A Bird in the House: Stories

By Margaret Laurence

A Bird in the House is a series of eight interconnected short stories narrated by Vanessa MacLeod as she matures from a child at age ten into a young woman at age twenty. Wise for her years, Vanessa reveals much about the adult world in which she lives.

"Vanessa rebels against the dominance of age; she watches [her grandfather] imitate her aunt Edna; and her rage at times is such that she would gladly kick him. It takes great skill to keep this story within the expanding horizon of this young girl and yet make it so revealing of the adult world."—Atlantic

"A Bird in the House achieves the breadth of scope which we usually associate with the novel (and thereby is as psychologically valid as a good novel), and at the same time uses the techniques of the short story form to reveal the different aspects of the young Vanessa." —Kent Thompson, The Fiddlehead

"I am haunted by the women in Laurence's novels as if they really were alive—and not as women I've known, but as women I've been."—Joan Larkin, Ms. Magazine

"Not since . . . To Kill a Mockingbird has there been a novel like this. It should not be missed by anyone who has a child or was a child."—Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

One of Canada's most accomplished writers, Margaret Laurence (1926-87) was the recipient of many awards including Canada's prestigious Governor General's Literary Award on two separate occasions, once for The Diviners.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Release date: Jul 10, 2013
• ISBN: 9780226923826

Margaret Laurence

Margaret Laurence (1926-1987) grew up in the small prairie town of Neepawa, Manitoba, Canada. Recognised as one of the greatest Canadian writers, her masterwork is the Manawaka sequence of five novels.

Reviews for A Bird in the House

[oldblack-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ooh yes, this is a goodie! I've never been overly fond of short stories because I felt that I didn't get to know the characters well enough. This series of stories, however, features the same main characters throughout. The result is that we do get to really understand the context of the narrator's life and to know her well. (It's really very close to being a novel...perhaps it is!)I bless the day Elizabeth Hay referred to Margaret Laurence and led to me reading Laurence's complete set of novels.

[gypsysmom_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is a small book of short stories. But, like The Stone Angel and A Jest of God, they all take place in the fictional town of Manawaka which is a thinly disguised Neepawa, MB where Laurence grew up. According to a Winnipeg Free Press article published at the time of her death in 1987 some people in Neepawa resented the way Laurence portrayed the town. This article says that only a few dozen people attended the memorial service in Neepawa "in sharp contrast to a standing-room-only tribute Friday in Toronto." I am indebted to the person who included a copy of this article in this book. I only found it as I finished the first story so it was a complete surprise to me.Vanessa McLeod is the central character of the stories. Isabel Huggan, in the afterward to the book, confirms what I suspected i.e. that these stories are autobiographical. Thus, I know quite a bit more about Peggy Wemyss than I did before. Vanessa and Peggy both lost their fathers at a young age. They both tried writing stories from a young age, honing their craft. They both could hardly wait to get out of their small town. Obviously, though, while Peggy while waiting to escape she was also observing all the people, tucking away things that emerged almost 25 years later when this book was written.It's hard to pick a favourite story because they were all great. I think that the one that affected me the most was probably "The Half-Husky". It's the story of a dog that Vanessa was given by the man who brought birch firewood for the family. Vanessa called him Nanuk in honour of his Husky lineage. Unfortunately Nanuk became the brunt of cruelty perpetrated by the newspaper boy. He became aggressive with anyone outside of the family and had to be euthanized. All these years later I can still feel the outrage Vanessa/Peggy felt.

[marianv_39 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A series of related stories that combined together equal a novel take place in 1930's Canada. They are told from the point of view of 6 year old Vanessa who describes herself as a "professional listener". She narrates the lives of her parents, aunts, uncles & grandparents during the years of the Great Depression leading up to WW2. Ther is little sentiment here, only the facts of day-to-day lives & the cumulative effect of what we are told can break the heart.

[m.belljackson · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interspersed with the depressing stories are some vivid depictions of nature.My favorite characters were Aunt Edna, Ewen, and Chris.None of the stories are favorites and I skipped the "Half Husky,"knowing that with all the human deaths, a cruel dog one was likely to follow,