CW: Suicide, domestic violence, alcoholism ( )

Jake och Beth lever med sina fem barn i en sjabbig förort till Auckland på Nya Zeeland. Trots att den arbetslöse och frustrerade Jake vid flera tillfällen misshandlar Beth försöker hustrun att mot alla odds hålla samman familjen. Då tonårsdottern Grace begår självmord, efter att ha blivit våldtagen av en vän till maken, beslutar sig Beth för att ta barnen med sig och återvända till sina rötter hos maorierna, landets ursprungsbefolkning.

Wow.

I thought I was prepared for this, having seen the movie (and been blown away by it) a few times now.

I was wrong.

This book hits as hard as Jake "The Muss" Heke. The punches keep on coming and never let up, but it's a book impossible to put down, getting drawn in right from page 1.
As expected, there's a lot more in the book than the movie, and getting to really know the characters through each individual's stream-of-conciousness narration sheds all kinds of lights on the story that it was unable to do visually. What did surprise me, is how several of the characters are actually displayed in a far more sympathetic light in the movie than they are the book. If you've seen the movie, and how unsympathetic they tend to be, you'll understand the surprise!

An absolute must read. ( )

C'est très dense et dans un style narratif qui nous enferme comme les personnages sont enfermés dans leur condition. Heureusement la fin est une ouverture qui permet à nouveau de respirer. Malgré tout, je n'ai pas retrouvé le même plaisir que j'avais au à lire "un père pour mes rêves" ( )

This review is unquestionably one of the hardest I’ve ever had to write. Maori author Alan Duff’s Once Were Warriors (1990) won the PEN Best First Book Award, was runner-up in the Goodman Fielder Wattie Award, (the 1968-1993 forerunner to the Ockhams), and was made into an award-winning film in 1994. But it is an uncompromisingly negative portrayal of dysfunctional Maori life, a book which comes in for both high praise and also trenchant criticism from some readers at Goodreads. And since I’m not Maori, and have not yet been to New Zealand and the book depicts a situation now nearly thirty years ago, I feel hesitant about the risk of stereotyping and blaming and of perpetuating assumptions about gender and race.
The early chapters are really shocking. Once Were Warriors pulls no punches about the self-inflicted misery and self-pity of the Maori people on Pine Block, a run-down, squalid government housing estate full of unemployed and unemployable no-hopers.
(You see what I mean? I don’t like describing another culture in this way, but that’s the way the book is written).
Duff uses different voices in the Heke family to paint the picture. Beth, a drinker herself, accepts horrific beatings from her drunken tough-guy husband because ‘she loves him’.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/07/13/once-were-warriors-by-alan-duff-bookreview/ ( )