| ||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
?Jones's writing is fluid and memorable . . . the story proves powerful and poignant.?
?"The Guardian"
?Jones has a marvelous ear for language . . . a novelist who deserves to be celebrated.?
?"The Telegraph"
?An elegantly written lament for lost opportunities.?
?"The Financial Times"
?In deft and vivid prose . . . Jones's gift for conjuring place and mood rarely falters.?
?"Times Literary Supplement"
?"The Guardian"
?Jones has a marvelous ear for language . . . a novelist who deserves to be celebrated.?
?"The Telegraph"
?An elegantly written lament for lost opportunities.?
?"The Financial Times"
?In deft and vivid prose . . . Jones's gift for conjuring place and mood rarely falters.?
?"Times Literary Supplement"
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Australian author Gail Jones, who has won popular recognition and prizes in Australia for every book she has written, has achieved another notable milestone with Sorry, nominated for the Miles Franklin Award for Best Novel of 2008. Set in sparsely populated Western Australia in the early 1940s, the novel recreates the life of Perdita Keene, a ten-year-old child, not wanted by her British parents, who had hoped she would die at birth. Perdita's childhood is formed by the aborigine women who nurse her in infancy, and she develops a strong friendship with Mary, an aborigine girl, and Billy, a deaf-mute white. All three children are outcasts, and their bonds with each other are total and life-affirming.
The murder of Perdita's father, described in the opening pages, is at the core of the novel, and the circumstances surrounding the case are not clear. All three children have witnessed the crime, but Perdita, the narrator for most of the novel, is so traumatized that she cannot remember any of the details except a blood-spattered blue dress, made from a fabric used to make several dresses for several different wearers.
If there is such a genre as "Australian Gothic," this novel would be one of its best-written examples. The sights, sounds, and smells of the bush, filled with storms, heat, dust, and exotic birds and animals, vibrate with life--and death--both physical and spiritual. Perdita's father has long lost his interest in researching aborigine myths and leads a mean-spirited, abusive life. Her mother seeks life lessons and values in the plays and sonnets of Shakespeare and is hospitalized periodically because she loses touch with reality.
Perdita, "the lost one," named for a character in Shakespeare's The Tempest, loves the aborigines, who value the continuum of life, not merely a set of static principles, like the whites who have driven them from their ancestral lands and forcibly removed their children. On some level, she is aware of the injustice, and she finds solace and a sense of order in aborigine, not white, culture.
Jones uses the battles of on-going World War II to parallel Perdita's troubles and illuminate the contrasts within Perdita's life, emphasizing the novel's major themes of war and peace, oppression and liberation, and order and chaos, both in society and within the individual. Entitled "Sorry" to honor the abused aborigine population, Jones notes that as recently as 1997, Prime Minister John Howard refused to acknowledge that the nation was "sorry" for its crimes, despite popular sentiment. Jones's novel is not a political screed, however. It is a story about a child who finds herself caught between two worlds--and learns the worst and the best about both. Lyrical, sensual, and full of passion, Sorry makes no apologies for its emotion or its dramatic intensity. For the author, these qualities are all part of saying "Sorry." Mary Whipple
The murder of Perdita's father, described in the opening pages, is at the core of the novel, and the circumstances surrounding the case are not clear. All three children have witnessed the crime, but Perdita, the narrator for most of the novel, is so traumatized that she cannot remember any of the details except a blood-spattered blue dress, made from a fabric used to make several dresses for several different wearers.
If there is such a genre as "Australian Gothic," this novel would be one of its best-written examples. The sights, sounds, and smells of the bush, filled with storms, heat, dust, and exotic birds and animals, vibrate with life--and death--both physical and spiritual. Perdita's father has long lost his interest in researching aborigine myths and leads a mean-spirited, abusive life. Her mother seeks life lessons and values in the plays and sonnets of Shakespeare and is hospitalized periodically because she loses touch with reality.
Perdita, "the lost one," named for a character in Shakespeare's The Tempest, loves the aborigines, who value the continuum of life, not merely a set of static principles, like the whites who have driven them from their ancestral lands and forcibly removed their children. On some level, she is aware of the injustice, and she finds solace and a sense of order in aborigine, not white, culture.
Jones uses the battles of on-going World War II to parallel Perdita's troubles and illuminate the contrasts within Perdita's life, emphasizing the novel's major themes of war and peace, oppression and liberation, and order and chaos, both in society and within the individual. Entitled "Sorry" to honor the abused aborigine population, Jones notes that as recently as 1997, Prime Minister John Howard refused to acknowledge that the nation was "sorry" for its crimes, despite popular sentiment. Jones's novel is not a political screed, however. It is a story about a child who finds herself caught between two worlds--and learns the worst and the best about both. Lyrical, sensual, and full of passion, Sorry makes no apologies for its emotion or its dramatic intensity. For the author, these qualities are all part of saying "Sorry." Mary Whipple
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I won't rehearse 'Sorry's plot here since previous reviewers have done a good job of it already. I will say that it is a beautiful and heartbreaking exploration of loss both personal (familial) and global (war). Indeed, much of Gail Jones literary style is self-indulgently verbose and weighed down by overly-ornate descriptions but these flaws do not impede 'Sorry' being a wholly satisfying read. It's the first novel I've read in a while in which I could lose myself and feel so invested in and empathetic towards the characters. Jones captures the thorough isolation and desolation of Perdita's life incredibly well. Her story is one that easily transcends the 1940s Australia in which it is set.
I do object to some of the other reviewers implying that the author adopts a preachy or heavy-handed tone when referring to the plight of the Aborigines. Compared to other aspects of the narrative Jones exercises quite a lot of restraint in this area. The history is harrowing enough to evoke feelings of discomfort in those who perhaps would rather not be confronted with the topic. I believe such sentiments are a reflection of the reader's state of mind than any fault on the author's part.
I do object to some of the other reviewers implying that the author adopts a preachy or heavy-handed tone when referring to the plight of the Aborigines. Compared to other aspects of the narrative Jones exercises quite a lot of restraint in this area. The history is harrowing enough to evoke feelings of discomfort in those who perhaps would rather not be confronted with the topic. I believe such sentiments are a reflection of the reader's state of mind than any fault on the author's part.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Perdita is the child of Nicholas and Stella, growing up in the Australian outback with few contacts with the outside world. The family acquire a half-aborigine servant, Mary, removed from her family as part of the government's efforts to "improve" the race. Perdita and Mary become friends, but their world is shattered when Nicholas is found stabbed to death and Mary takes the blame for the death.
It's a beautifully written story, full of eloquent passages and you can enjoy it for that alone. The title refers to the Australian government's refusal to apologise to its Aborigine citizens for their previous mistreatment (possibly because of the potential for lawsuits?) and it's a pity Gail Jones chose it, because it takes away our ability to discover for ourselves exactly what this story is about. The author avoids lecturing us, but the sense of outrage is there, just hovering below the surface and that detracts instead of adding to the weight of the tale.
It's a beautifully written story, full of eloquent passages and you can enjoy it for that alone. The title refers to the Australian government's refusal to apologise to its Aborigine citizens for their previous mistreatment (possibly because of the potential for lawsuits?) and it's a pity Gail Jones chose it, because it takes away our ability to discover for ourselves exactly what this story is about. The author avoids lecturing us, but the sense of outrage is there, just hovering below the surface and that detracts instead of adding to the weight of the tale.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Beautifully written and highly recommended
One of the best novels I've read in recent years! Gail Jones has it all - just the wonderful prose in the telling of this story makes the book worthwhile. Read more
Published on 11 July 2009 by Literature Lady
Tears are not Enough
I was going to title this thread 'You will be' instead of the Sorry of the title, but that would be flippant. Read more
Published on 16 May 2008 by Leyla Sanai
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
