Ninja rating: 5/5 ninjas

3 words: Important, sad, funny.

Recommended for: Every Australian.

Best character and why: Maxine because she says it how it is.

Best line: “It was always the sea that brought bloodshed to our lands; the ocean on which they arrived to destroy us; the tide on which they stole us away.”

Favourite part: The stories of well-intentioned people whose ignorance hurt people.

Question: Maxine, has anything changed since The Hate Race came out?

More thoughts: This is one of the most important and powerful books I have

read in a while. It’s an influential, funny, and at times shocking memoir about growing

up black in white middle-class Australia.