Home

by Larissa Behrendt

A story of homecoming, this absorbing novel opens with a young, city-based lawyer setting out on her first visit to ancestral country. Candice arrives at "the place where the rivers meet", the camp of the Eualeyai where in 1918 her grandmother Garibooli was abducted. As Garibooli takes up the story of Candice's Aboriginal family, the twentieth century falls away.

Garibooli, renamed Elizabeth, is sent to work as a housemaid, but marriage soon offers escape from the terror of the master's night-time visits. Her displacement carries into the lives of her seven children - their stories witness to the impact of orphanage life and the consequences of having a dark skin in post-war Australia. Vividly rekindled, the lives of her family point the direction home for Candice.

Home is a powerful and intelligent first novel from an author who understands both the capacity of language to suppress and the restorative potency of stories that bridge past and present.

Genres: Fiction, Australia, Indigenous, Historical Fiction, Audiobook, Book Club, College

317 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2004

About the author

Larissa is the author of three novels: Home, which won the 2002 David Unaipon Award and the regional Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book; Legacy, which won the 2010 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Indigenous Writing; and After Story. She has published numerous books on Indigenous legal issues; her most recent non-fiction book is Finding Eliza: Power and Colonial Storytelling. She was awarded the 2009 NAIDOC Person of the Year award and 2011 NSW Australian of the Year. Larissa wrote and directed the feature films, After the Apology and Innocence Betrayed and has written and produced several short films. In 2018 she won the Australian Directors’ Guild Award for Best Direction in a Documentary Feature and in 2020 the AACTA for Best Direction in Nonfiction Television. She is the host of Speaking Out on ABC radio and is Distinguished Professor at the Jumbunna Institute at the University of Technology Sydney.

Reviews

[Maddie · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Nothing matters more than family."

It wasn't until the third chapter that this book began to draw me in, but once it did I really enjoyed it. It provides an interesting and more personal perspective of what it was like to grow up Aboriginal during 20th century Australia. I enjoyed its strong character focus, as many of the characters had rich and detailed backgrounds, helping to explain their actions and experiences.

The downsides for me were that there were some inconsistencies in its readability. Most chapters were engaging and easy to read whereas other parts became quite heavy, long-winded and sometimes almost academic. Also, there were some minor confusions that had me flipping back the pages to see if I had read wrong, for example; 6 years difference between two siblings seemed to become 3 years later on, a mentioned third son that didn't exist, and a couple other things. Of course these were slight, but they did interrupt my flow of reading.

Overall though, I thought this book was very good. Personally I found the non-linear format to be well executed, and the multiple narratives compelling. Home was an enjoyable way to start to my reading list for 2018.

[Calzean · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is a fictional story based on events that happened in the life of the author's grandmother.
There is a lot of storylines stemming from what occurs when the young Aboriginal Garibooli is kidnapped by the police and sent to be a housemaid in Parkes where her life will be "better". Garibooli is renamed Elizabeth, isolated, friendless and repeatedly raped by her boss/owner, becomes pregnant and the baby is forcefully removed.
She escapes by marrying a German drifter, dreamer and Communist. They have six children. Garibooli dies at a young age and three of her children are forced into a home.
The book then traces the various paths of her children and strangely some of the side characters.
When the book is good it is very good. The granddaughter Candice (the author in disguise?) and her experiences of being a light skinned Aboriginal. The short digression on how the English treated the Irish and the parallels to what was done to the Aborigines. The lack of rights, isolation, alienation and segregation that occurred. How people's impressions changed when they learnt the apparent Spanish/Greek/Italian person was actually Aboriginal.
But there was an unevenness in the story telling. Side-tracks into minor characters, academic references and historical events. An abrupt conclusion.
Overall though it is a book that covers a lot of Australia's society, culture and people especially in the period post WWII to the 1990s. It shows the good and the bad in people, the ignorance of many, the inaccuracies of school history teachings and the pure vindictiveness of people against those who are "different".

[Chrissie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an epic family story which spans nearly a Century, and starts with an Aboriginal family whose daughter is forcibly taken from them and given to a white family. Common at the time apparently. I got lost in the story, the visible characters, and the burgeoning families, but the horror of the treatment of Aboriginal people will stay with me, and I will be reading more non-fiction around this subject.

[Mila Kordic · Rating 3 out of 5]

i’m sort of torn because this book was very up and down. the start was a drag and it wasn’t until we got to garibooli’s story that i actually became interested. it was very inconsistent, one chapter would be amazing and so profound and the other would be boring and i felt like a lot of the time the author was spoon feeding me everything. the characters were interesting (to say the least). i liked how garibooli’s children weren’t perfect and their struggles were reflected in their personalities but i feel like there’s a fine line between dealing with trauma and being pure evil 😭 anyways, this book was interesting and insightful at times but also irritating and superficial. all i know for sure is that i wish nothing but the worst for daisy and hope she rots in hell.

[Deb Chapman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book touched me deeply, easy to read and well written, including some glorious descriptions, and also worked at another level for me which is why I rated it a 5. It so cleverly illustrates how stolen generations happened and subtly teased out the profound effects at the time and how magnified over the generations. I think it’s a very special book. A friend lent it to me a number of yrs ago and each time I’d picked it up, I’d put it down again. Obv I wasn’t ready for it then. So glad I waited and was so engrossed and invested in the characters. Highly recommend for waitfellas to more deeply understand and interrogate colonisation in Australia. That Larissa Berhendt is a real polymath

[Lizzie Haynes · Rating 2 out of 5]

well I finished it which is a good sign. I didn't mind the first half of the book but after Elizabeth I just got so bored, even while reading her story I felt that her ending was so forced and the multiple changes in point of view was a bit confusing at times.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Home (2004) is the debut novel of Larissa Behrendt of the Eualeyai/Kamilaroi people. A lawyer and an Aboriginal activist, Behrendt went on to write the novel Legacy (2009, see my review) and also Finding Eliza, Power and Colonial Storytelling (2016, see my review). Home won the David Unaipon Award as an unpublished manuscript in 2002 and the Commonwealth Writers Prize, South East Asia and South Pacific Region, Best First Book, 2005. It tells an important story… but I think it needed tighter editing at UQP to bring the narrative into shape. It reads a bit like a sprawling and sometimes unconvincing family saga that strays here and there into heavy-handed historical and legal backgrounding, and these flaws detract from the significant issues raised by the novel.

Like many debut novels, Home appears to have autobiographical elements. The story is bookended by the story of Candice, who, like the author, is a successful, well-travelled lawyer working in indigenous land rights issues. Like the author, the characters have German and Indigenous ancestry, and so they have skin which varies in colour from light to dark, raising questions of identity and racism. Some of them can ‘pass for white’ and until their Aboriginality is revealed they are treated with friendship and respect because they are thought to be Mediterranean or exotic. But their ‘whiteness’ means that they also suffer crudely racist commentary because their companions do not expect that an Indigenous person could be among them. For these characters there is always the dilemma and invidious choice about how and who to be. (During and after WW1 and WW2, some of the characters also suffer anti-German prejudice, but this is one of a number of side issues in the novel).

At the start of the novel Candice is making her first trip ‘home’ to her country, a situation that has arisen because her father did not know about his Aboriginality until well into adulthood. As the middle sections of the book reveal, the story of this fragmented family begins with Garibooli in 1918, when she is abducted from her family by the authorities and placed directly into domestic service in Parkes NSW, in the dysfunctional home of Lydia and Edward Howard whose marriage is a farce. Garibooli is renamed Elizabeth and works eleven hour days unpaid under the direction of their housekeeper Frances Grainger, one of the generation of women bereft by the war.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2017/07/10/h...

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had never heard of this novel and chose it at random, so I was pleasantly surprised how good it was. A family saga spanning the 20th century, centred on an Aboriginal family.

[Mahayana Dugast · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good book with painful insight into the tragic fate of Aboriginal Australians. So sad.

[Gurnoor Batth · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF:

Started out strong but the writing style is not for me. Might come back to it later.

[Nora · Rating 2 out of 5]

The fact that this book is a fictional story based on events that happened in the life of the author's grandmother wins it a lot of points. It sheds light on a group of people who's story needs to be told on their own terms, so I'm glad I read it. That said, the writing style started to annoy me after a while. The author is a lawyer and writes like lawyer (and not a lawyer who also happens to be a really good writer of fiction). There were times, I'm sorry to say, when it read like the cliff notes of a much more interesting version of itself.

[Niamh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a great book and I'm surprised to see so few people have rated it - It should definitely be more widely circulated.
A book about aboriginal people by an aboriginal person. Well written, very well researched. While I didn't like all the characters! many of them did have a depth to them and grew along with the book. There were however others that did seem rather thin (Daisy for eg).
Rounding up from 3.5 to 4 because on one hand the book tried to do too much within a compact space, and on the other the story seemed rather repetitive in parts and felt like it was dragging.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a worthwhile read and stories such as the ones explored here should be more widely told. The long term view of a family over three generations reveals the intergenerational impact of trauma and disconnection in a powerful and compelling way. However, some of the writing is uneven, and I felt there was unnecessary detail about many minor characters which meant the story dragged at times. Where the writing was stronger, the story was very moving.

[Ren · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't know how to describe how I felt about this book. At first I thought it was not so good, and then for a while in the middle there I was enjoying it despite a few frustrations, but by the end I was nearly crying tears of irritation. Generally, I personally did not like it and it left a fairly sour taste in my mouth. There were plenty of positives. Firstly, it is a book about the Stolen Generation, and the awful affects of that displacement and violence from 1918 right up to now(ish), when displacement and violence against Aboriginal people still continues, written by an indigenous person. This is important and gave a lot to this book. Race and racism were shown and dealt with in ways that I felt (in fairness, as a white person) were blunt and honest and confronting; there was no sugar-coating and I don't think there should be, either, so this was a major strength of the book. Leading on from that, it was very good at displaying just how much displacement and the stealing of children affected and still affects Aboriginals, as well as how Australia really has not come as far as we like to pretend we have. The way that it showed how one stolen child affected so many people for several generations was very clever and very heartbreaking. Also, there were several very upsetting, emotional parts that were made all the more emotional because of the knowledge that they were essentially true. It was generally very powerful and insightful, and I am not likely to forget it at all (especially since I am actually studying it). The best part was the plot, if you can reasonably call it a plot when it's so based in the truth (I am fairly sure this is a fictionalised version of Behrendt's family's story, but even if I'm mistaken, this is still very relevant and real). It was a fairly compelling book to read, and I never found myself bored.
However, for all those strengths there was a lot about this book that sat badly with me. And that's my point, it sat badly WITH ME. I do think this is still an important read, even if there were things I didn't like, and I'm not saying it was a bad book, necessarily. It just didn't work for me.

My first issue was that the writing style and I did not click. Firstly I didn’t think that the non-linear structure of the book was done as well as it could have been. A lot of things felt like unnecessary tangents until half-way through them when you realised they were important backstory. Also, it made it feel very disjointed. This was almost definitely done on purpose to reflect the kind of displacement that happened to this family, but like I said, I feel like this could have been done a little better. For example, it was very prone to ‘head jumping’. Though it was in third person and thus not as confusing as when done in first (small mercies), within one chapter the viewpoint character could change five times, and this was not pleasant for me to read. It interrupted the flow and it destroyed my interest at times. It would have been better to at least separate each perspective into chapters. Mostly, this was probably just my issue and my preference as a reader, but I do think that I have a slight point objectively. Secondly, the actual prose of the book at several points to me felt either clunky and awkward, or overdone, or both.

There were a lot of characterisation issues for me. There were some characters that I found interesting and grew quite attached to, but there were even more characters that I felt made decisions that made very little sense (Thomas, William, Daisy, even Candice) and because these characters were very half-heartedly characterised, it was hard to try and make their choices make sense or suspend my disbelief, and it also made it very hard to forgive them (I mostly mean Daisy and how she treated Patricia here). Not every character needed to be immensely developed and sometimes all that was needed to be effective in explaining them was the short snippets offered (Neil, Frances, Lydia, and some others), but in both these cases and the cases where the wasn't enough explanation or development, the information offered to the reader about the majority of characters was offered in info-dump flashback forms. This info-dumping and occasional weak characterisation combined with the non-linear format of several things, particularly Bob's story, made it a little hard to follow such a large cast of characters and also made me frustrated and caused my interest to lessen. Again, some of this probably ties back into the idea of making it disjointed on purpose and not letting you grew too attached to characters to reflect the consequences of the Stolen Generation, but I just don't think it was effective in some cases.

Most frustratingly, nearly every woman in the book seemed to have all their problems magically solved by having children and was absolutely obsessed with being a mother. I understand that they would have been expected to have children at the time, and I understand that these women would obviously have loved their children, but being a parent doesn't magically make the other problems someone has, especially with their spouse, all better, and it was uncomfortable how much ALL the mothers liked being mothers, ESPECIALLY in comparison to how much the fathers didn't care for being fathers. Every single man in this book was sexist and controlling and the vast majority were unfaithful. For a while I thought Patricia and Pasquale were different to this ongoing trend. But alas, even Patricia, who was self-made, tough and talented, more or less happily gave up work for motherhood. She was in poor health and was told by doctors that getting pregnant again would be dangerous, but was willing to risk her own life to try and have another child. And Pasquale had an affair WITH HER SISTER and got the mistress knocked up. Bob's wife (who's name escapes me) suddenly didn't mind the fact that she was being abused by Bob quite so much because she had children. Either the characters followed these models, or they were Daisy, who was unpleasant and unredeemed through the whole novel, or Grigor’s second wife, who was a very unpleasant portrayal of mental illness (cheers Behrendt). If this wasn’t enough, in the cases of some of these men (particularly but not exclusively Bob) there were attempts to justify their behaviour. Oh, Pasquale was wrong but he did it because Patricia made him feel lonely. Oh, Bob was controlling and verbally and emotionally abusive to a woman who loved and was completely devoted to him, but it was because he had critically low self esteem. I don’t think that any of these were necessarily bad explanations, as explanations go, but the way they were presented sat badly with me, because honestly, these men should have been more condemned for the actions than they were. I feel as though we were supposed to actually like Bob, despite everything, and feel sorry for Pasquale, who was just some weak-willed lonely man taken in by evil evil Daisy (who was legitimately cruel but was pretty obviously not the only one at fault).
Also, an issue that is DEFINITELY mine and not the book's, but one I still want to mention, is that I thoroughly dislike the use of frame narration or 'now-and-then' type narration, for lack of a better way of explaining it. The way that the book started with Candice, before jumping all the way back to Garibooli and coming all the way BACK to Candice did not work for me at all. It's one of my personal bookish pet hates as it happens.

Other very minor issues I had included: the only gay character came across as being somewhat sexist in a way that seemed to stem from his homosexuality because of how he is (briefly) written, some instalove-ish moments, my own personal squeamishness about having to read about the 'joys' of pregnancy and motherhood, and some misreading of Wuthering Heights that involves romanticising and/or whitewashing Heathcliff, which although not for completely bad or un-understandable reasons, is another personal pet hate.

Overall, my general opinion and enjoyment of the book was fairly low, despite the fact that it did make me quite emotional. That said though, I really hope Candice did call Christoph.

[A · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading this book was particularly timely for me, in the current Australian political climate. For those who may not know, a piece of legislation known as s18c of the Racial Discrimination Act is currently a pretty hot topic. It basically states that it's unlawful to "offend, insult, humiliate or intimidate another person or a group of people because of their race, colour or national or ethnic origin". While this law has been around since 1995, it recently became publicised because Andrew Bolt, probably Australia's most-read newspaper columnist who also has a TV show, was found to be in breach of it in 2011.

He had written a series of articles where he'd claimed that a group of fair-skinned people had "chosen" to identify as Aboriginal only for political and financial gain. One of these people was the author of this book, Larissa Behrendt. So bear with me as I explain the back-story of the issues and opinions that are electrifying Australian public discourse at the moment, in order to get to the actual "Review" part of this review!

So, Bolt's articles were indeed vile and inflammatory and fed the dark not-exactly-undercurrent of hateful sentiment towards Aboriginal people that unfortunately does exist in Australia. For those who may not know, there is a stereotype in Australia of Aboriginal people as "lazy, good-for-nothing, whinging dole-bludgers and criminals who spend all their time and taxpayer money on booze and drugs". (I have actually seen these comments being made - it makes me tear up a little how viciously they are stated sometimes.) There are people who will dismiss any other viewpoint as being a confected nonsense of the "Aboriginal Grievance Industry" and finish with a good old-fashioned "They should just harden up and get over it." So I'm sorry you just had to read that hateful paragraph, but it's a brief summary of what it can be like here in Australia.

The thing is, more than being vile and inflammatory, the articles were just plainly wrong - Andrew Bolt had literally made up lies about these people and published them to support his agenda. Here are some excerpts that he had written about Larissa Behrendt, and the judge Justice Bromberg's findings of them:

BOLT: "The very pale Professor Larissa Behrendt, who may have been raised by her white mother but today, as a professional Aborigine, is chairman of our biggest taxpayer-funded Aboriginal television service.

BROMBERG: "The factual assertions made were erroneous. Professor Behrendt's Aboriginal father did not separate from her mother until Professor Behrendt was about 15 years old. Her father was always part of the family during her upbringing, even after that separation."

BOLT: "Larissa Behrendt has also worked as a professional Aborigine ever since leaving Harvard Law School, despite looking almost as German as her father … But which people are 'yours', exactly, mein liebchen? And isn't it bizarre to demand laws to give you more rights as a white Aborigine than your own white dad?"

BROMBERG: "To her knowledge, there is no German descent on either her father or mother's side of the family although she assumes that because of her father's Germanic surname, there may have been some German descent."

When I first read the Bolt articles, I felt like I'd been winded. I could hardly believe the tone, the aggression, the chorus of agreement from his readers, then later on - the barefaced lies. I was not too surprised to learn that Larissa Behrendt was amongst the 9 people who took him to court.

However, after reading this book, I can see why she HAD to - she couldn't not act. It was so clear from the 3 generations of tragic family history she describes in the book. And the turning point for me was the following paragraph:

Some people try to make you feel bad because you're different - or because they think you're different - but when they realise that you are actually proud of those things, they try to take it away from you, tell you that "you're not a real one" or "you're an exception". It's as though wanted to enjoy the power to taint you and then attempt to deprive you of the identify they tried to make so shameful. After I read Michel Foucault at university I could better articulate the power to name and then dispossess.

As a "different" Australian myself, I had felt the above keenly but inarticulately - it was the first time it had ever been laid out so clearly, it felt like a lightning bolt of pure understanding for my own life.

When I first started reading, I was mildly grated by the writing style. Almost immediately, I forgot all about writing style and fell deeply into the storyline itself. I think she does an amazing job of following a mere 3 generations of people and showing not just the individual damage but inter-generational damage. Many people I've chatted to think that "All this stuff was ages ago, they should just get over it already." This book shows, painfully clearly, that no - it was not "ages ago", it was well within living memory and obviously the consequences echo on through the generations. She illustrates so clearly how Aboriginality has shaped and informed her characters' identities. Much of the debate around s18c of the Racial Discrimination Act centres around this notion that it's about "racial minorities getting hurt feelings". Anyone who thinks that the depth of devastation can be described as "hurt feelings" would benefit from reading this book.

As a side note, there have been some comments about the lawyerly writing style. I actually viewed this as a good thing. I found the legal history described in the latter part of the book extremely informative and was glad of it.

I'll finish by going back to the Andrew Bolt case and a few of the things he said during and after. For example, he successfully muddied the waters regarding what the case was about - so instead of acknowledging that it was about him concocting lies to further an agenda and passing it off as journalism, he claimed it was a "terrible day for freedom of speech" and complained he had been "silenced" (from his broadcast platform of columnist of newspaper with highest circulation in Australia! He retained that job as well as the TV slot - how "silenced" he was!).

But the thing he said that stuck with me was, he tried the line that it was the complainants who were "making it about race". He said, "I don't believe in racial division, between black, white or anything else. If I look at the people suing me, I don't find I'm of a different race to them … I find that notion offensive, and it harks back to Nazi Germany. I believe, fundamentally, that there is a human race, and beyond that it's all culture."

What Larissa Behrendt's book shows is that, it is a little disingenuous to say that you "don't believe in racial division". Her book shows that, it doesn't matter if you don't believe in race. More to the point, race believes in you. And that's why I thought this was an excellent book.

PS - Justice Bromberg's findings of the Eatock v Bolt case are surprisingly readable and absolutely fascinating. Scroll down to the section called "The Witness Evidence" (from 67 on). Larissa Behrendt's evidence starts from 117.

[Kris McCracken · Rating 2 out of 5]

Larissa Behrendt's debut novel "Home" presents an intriguing exploration of family trauma and the enduring scars of colonisation, delving into the fraught issue of Indigenous land rights. The book is rich in historical context and offers a much-needed perspective on the intergenerational impact of displacement and institutionalisation. Yet, despite its worthy themes, the execution leaves something to be desired, rendering the story more pedestrian than profound.

The novel explores the psychological damage inflicted upon the children torn from their families and the consequences of their institutionalisation. While Behrendt uses her characters to illustrate the legacy of systemic injustice, this portrayal often feels one-dimensional, lacking the nuance or path to redemption that might have made them more engaging. Their trauma is compelling, but their development remains frustratingly static.

Behrendt's grasp of the historical and legal backdrop is thorough, and "Home" is undeniably thought-provoking, particularly in its treatment of Indigenous land rights. However, the novel's reliance on heavy exposition and legal discourse does bog down the narrative. The storytelling becomes sluggish, particularly during the detailed accounts of legal cases or the quoting of passages, didactic asides than integral parts of the plot. This disrupts the emotional connection with the characters, leaving the reader more distanced than immersed in their world.

The pacing of the novel is another challenge. While the themes are undeniably important, the story itself unfolds slowly, with the occasional burst of intensity that quickly recedes into more meandering sections. "Home" offers much to reflect on. However, its pacing and didactic tendencies may leave others longing for a more dynamic and emotionally engaging reading experience.

⭐ ⭐ 1/2

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good book that, through telling the history of Garibooli (Elizabeth) Boney and her family provides examples of some of the difficulties faced by Aboriginal people in Australia, including the destruction of culture and identity caused by the forced removal of children from their families.

This is one of those novels that must be semi-autobiographical, and sometimes it slips into something that feels more like therapeutic journaling (particularly when Candice, the granddaughter of Garibooli, talks about her friendship with Kate and her French lover Christophe. Yes, it gets kind of distracting, as do the mini lectures comparing the Irish and the Aboriginal stories, the books that we should probably all add to our reading lists, and the specific newspaper articles that we should look up on Trove. It’s almost as though Behrendt is worried that she won’t get a chance to write anything else so she has to pack all of her thoughts and learning into this one novel.

For me, personally, I appreciated that this book gave me a growing understanding of some of the struggles faced by Aboriginal men and women, particularly those who have been separated from their families. This is a wound that will take many generations for Australia to recover from, and we must do better.

It’s a good book, and we’ll worth reading, but if you want something shorter and more poetic, I would recommend The White Girl.

[Lucy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was one I picked up on impulse in the library, partly because it promised a family saga kind of story, which I am finding I like, and partly because I'm in Australia for a limited time and my library back in the UK is very unlikely to stock books by Aboriginal authors (especially considering how small my usual library is) and I wanted to take advantage of the chance to read a different perspective.

I hate to say that this book is an important book to read, it is, but there are thousands of books which are 'important' and you won't have time to read them all. I personally found this book really compelling, although what happened to a lot of the characters was fairly horrific and hard to read a lot of the time, I really wanted to find out what would happen to all the characters. The characters all had their good and bad traits and they all made mistakes but due to the POV switching, you could see why they made those decisions. Especially Danny, because ouch.

I dropped a star from this book because I felt the ending was quite abrupt and I think there were a few too many characters and it stretched the book a little bit with the different subplots and issues it covered but I really enjoyed it nonetheless.

[Meg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Home by Larissa Behrendt, relates a fictional story based on her own family. It relates the tale of Candice a lawyer, who sets out on a journey to "where the two rivers meet" in NSW, to trace her family history. (From1918-2004). Her grandmother, Garibooli is of the Eualeyai/Kamilaro people. She was abducted and become one of the many children of the stolen generation. Her name is changed to Elizabeth, and is placed into domestic service to a white family on the land. She is sexually abused and escapes by marrying an idealistic German, Grigor Brecht. She has six children to Grigor, (and one to the white boss which is taken from her). She dies young and three of her children are placed in orphanges. Elizabeth never revealed her aboriginal ancestory to her children. It is only later in life they discover this connection (and because of their skin colouring, some even think they are of Greek or Italian descent). It is a story of a family saga with dramatics. Yet, it does also emphasize the sadness, loss and effects of the stolen generation and orphanage life. There are other minor characters in the book, and they too have trouble in cultural identity and living in a 'white Australia'.

[T’Layne Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoy Larissa Behrendt’s novels. This is the third that I’ve read, although I believe this was her debut. Because I had enjoyed the other two books so much I bought this without really reading the summary. So it took me a minute to adjust when I realised this was a multi generational historic fiction, rather than the contemp fic I had expected. It was totally worth the adjustment though. Behrendt has woven this family’s story like a tapestry; threads connecting and diverging to create a lovely mix of small vignettes and fleshed out dramas. Ultimately this is a moving account of Australia’s genocidal policies towards Aboriginal Peoples, specifically the legacy of the Stolen Generations, told through the experiences of one family.
There are many CW in this novel, although I did feel Behrendt handled the traumas in a gentle way, not dwelling on or exploiting the pain that her characters experienced.
Some queer rep in minor characters.
I listened to the audio version and as usual Tamala Shelton was great.
Highly recommended

[Tanya · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first read for Aussie April 2020 and it did not disappoint. I was moved to tears towards the end of this story and powerfully so. I was not expecting the part which made me sob and I am always a fan of an author who can tug at my emotions so well. This is the story of Garibooli, the grandmother of the young attorney that we are introduced to in the first part of book. The novel is mainly about Garibooli (aka Elizabeth) and her family tree through the decades. Garibooli was kidnapped in 1918 when she was 10 years old - she was sent to be a kitchen maid of a white household in another town of Australia. Her brother witnesses this horrific event and couldn't save her and by not being able to help, he feels guilty his entire life and that sense of loss and helplessness flows steady the entire book. This novel encompasses Garibooli's family members onward and the reader discovers their lives as well and what happened to them as the years went by. This was an epic read - almost too much for one book. Several characters were unnecessary and made the story lag in these bits. At the core, Garibooli and her brother were such beautiful characters and how the author wove their souls together even though they were apart was amazing. So glad I read this Aussie gem.

[Vivienne · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a somewhat different take on the Stolen Generation story, told from a very personal viewpoint by various members and generations of the one extended family and spanning a huge time frame.
Basically it is the story of family, set against the history of Aboriginal inequality and the impact of the stolen generation and institutional life not only on those taken away and their parents, but for generations to come.
I listened to this, Behrendt's first novel, on Audible and sometimes found the jumping from one voice to another and from one time to another, a lttle hard to follow but they intertwine well and overall it is a satisfying and quite moving book with a vast cast of characters all of whom are painted clearly and believably. A very personal view of what has become a very public subject***

[Renee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Home is a story about an Aboriginal family spanning across 3 generations. The book starts with and continues to discuss the impact of being removed, the stolen generation and it continual pain it causes. The book is lovely written and enables the reader to connect with each off the characters, their pain and their experiences. It is a heart breaking read yet at the same time provides a valuable insight to the atrocities undertake by white people in Australia towards the Aboriginal people and the strength and resilience to keep fighting and searching for love and belonging.

[Toni · Rating 2 out of 5]

Is this great literature, hell no. Does it have value, yes.

Is there better stories out there - without a doubt 1000%.

Listen, I get that this is someone's take on their family's personal history so we are TOLD everything or at least the bits they want the reader to know so there's zero development of feeling true affinity for the characters. I am told who to pity, who to distrust, who to hate...and if the writing was better, I would have naturally pitied, distrusted, hated...but the persuasive slant was so obvious, I found that I was looking for an objective viewpoint the whole story.

Meh, it's a freebie from the audible plus catalog so no $$ wasted and my time, well, it wasn't a total loss.

[Chris Howells · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an epic novel, spanning over 100 years it deal with the plight of the Aboriginal people. The characters are well drawn and the plot is dense and sprawling. My only complaint is too much telling. We have the odd scene to get our teeth into but the vast majority of the story is simply told. There is a lot of material, but after a while I felt distant from the action and characters. The book would of benefitted from a much shorter time span to allow readers to really get to know what is going on.

[Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

An engaging historical novel following the trevails of one woman's children over the years. I have a general liking for this genre, which usually has to contrive reasons for the descendents to be scattered to the winds. Unfortunately, Behrendt doesn't have to resort to that, because the very real policy of child removal of Aboriginal children creates plenty of loss. The large cast are treated with varying degrees of depth, which worked for me, as slices of a life alternate with deep insight in giving a glimpse of changing time, and diaspora. Highly recommended.

[Morag Forbes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Audiobook: A story following, clumsily at times: family, inter generational trauma and a quest for home, belonging and identity. The focus is particularly on the last 100 years of Australian history and the poor (to say the least) treatment of Aboriginal people. a really important topic and by having it told through a family history brought it to life. But the non-linear timeline and the number of characters made it very confusing to follow.

[Maria Magdalena · Rating 5 out of 5]

A family saga with a difference. A piece of Australian history as experienced by a native Australian family who's little daughter was stolen. A book well written and insightful - should be read in all Australian class rooms. Maybe some of the racist white Aussies would understand what it's like to go through life as a second class citizen in your own country.

[Christine Davie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love this authors books and I enjoyed this one but it felt a bit skinny in parts .. some of the characters tales could have had a bit more to them I thought. It tried to do a lot but wore itself thin. Am I wrong or alone in hoping writers like Larissa might be able to show us why Australia needs to unite and heal our indigenous and white heritage and maybe even set us on a path to how?

[kelsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thoughtful exploration of the experiences of First Nations Australians, throughout history.
I found it was slow to begin to really understand the experiences, but could be a result of the need to set some context towards the beginning.
Despite this a really good read, and a valuable addition to literary understandings of the Indigneous experience.