Foal's Bread in Aussie Readers

Apr 07, 2012 Penni Russon rated it really liked it

The great strength of this novel was the heightened language, the way that words were charged with their own kind of magic, flowing through everything: the body of the horse, the night sky, lightning, the earth's crust, the fences and bridges and farm buildings, the child, the mother... Drawing strongly on a distinctly Indigenous way of understanding the connectedness of all things, the novel is a respectful attempt to reconcile white Australia and Indigenous experiences, it stares frankly at th ...more

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Aug 06, 2012 Shelleyrae at Book'd Out rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: aussie-author, provided-by-publisher, arc-are

Though wonderfully evocative and lyrical, Foal's Bread is a bleak, raw story of loss, hardship and love. In the moonlight, at the base of One Tree Hill, a fourteen year old girl watches impassively as her fate drifts down river in a butter box. Spanning several decades, from the mid 1920's to the 1950's, set in the hard country of New South Wales, this is a compelling novel that traces the life of Noah Child.

Foal's Bread is a novel that is appreciated rather than enjoyed, for the unrelenting t ...more

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May 20, 2013 Jane rated it did not like it

Gillian Mears' novel Foal's Bread is set in 1920s New South Wales and is about a farming family and their love of horse jumping in various shows around the state. At that time high jumping was very popular, and horses were jumped over enormous heights- 8 feet one and a half inches is the record. Noah met Roley Nancarrow at one of these shows and soon they married much to the disappointment of Roley's mother who had other girls in mind than a half-wild girl with "dark" blood. When Noah and Roley ...more

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Jul 02, 2013 Tango rated it it was amazing

I read this for my in person book club and have to admit that it didn't appeal at first. I'm not really a horsey person, although I do love animals. But this book is about so much more and I actually found that I loved the descriptions of horse riding and show jumping. The relationships between the main characters and their horses seemed so vividly real.

This book was gripping from the first page and the characters really grew on me. It was both tender and tragic and I found myself crying for th ...more

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Oct 06, 2011 Marg rated it liked it

Shelves: readalong

I have been reading this as part of a readalong.

You can see all four posts about my reaction to this book at the following link:

http://www.theintrepidreader.com/sear... ...more

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Aug 07, 2012 Lynne Leonhardt rated it it was amazing

This is a remarkable book. I have reviewed it as guest writer for Universal Heart Book Club on the subject of "childhood landscapes".

http://www.universalheartbookclub.com...

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