Reviews with content warning for Rape - Bodies of Light

It's been said before but good grief. This is an excellent book with truly gut wrenching, revealing prose, and it is also deeply, deeply sad. Incredibly bleak and richly emotive story about the trauma of the foster system and how state violence fails women and children. If you're thinking of reading this one, have a fun book lined up afterwards, and know that it hits every trigger warning under the sun. But I must emphasise: this was very deserving of the Miles Franklin, and is an incredible piece of literature.

Content Warnings

serendipitysbooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Bodies of Light has been on my radar since it was nominated for the Stella Prize. I finally read it this week after it won the Miles Franklin Literary Award.

I was immediately engrossed. The book opens when the narrator is contacted on Facebook by someone whose name she doesn’t recognise asking if she is related to Maggie Sullivan. She panics because she is Maggie, but nobody knows; she’s tried to leave her life as Maggie far behind. We then follow Maggie’s life from a small child in Australia, through her iterations as Josie and later Holly in New Zealand and then America over the course of more than 40 years. After the death of her mother by overdose when she was 2 and the arrest of her father some years later Maggie’s life becomes a series of foster homes and residential units - some good; other very bad. Her late teens and early twenties are marred by a breakdown and later the deaths of her children. Addiction also features. Her life is a struggle to escape the demons of her past and find her identity and stability. Sometimes she does well and is fortunate to have people in her life who help her; other times she struggles, pushes people away or has no one willing or able to help.

I found Maggie a really compelling character and her story all too believable. You only have to take a cursory look at details of investigations into state care to see that Maggie’s story embodies the sad yet undeniable truth. The links between traumas children experience in care, the loss of control and identity, and later problems like homelessness, addiction, relationship problems, financial struggles and poor mental health are self-evident, as is the conclusion - changes are desperately needed to the system of state care for children.

Down’s writing was gorgeous; Maggie a captivating and compelling character. Other characters were also richly rendered; places accurately and vividly evoked. I listened on audio which was generally really good although the pronunciation of my childhood home town varied and was sometimes hilariously bad.

An important and impactful novel, one that made me think and made me feel.

Content Warnings

narpetcards's review against another edition

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dark reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

sezzler's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Content Warnings

sarahxify's review

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dark emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This tells the story of Maggie, a missing person in Australia who is in reality living in the states with a new identity. From Maggie's perspective, we hear how she got there, and the awful circumstances that drove her to make such a desperate move. She recounts her time in foster homes in Australia, and the sexual abuse and trauma she suffered at the hands of the people that were supposed to protect her. The writing is perfect; it's controlled, tight, and impeccably timed. Easily one of the most assured and compelling pieces of literature I have read for a long time. Is "phenomenal" too strong a word?

Lots of content warnings for sexual assault and child death for this one, but if these themes are okay for you, I really could not recommend it more.

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