them. I have quite a few lined up to read, but if you have read any that you think I should add to my list, please let me know! :-)

Kim Scott is from Western Australia and is of the Noongar people. "Taboo" was a Miles Franklin award finalist in 2018, and has also won a number of other awards e.g. NSW Premier's Literary Awards 2018 and the Queensland Literary Awards 2018. He has written previous books which have also won major awards, such as ""That Deadman Dance" which won the Miles Franklin award in 2011. "Taboo" is the first book by Kim Scott that I have read, and "That Deadman Dance" is also in my "to read soon" pile.

"Taboo" is written in 3 parts. I must admit I struggled to put much of Part I into context until I started reading Part II, as Part I and Part III are the present time, and Part II gives you some of the past/background that leads up to the events that occur in Part I and III.  

The story is set in the present day from what I can tell, and the setting is people from "that Wirlomin mob" coming back to their land in WA which has been taboo for many years after brutal massacres of their people by the colonisers. They are returning for the opening of a "Peace Park", a Reconciliation memorial. Many of the group have been in prison and/or are dealing with addictions and other issues as part of the flow on effects of colonisation. There is also such compassion and resilience and passion too, and the characters really do come to life out of the page. The book deals with issues of being disconnected from their people and country, loss of language and knowledge that stretched back thousands of years. The book also makes you recognise the sometimes unconscious and sometimes deliberate biases with which we look at the world and judge people, and how one-sided history books can be. Despite these serious issues, and some very dark unpleasant sexual exploitation parts to the book, the story is written in the most beautiful way, almost like poetry or painting with words that bring scenes and people to life, and also there is humour and wit at times. 

  

Some of the Aboriginal characters in the book speak in their local language, and are trying to teach other characters the words so that their language and culture and stories live on. But the words are not written, which although it disappointed me a little at first as I am really interested to learn the local Indigenous words for places and animals, I think it was a deliberate choice by the author to not include the words in the local language and actually made me think about how many Australian languages have been lost or are only spoken by a few remaining people who survived the colonisation period and were able to stay connected to their people and country. So much culture and language lost, before you even contemplate the human life cost of the brutal massacres. It also made me reflect on how Indigenous Australian languages were spoken languages, not traditionally written down as texts, at least from the little I know (which is very little) and so perhaps there isn't one set way to write each word.   

Anyway, this was a complex book for me, very thought-provoking - while I was reading it, and also now after I have finished the book I am still reflecting on it and digesting it in my mind. It has some dark disturbing aspects, but it also has some positive light throughout it, and some humour and is beautifully written. I think it will stay with me for some time, which is a sign of a really good book.

If you would like to hear the author, Kim Scott, reading from the first few pages of this book, you can listen to this episode of ABC National's AWAYE program. Kim brings his writing to life, it sounds like poetry it is so evocative in places.

If you want a more detailed review with more of the story line then you may be interested in this review from the Sydney Morning Herald. 

Aussie author challenge stats: new to me author, male author, Australian Indigenous Author.