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The Gathering Spirit

by
March 2005, no. 269

Butterfly Song by Terri Janke

Penguin, $22.95pb, 252pp, 014 300 2627

The Gathering Spirit

by
March 2005, no. 269

From the first paragraph, Terri Janke’s Butterfly Song makes its intentions clear: this is a novel about the love of the land and the palpable connection to the ancestral home. ‘They say if you live on an island for too long, you merge with it. Your bones become the sands, your blood the ocean. Your flesh is the fertile ground. Your heart becomes the stories, dances, songs. The island is part of your makeup …’ This is why Tarena Shaw feels an odd sense of belonging when she first steps foot on Thursday Island, her grandparents’ birthplace. Though she has never been there before, the memories and myths that have been passed down the family tree have guaranteed a spiritual bond between the black-suited city slicker and the tropical island with water like a ‘living gemstone’.

Butterfly Song

Butterfly Song

by Terri Janke

Penguin, $22.95pb, 252pp, 014 300 2627

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