Dark Jelly

by Alice Tawhai

In 'Dark Jelly', this third collection of third stories, Alice Tawhai delves into the nature of reality, enabling readers to experience altered perceptions, encounters that weave madness and sanity, dreams and drug-induced hallucinations, darkness and light.

Genres: Short Stories

239 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

Reviews

[Sheri · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bleh, I just found this very distasteful. I knew it was going to be exploring darkness, but I was hoping for more moody and spooky, maybe a bit dark supernatural. Not abuse, rape, murder, drugs etc. I almost DNFed several times, but trying to use it for reading challenge prompts and had trouble finding something I could get affordably/from the library. It was very depressing and disturbing, and I found myself just trying to push through so I could say I was done.

[Annie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an excellent collection of short stories. The stories are often very dark, and they explore concepts like mental illness, physical abuse, and racism. Most of what I knew about this book going in was that Alice Tawhai is a New Zealand author, but I am so glad I picked up these stories. I can’t stress enough how beautifully written they are. The collection could be incredibly dark and depressing, but there are elements of hopefulness in some of the stories, and readers are often put into the point of view of characters who see the world in interesting and unique ways.

[Amanda Veazey · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me a long time to finish this book. I was warned going into it that the stories were dark. "Sounds right up my alley!" I thought. I didn't realize that in this context "dark" meant that the entire universe these stories take place in was bleak and essentially hopeless. I still liked some of the stories, and appreciated the look at very different lives on a different continent.

[Sarah Swedberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

These stories were really disturbing. That was the point, of course. The writing was good but after a while, I had to close my eyes while reading which kind of makes reading hard.

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very relevant, if somewhat repetitive, stories of everyday life in Aotearoa.

[mei · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eventually the stories start to get repetitive though I love her writing style.

[Lynne McLeod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phew this is dark. Nearly as dark as Stephen King's book Dark, No stars although Alice Tawhai is a far better writer.
These are stories of the 'underbelly' of the human condition, stories of incest, child abuse, rape and despair where women are objects and men are filled with rage and gang mentality. Of the three books of her short stories this is the darkest. The story called Black Jelly is a shocker, yet in between the story lines are the most beautiful descriptions of skies,of nature,of water often using ethereal colours and seemingly effortlessly done in a line or two.A book not for the fainthearted.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Darkest of her short stories so far, but like Grimshaw Tawhai ties them together with a common theme. Also like CG she is unrelenting in her examination of us, sometimes she pulls her sleeves up and is intrepid in her choice of subject - schizophrenia, OCD. I thank her.

[Andromeda M31 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Found on a loan shelf at a hostel in New Zealand. While I enjoyed the first several stories, I became frustrated with the same theme being repeated over and over, in roughly the same length of pages, with the same emotional rise and fall. Not a book to read straight through.