Will Sargent reviewed Black Juice by Margo Lanagan
Review of 'Black Juice' on 'Storygraph'
3 stars
It has taken me over a year to finish this book. I think that's a record.
The issue I have with the book is that although the writing is inventive, it's well and truly a young adult book. You can tell by the plots. In most of them, there's a young adult who is on the verge of discovering that his parents, or his community, are assholes. Then, one or more of them of them dies. Then, the child is brought to an awareness that the world is larger than the world he has previously known with his parents and/or community.
There is one story, which is odd and catchy, about an old man who has been a servant of the castle for years. The lord has married a "young and wilful" wife who comes from the gypsies, and is utterly in love with her. The old man, try as …
It has taken me over a year to finish this book. I think that's a record.
The issue I have with the book is that although the writing is inventive, it's well and truly a young adult book. You can tell by the plots. In most of them, there's a young adult who is on the verge of discovering that his parents, or his community, are assholes. Then, one or more of them of them dies. Then, the child is brought to an awareness that the world is larger than the world he has previously known with his parents and/or community.
There is one story, which is odd and catchy, about an old man who has been a servant of the castle for years. The lord has married a "young and wilful" wife who comes from the gypsies, and is utterly in love with her. The old man, try as he might, cannot bring himself to love her, and cannot see what his lord sees. To him, she is simply and obviously Bad News.
And that's the issue I have with so many of the stories in this book. The world may be different, but the families are the same, and even when they're not bad news, it doesn't make any difference -- to an adolescent, families are, by definition, familiar. And that shows up in the stories... as soon as the tale turned to what his parents did or how annoying this particular habit was, my eyes would glaze over. It's not even that they're bad news... they're filler.
So. I'd give this book to a kid, and it would blow their minds. But I don't think I'll ever read it again.