Book Review: The Yield by Tara June Winch

Published: July 2, 2019
Publisher: HarperVia
Received: purchased
Read from August 13, 2022 to January 4, 2023
Synopsis from Goodreads:

Knowing that he will soon die, Albert ‘Poppy’ Gondiwindi takes pen to paper. His life has been spent on the banks of the Murrumby River at Prosperous House, on Massacre Plains. Albert is determined to pass on the language of his people and everything that was ever remembered. He finds the words on the wind.

August Gondiwindi has been living on the other side of the world for ten years when she learns of her grandfather’s death. She returns home for his burial, wracked with grief and burdened with all she tried to leave behind. Her homecoming is bittersweet as she confronts the love of her kin and news that Prosperous is to be repossessed by a mining company. Determined to make amends she endeavours to save their land – a quest that leads her to the voice of her grandfather and into the past, the stories of her people, the secrets of the river.

Profoundly moving and exquisitely written, Tara June Winch’s The Yield is the story of a people and a culture dispossessed. But it is as much a celebration of what was and what endures, and a powerful reclaiming of Indigenous language, storytelling and identity.

Review:

The Yield was one of the picks for the Branching Out Book Club, but I didn't manage to finish the book until long after the reading period had ended. The story is about August, who moved to France to escape her hometown in Australia. When she was a child, August's sister went missing, and memories of her sister haunt August when she returns to her hometown for her grandfather's funeral. She also learns that a mine is going to be opened, which means that they'll tear down her childhood home.

My favorite part of the story was the setting. I've read very few books set in Australia. Actually, it's possible that I've never read a book set in Australia. August grew up in a house that was formerly a mission set up by a Lutheran priest, and there's a lot of discussion about the colonization of Australia, particularly through a letter written by said priest, which is interspersed throughout the story. I found the letter more interesting that August's story itself.

For me, August's story felt slow, and I wasn't very motivated to pick up the book, which is part of what took me so long to finish it. The story is also quite dark because of the subject matter, so it was far from a light and cheerful read.

Still, I appreciated getting to read a story from a different perspective than I ever had before.