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Birdie: A Novel
Monkey Beach meets Green Grass, Running Water meets The Beachcombers in this wise and funny novel by a debut Cree author
Birdie is a darkly comic and moving first novel about the universal experience of recovering from wounds of the past, informed by the lore and knowledge of Cree traditions. Bernice Meetoos, a Cree woman, leaves her home in Northern Alberta following tragedy and travels to Gibsons, BC. She is on something of a vision quest, seeking to understand the messages from The Frugal Gourmet (one of the only television shows available on CBC North) that come to her in her dreams. She is also driven by the leftover teenaged desire to meet Pat Johns, who played Jesse on The Beachcombers, because he is, as she says, a working, healthy Indian man. Bernice heads for Molly’s Reach to find answers but they are not the ones she expected.
With the arrival in Gibsons of her Auntie Val and her cousin Skinny Freda, Bernice finds the strength to face the past and draw the lessons from her dreams that she was never fully taught in life. Part road trip, dream quest and travelogue, the novel touches on the universality of women's experience, regardless of culture or race.
Cover art by Cree author and artist, George Littlechild
Birdie is a darkly comic and moving first novel about the universal experience of recovering from wounds of the past, informed by the lore and knowledge of Cree traditions. Bernice Meetoos, a Cree woman, leaves her home in Northern Alberta following tragedy and travels to Gibsons, BC. She is on something of a vision quest, seeking to understand the messages from The Frugal Gourmet (one of the only television shows available on CBC North) that come to her in her dreams. She is also driven by the leftover teenaged desire to meet Pat Johns, who played Jesse on The Beachcombers, because he is, as she says, a working, healthy Indian man. Bernice heads for Molly’s Reach to find answers but they are not the ones she expected.
With the arrival in Gibsons of her Auntie Val and her cousin Skinny Freda, Bernice finds the strength to face the past and draw the lessons from her dreams that she was never fully taught in life. Part road trip, dream quest and travelogue, the novel touches on the universality of women's experience, regardless of culture or race.
Cover art by Cree author and artist, George Littlechild
288 pages, Hardcover
First published May 26, 2015
251 people are currently reading
8030 people want to read
About the author
Tracey Lindberg
7 books139 followersTracey Lindberg is a citizen of As’in’i’wa’chi Ni’yaw Nation Rocky Mountain Cree and hails from the Kelly Lake Cree Nation community.
A graduate of the University of Saskatchewan, Harvard University and the University of Ottawa law schools, she is the first Aboriginal woman in Canada to complete her graduate law degree at Harvard. Lindberg won the Governor General's Award in 2007 upon convocation for her dissertation "Critical Indigenous Legal Theory".
She is an award-winning academic writer and teaches Indigenous studies and Indigenous law at two universities in Canada. She sings the blues loudly, talks quietly and is next in a long line of argumentative Cree women. Birdie is her first novel.
A graduate of the University of Saskatchewan, Harvard University and the University of Ottawa law schools, she is the first Aboriginal woman in Canada to complete her graduate law degree at Harvard. Lindberg won the Governor General's Award in 2007 upon convocation for her dissertation "Critical Indigenous Legal Theory".
She is an award-winning academic writer and teaches Indigenous studies and Indigenous law at two universities in Canada. She sings the blues loudly, talks quietly and is next in a long line of argumentative Cree women. Birdie is her first novel.
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March 31, 2017
CANADA READS FINALIST 2016
I don't really know how to start this review, so I'll just be upfront: I don't know what to make of Birdie. Let me break it down for you in a top five why-I-didn't-like-it list.
1. The first 100 pages were nigh-indecipherable.
The twist at the back end of these 100 pages had my interest piqued, but I never felt as if the opening was justified. Yeah, there ends up being a fairly decent narrative reason for making the passages shift so freely through time and situation, but it doesn't make up for the fact that almost half of the novel is painful to read.
2. The verb tenses.
So there's a Q&A with the author at the end which helped to clear up some of what I missed in Birdie. But you know what? A character being able to "shift time and space" was not something I got from this reading. I'm not even entirely clear on whether that ability is metaphorical, spiritual, or literal. Birdie's timeline is perhaps best explained in a thought experiment. Imagine taking a linear story, tearing it up into variable sizes and placing the shreds in a snow globe. Shake up the globe. You have to figure out how to put the 100s of verb-snowflakes into chronological order, but you can only pick up one piece at a time. Enjoy.
3.The characters.
You know, this is the first time in a long time that I've been genuinely confused as to who is who for such an extended period of time. Why? The characters are presented in such a muddled format in the opening that they all gelled together for me. Towards the end we begin to see the storyline from other characters' perspectives in brief snippets, which helps clear things up somewhat. But it wasn't until I was almost done the novel that I had a good idea of how each character related to one another.
4. It is an exhausting read.
I don't think I'm a stranger to difficult novels. Indeed, I love a book that flips literary convention on its head and challenges me to think about how a story should be told. But, wow, did this ever sap the joy of reading from me for a week. In addition to the emotionally harrowing nature of some of these passages, I never felt excited to pick up Birdie. This is a real shame since I use reading as an escape and am usually excited to dig into whatever I'm reading as a break from diagrams and statistics. Between events that I couldn't slot in chronological order and events that seem to repeat throughout the novel, I stayed confused throughout my read.
5. I think there might be a good novel in here and I'm just missing the point.
This is the rub. This novel has many themes: mental health, sexual abuse, Cree tradition, murdered and missing aboriginal women(to name a few). Birdie has so many ingredients in the pot and such an atypical storyline that I'll freely admit that I may not have appreciated the full nature of the book. It's very possible that this book is just too complex for me to figure out. All the same, I was so frustrated with the format and structure of this book that I wasn't interested in spending time pouring over every single detail to see if it was laced with meaning.
*Edited on March 11, 2016 to fix some formatting issues
I don't really know how to start this review, so I'll just be upfront: I don't know what to make of Birdie. Let me break it down for you in a top five why-I-didn't-like-it list.
1. The first 100 pages were nigh-indecipherable.
The twist at the back end of these 100 pages had my interest piqued, but I never felt as if the opening was justified. Yeah, there ends up being a fairly decent narrative reason for making the passages shift so freely through time and situation, but it doesn't make up for the fact that almost half of the novel is painful to read.
2. The verb tenses.
So there's a Q&A with the author at the end which helped to clear up some of what I missed in Birdie. But you know what? A character being able to "shift time and space" was not something I got from this reading. I'm not even entirely clear on whether that ability is metaphorical, spiritual, or literal. Birdie's timeline is perhaps best explained in a thought experiment. Imagine taking a linear story, tearing it up into variable sizes and placing the shreds in a snow globe. Shake up the globe. You have to figure out how to put the 100s of verb-snowflakes into chronological order, but you can only pick up one piece at a time. Enjoy.
3.The characters.
You know, this is the first time in a long time that I've been genuinely confused as to who is who for such an extended period of time. Why? The characters are presented in such a muddled format in the opening that they all gelled together for me. Towards the end we begin to see the storyline from other characters' perspectives in brief snippets, which helps clear things up somewhat. But it wasn't until I was almost done the novel that I had a good idea of how each character related to one another.
4. It is an exhausting read.
I don't think I'm a stranger to difficult novels. Indeed, I love a book that flips literary convention on its head and challenges me to think about how a story should be told. But, wow, did this ever sap the joy of reading from me for a week. In addition to the emotionally harrowing nature of some of these passages, I never felt excited to pick up Birdie. This is a real shame since I use reading as an escape and am usually excited to dig into whatever I'm reading as a break from diagrams and statistics. Between events that I couldn't slot in chronological order and events that seem to repeat throughout the novel, I stayed confused throughout my read.
5. I think there might be a good novel in here and I'm just missing the point.
This is the rub. This novel has many themes: mental health, sexual abuse, Cree tradition, murdered and missing aboriginal women(to name a few). Birdie has so many ingredients in the pot and such an atypical storyline that I'll freely admit that I may not have appreciated the full nature of the book. It's very possible that this book is just too complex for me to figure out. All the same, I was so frustrated with the format and structure of this book that I wasn't interested in spending time pouring over every single detail to see if it was laced with meaning.
*Edited on March 11, 2016 to fix some formatting issues
June 26, 2017
No one ever talked about a lot of things. What happened to Freda's mom. Why Freda lived with everyone at one time or another. Why Maggie stopped talking to anyone. When the electricity would come back on. Why no one stayed with the uncles. The silence about what was happening around them seeped into the kitchen, first. Permeating the curtains. Eating into the linoleum. Eventually settling in the fridge. It was like some sort of bad medicine – it made Freda skinny, Bernice fat, and Maggie disappear.
In a recent report, it was determined that 1,181 Canadian Native women went missing or were murdered between 1980 and 2012. That's a terrible fact, naturally prompting calls for more studies, commissions, and official inquiries – something needs to be done – and in the middle of this national conversation, Birdie is an astonishing contribution: a book written by a Cree woman, giving voice to the women who, broken by their lives, put themselves at risk with violent men, or who choose to disappear, or who, like the main character Bernice/Birdie, go missing within themselves.
Bernice is a wonderful character: although we learn nearly right away that she was repeatedly sexually assaulted as a child, she is resilient and loving and sharp-witted. Raised by a single mother who disappeared one day, Bernice eventually lived with her beloved Aunt Val, an overcompensating white foster family, on the streets of Edmonton, and in a psychiatric facility nicknamed “the San”. When Birdie begins, Bernice has walked out of the San, deciding to move to Gibson's, B.C. – the setting used for The Beachcombers – where she hopes to somehow meet Pat John; the Native actor who played Jesse on the show; Bernice's longtime celebrity crush; a healthy, working Indian man. Bernice gets a job in a bakery (owned by a nice enough former Californian hippy-type woman; another overcompensating white person who acts like she's “never met an Indian before” and who feels vaguely responsible for protecting Bernice). After indulging in frequently risky sexual behaviour, Bernice has a breakdown one night and takes to her bed. After a few days, the bakery owner, Lola, calls in Bernice's Aunt Val and her cousin Skinny Freda, and as Bernice lays catatonic – having either a vision quest or a mental breakdown – the women do what they can to heal her.
Bernice lies in bed, motionless, but feels the gentle rush of water against her as she makes her way upstream. Past her past. It feels peaceful. She knows she will have to push her way upstream sometime. For now, she floats, feeling anything but free. For now, she knows it is enough to be able to slip along without plunging. For now, she stays in bed, none of the women-gathering around her aware that she is travelling. Bernice knows, somewhere at the core of her, that she is on a voyage. Whether it is to someplace or from it, she is not sure. All she knows is that water is a woman. Protective. She does not fear sinking.
Because Bernice is confronting her own history, the timeline shifts around, hinting at events and eventually making them clear – and while this can be confusing, it makes for a rewarding structure. Each chapter begins with a Cree word or idea and its best English translation, followed by a snippet of a continuing Acimowin (or fable-like story), excerpts from Bernice's dreams that often feature a recurring motif of the Pimatisewin (life or Tree of Life that Bernice feels responsible for healing) and instructions from James Beard, The Frugal Gourmet – Bernice's other favourite CBC show. There are many idiosyncratic writing quirks: sometimes Bernice thinks in sentence fragments like – More importantly, she thinks that she is becoming. Something. Else. – and she uses novel portmanteaus like “feasttalk” or “skinnyhappiness”. While I do enjoy word play, if I had a complaint about these quirks, it would be that they're used too seldom to call it an overall style of writing; I think they wouldn't be as jarring if they occurred in every chapter. And yet, while many of author Tracey Lindberg's writing choices made this a non-straightforward read, I'm sure that's rather the point – Birdie is about the lingering effects of the “colonization-bomb” and it would be unfair to expect it to strictly follow the grammatical/narrative rules of the coloninizers' language.
All of the women (including Lola) in Birdie have been broken in some way, and as a result, every one of them puts herself at risk with potentially dangerous men. Although we get an idea from Bernice's memories as to why she would behave this way, it's a bit of a mystery for the others (beyond hard living on their remote Reserve in northern Alberta), and the two sections from Bernice's mother's point of view that bookend Birdie did nothing to explain why she put herself at the most risk of all. And that's what I found to be the most effective part of this book: beyond one sentence referencing residential schools and their efforts to stomp out Native cultures, Birdie demonstrates the dangers inherent in being a Native woman without overtly blaming “the white man”. But that's not to mean that there isn't blame to go around – the Reserve system (and the lingering effects of the “colonization bomb”) is shown to be responsible for the poor treatment of Native women. Yet it also demonstrates the power that Native women have to heal themselves. This is a message that we from the colonizing culture can understand without getting our backs up – and that's exactly what it will take to have a productive conversation about the horrifying fact of the murdered and missing 1,181 women.
According to this article, Tracey Lindberg is a lawyer and a Professor of Law at two Canadian universities, and as such, wanted to explore in this book the tenet of Cree law known as Wahkohtowin: that all human beings treat each other like relatives, that we have a reciprocal obligation to take care of one another as if we were universally bound by family ties. Lindberg goes on to say:
The reason that I wrote this novel, rather than write it as an academic article is that I’ve seen, along the way, it’s really quite easy to make decisions in law about indigenous people as a category. It’s really easy to lecture about indigenous peoples if it’s a topic...So what I hope that the book does — that good stuff — is to humanize us, humanize indigenous woman, indigenous girls, so that, in a way, we’re thought of as relatives. Because you care about your relatives. You don’t let your relatives get murdered or go missing.
And that is exactly what Lindberg achieved here. Bernice is a fully human character whose experiences filled me with empathy – and whether the dangers she faced came from within her own community or were a direct result of the harms done by my own, it's time to forget the political posturing and protect these at-risk women; recognising that we are all, indeed, family after all. Birdie is an important and rewarding read.
October 27, 2015
That was a beautiful read. I do believe that's the first time I ever described a reading experience as beautiful. And to think, I only bought this book because I loved the cover.
I only gave it 4 stars because it was *a lot* to take in. I haven't decided if it was actually too much or if life is just too busy at the moment for me to take in anything more than mindless reading. But I want to read this book again.
I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've read about Indigenous people and really wished I had read something nonfiction before this because I believe conjecture starts to creep in otherwise. The main characters are Cree women and there were several times when I found myself reading and thinking that some of these experiences can be transferred right onto the pages of African American literature.
There is a fantastical aspect of the book and I love how it was incorporated. These women and girls are able to *shift* out of their bodies. The main character is initially only able to do so mentally but then becomes able to do so physically. Many times the shifting occurs when they are being raped by male relatives. The familial sexual abuse is a secret that they keep and the trauma manifests differently in each of them.
Ah, there's so much more to be said about this book. You see - it's a lot! I've had a serious case of writers block and this is the first review I've written in months. I think I just had a breakthrough :-) I'll update this review if I decide to finish it over on the blog...
I only gave it 4 stars because it was *a lot* to take in. I haven't decided if it was actually too much or if life is just too busy at the moment for me to take in anything more than mindless reading. But I want to read this book again.
I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've read about Indigenous people and really wished I had read something nonfiction before this because I believe conjecture starts to creep in otherwise. The main characters are Cree women and there were several times when I found myself reading and thinking that some of these experiences can be transferred right onto the pages of African American literature.
There is a fantastical aspect of the book and I love how it was incorporated. These women and girls are able to *shift* out of their bodies. The main character is initially only able to do so mentally but then becomes able to do so physically. Many times the shifting occurs when they are being raped by male relatives. The familial sexual abuse is a secret that they keep and the trauma manifests differently in each of them.
Ah, there's so much more to be said about this book. You see - it's a lot! I've had a serious case of writers block and this is the first review I've written in months. I think I just had a breakthrough :-) I'll update this review if I decide to finish it over on the blog...
February 10, 2017
How to rate this book? How to rate a piece of abstract art? How to rate poetry that is like nothing else you've ever encountered?
It was only in the last quarter that I decided to give this book at 4* rating. I struggled with the first half or more, both with the tragic story itself, and with the writing style, which is so unique, so artistic. I was going to rate it 3* because the answer to my question "would I recommend this to anyone?" was a resounding "no."
But then something incredible happened. CBC News did a show where ten Canadians were given ten minutes one-on-one with PM Justin Trudeau. And in that group was a brave, young female aboriginal woman, talking about her concerns for her missing relatives, and for her baby daughter growing up in a world that is unsafe for native women in Canada.
And as I watched this woman, I wept and wept and wept. I couldn't stop it! And I realized that it was this book --which I was nearly finished -- that had taught me so much about the experience of women like Birdie. And I realized, too, that there hasn't been another book that has touched me and taught me like this one has.
Throw away your expectations before you open this novel. Timelines and linear thinking, events, customs, mental health, streams of thought the way you know them are abandoned. Punctuation, even grammar, is handed over to the artistic. Once you grasp on (and it took me awhile) I think what you'll find is powerful, a story that will seep into your bones for a long time.
It was only in the last quarter that I decided to give this book at 4* rating. I struggled with the first half or more, both with the tragic story itself, and with the writing style, which is so unique, so artistic. I was going to rate it 3* because the answer to my question "would I recommend this to anyone?" was a resounding "no."
But then something incredible happened. CBC News did a show where ten Canadians were given ten minutes one-on-one with PM Justin Trudeau. And in that group was a brave, young female aboriginal woman, talking about her concerns for her missing relatives, and for her baby daughter growing up in a world that is unsafe for native women in Canada.
And as I watched this woman, I wept and wept and wept. I couldn't stop it! And I realized that it was this book --which I was nearly finished -- that had taught me so much about the experience of women like Birdie. And I realized, too, that there hasn't been another book that has touched me and taught me like this one has.
Throw away your expectations before you open this novel. Timelines and linear thinking, events, customs, mental health, streams of thought the way you know them are abandoned. Punctuation, even grammar, is handed over to the artistic. Once you grasp on (and it took me awhile) I think what you'll find is powerful, a story that will seep into your bones for a long time.
December 24, 2019
As an audio-book, I had to replay the first few tracks constantly because I couldn't figure out what was going on! Initially, I was excited to read this book based on the summary which said "... funny novel" (it's definitely not!), but if it weren't for the summary printed on the CD case, I would have been totally lost! With that, and getting past the first two CDs, the story finally began making sense to me. It's a powerful narrative of neglect, incest, abuse and mental illness. The plight of Canadian-Indigenous women is all too real and must be addressed, but not in this format. "Magic realism" can be off-putting and very difficult to follow for many readers, whether it's in print or audio form. In my opinion, this was an unfortunate choice to use in the telling of such circumstances.
March 21, 2015
Coming in May!
A stunning debut novel, grounded in the sheer beauty of Cree poetics, love, and a benevolence few of us are lucky enough to know. The brilliance of Indigenous women dances off each page—this story is our story, so carefully woven together into a tapestry that is the spine of our collective beings. I see myself, my family and my life in every sentence. This is the novel Canada has been waiting for.
A stunning debut novel, grounded in the sheer beauty of Cree poetics, love, and a benevolence few of us are lucky enough to know. The brilliance of Indigenous women dances off each page—this story is our story, so carefully woven together into a tapestry that is the spine of our collective beings. I see myself, my family and my life in every sentence. This is the novel Canada has been waiting for.
May 28, 2016
Birdie is a gut-punch of a book.
But it's a hard one to talk about, given the history of indigenous peoples in Canada, and our current political fixation on the plight of native women. (Please note that any criticism here is directed to the fetishization of one cause at a time. The plight is real and serious and deserves to be dealt with, not just in 2015 and 2016 because it became momentarily trendy among progressives, but all the time, until it's solved.)
So what this isn't, is an Issue novel. Or a novel about The Evils of Colonialism. Although the issues are there, as are the generational impacts of Colonialism on Canada's native people.
It's the story of how centuries of all this crap landed right on the head of one young girl, who dealt with trauma after trauma until she couldn't, and she ... disintegrated. Psychologically. It's presented in the text in very indigenous terms, in Cree terms, and that is certainly how it was experienced by the protagonist and other characters; it could be understood as the vision quest as written, or as PTSD coming home to roost in spectacular fashion, or both (I tend to both).
Birdie felt very real to me, as did all of her friends and family. The writing is very assured, very sophisticated, for a debut. It's incredible.
Some previous reviews have criticized the tenuous grip on time and chronology, particularly in the first sections. Personally I didn't have any trouble with it. Of course her grasp of time and chronology is tenuous; she's stuck in bed with a massive, massive depression as a result of PTSD and going through flashback after flashback. This does not make for tidy story-telling.
Some previous reviews have also criticized the other characters on a moral level. I can see where they're coming from, but it's not a criticism I share. Yes, the people surrounding Birdie fail her on every level, even the ones who love her, even the ones whose job it is to protect her. They're human and they fuck up, terribly, and then they come back to try to save her when it may be too little too late. I don't feel, myself, that the book let them off the hook for this, only that Birdie is exceptionally forgiving and was able to see the good in them.
I couldn't put it down, which is pretty amazing when you consider that the actual novel is about a woman who is very depressed and goes to bed for a month. It doesn't sound compelling, plot-wise, but the unfolding back-and-forth of the flashbacks, the unspooling of her history, and the tremendous investment of the reader (at least this reader) in whether or not she will be able to continue coping with the cumulative impact of what she has experienced, was very compelling.
I highly recommend Birdie, and I hope it continues to be widely read and discussed for decades, not just while Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women are on the front pages of our newspapers.
But it's a hard one to talk about, given the history of indigenous peoples in Canada, and our current political fixation on the plight of native women. (Please note that any criticism here is directed to the fetishization of one cause at a time. The plight is real and serious and deserves to be dealt with, not just in 2015 and 2016 because it became momentarily trendy among progressives, but all the time, until it's solved.)
So what this isn't, is an Issue novel. Or a novel about The Evils of Colonialism. Although the issues are there, as are the generational impacts of Colonialism on Canada's native people.
It's the story of how centuries of all this crap landed right on the head of one young girl, who dealt with trauma after trauma until she couldn't, and she ... disintegrated. Psychologically. It's presented in the text in very indigenous terms, in Cree terms, and that is certainly how it was experienced by the protagonist and other characters; it could be understood as the vision quest as written, or as PTSD coming home to roost in spectacular fashion, or both (I tend to both).
Birdie felt very real to me, as did all of her friends and family. The writing is very assured, very sophisticated, for a debut. It's incredible.
Some previous reviews have criticized the tenuous grip on time and chronology, particularly in the first sections. Personally I didn't have any trouble with it. Of course her grasp of time and chronology is tenuous; she's stuck in bed with a massive, massive depression as a result of PTSD and going through flashback after flashback. This does not make for tidy story-telling.
Some previous reviews have also criticized the other characters on a moral level. I can see where they're coming from, but it's not a criticism I share. Yes, the people surrounding Birdie fail her on every level, even the ones who love her, even the ones whose job it is to protect her. They're human and they fuck up, terribly, and then they come back to try to save her when it may be too little too late. I don't feel, myself, that the book let them off the hook for this, only that Birdie is exceptionally forgiving and was able to see the good in them.
I couldn't put it down, which is pretty amazing when you consider that the actual novel is about a woman who is very depressed and goes to bed for a month. It doesn't sound compelling, plot-wise, but the unfolding back-and-forth of the flashbacks, the unspooling of her history, and the tremendous investment of the reader (at least this reader) in whether or not she will be able to continue coping with the cumulative impact of what she has experienced, was very compelling.
I highly recommend Birdie, and I hope it continues to be widely read and discussed for decades, not just while Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women are on the front pages of our newspapers.
March 13, 2016
i cannot guarantee i am going to make a lot of sense here as i work through my thoughts on this novel, so preemptive apologies if you've found yourself here on this review. :)
birdie landed on my radar last year, i kept hearing great things about this debut novel from the incredibly impressive and accomplished tracey lindberg. it was then chosen as a contender for the 2016 edition of canada reads. because of that, the book got bumped up my TBR list. also because of canada reads, the theme of 'starting over' was ever-present in my head as i was reading, as that is the framework for the program this year.
so, birdie. it's such an interesting novel. it's definitely a book that, for me, requires more than one reading. there's a lot going on here, and though i know i 'got' the story, there are just so many layers and dots to connect and consider. but it's not a book i want to jump right back into right away. this is an emotional read, to be sure. there are some heavy subjects which are so sad and heartbreaking. but there is also a strong heart and sense of compassion in lindberg's writing. the story, though very tough at times, isn't completely burdened by what birdie has endured. rather it is buoyant in birdie's survival.
i did have a couple of issues with the story. one of these was really getting 'in' to birdie. a good portion of the story has birdie in a bit of a vision quest/catatonic state - aware but unresponsive in her bed. birdie is a bookish, thoughtful woman and the story is very internal to her thoughts and memories. while i liked this aspect of the book very much, i felt a bit detached. at the same time - birdie seeming to be dissociative, given all she has lived through, is completely understandable. my second issue had to do with the timeline of the narrative. though i am usually totally fine with non-linear tellings, there was a very bumpy flow to this book. i think that because there are shifts in time, as well as birdie's dream sequences, it caused things to fragment just a bit too much. though, again, birdie's life was so fragmented. so i do get it... i just wish it had gone a bit more smoothly as i read - i kept getting jostled out of the story. and i wish that i loved it more. but, i am very glad i have read this book, and i hope that many people will discover it and appreciate what tracey lindberg has done in her debut work.
oh - and i have to give an awesome 'hurrah!' for the beachcombers, and jesse jim, specifically, being so important to birdie in her life. canadians of a certain age will likely all be going 'aww. yeah!'
i am quite interested in seeing how bruce poon tip will champion birdie in canada reads. he seems like such a smart, sensitive, and circumspect fellow.
birdie landed on my radar last year, i kept hearing great things about this debut novel from the incredibly impressive and accomplished tracey lindberg. it was then chosen as a contender for the 2016 edition of canada reads. because of that, the book got bumped up my TBR list. also because of canada reads, the theme of 'starting over' was ever-present in my head as i was reading, as that is the framework for the program this year.
so, birdie. it's such an interesting novel. it's definitely a book that, for me, requires more than one reading. there's a lot going on here, and though i know i 'got' the story, there are just so many layers and dots to connect and consider. but it's not a book i want to jump right back into right away. this is an emotional read, to be sure. there are some heavy subjects which are so sad and heartbreaking. but there is also a strong heart and sense of compassion in lindberg's writing. the story, though very tough at times, isn't completely burdened by what birdie has endured. rather it is buoyant in birdie's survival.
i did have a couple of issues with the story. one of these was really getting 'in' to birdie. a good portion of the story has birdie in a bit of a vision quest/catatonic state - aware but unresponsive in her bed. birdie is a bookish, thoughtful woman and the story is very internal to her thoughts and memories. while i liked this aspect of the book very much, i felt a bit detached. at the same time - birdie seeming to be dissociative, given all she has lived through, is completely understandable. my second issue had to do with the timeline of the narrative. though i am usually totally fine with non-linear tellings, there was a very bumpy flow to this book. i think that because there are shifts in time, as well as birdie's dream sequences, it caused things to fragment just a bit too much. though, again, birdie's life was so fragmented. so i do get it... i just wish it had gone a bit more smoothly as i read - i kept getting jostled out of the story. and i wish that i loved it more. but, i am very glad i have read this book, and i hope that many people will discover it and appreciate what tracey lindberg has done in her debut work.
oh - and i have to give an awesome 'hurrah!' for the beachcombers, and jesse jim, specifically, being so important to birdie in her life. canadians of a certain age will likely all be going 'aww. yeah!'
i am quite interested in seeing how bruce poon tip will champion birdie in canada reads. he seems like such a smart, sensitive, and circumspect fellow.
June 22, 2021
This was such a great novel for so many reasons. The author's voice came through loud and clear. The writing was gorgeous, and the message was powerful. Having said that, it was not an easy book to read because of the trauma experienced by the female indigenous characters, and because of the "time shift" narrative which made it confusing at times to follow. Although not an easy read, this is an important book if you want to understand some of the things that indigenous women suffer in today's society, both within and without their own culture. I finished it, appropriately, on National Indigenous Peoples Day, June 21.
March 10, 2016
As an English teacher and someone who reads Canadian literature often, I was disappointed with this selection. I picked it up because it is being featured on Canada Reads in March, under the theme of 'Starting Over.' Unfortunately, this theme was not part of my experience with the book.
Without ruining this for anyone, the ending does not provide our protagonist with any release...nothing is resolved, and the people that she most relies on to 'help her recover/heal' are some of the same people who participated in her pain, were witnesses to her tragedy without assisting, and they never apologize for it. The author herself said, "Because you care about your relatives. You don’t let your relatives get murdered or go missing." But these relatives allowed 'Birdie' to be raped for years as a child...and there is no reckoning or recognition of guilt, ever. No. This novel ends sour. It tells the reader that people don't really change, and if you get shit on by your relatives, going back to them is a way to heal...which is painful to believe.
Without ruining this for anyone, the ending does not provide our protagonist with any release...nothing is resolved, and the people that she most relies on to 'help her recover/heal' are some of the same people who participated in her pain, were witnesses to her tragedy without assisting, and they never apologize for it. The author herself said, "Because you care about your relatives. You don’t let your relatives get murdered or go missing." But these relatives allowed 'Birdie' to be raped for years as a child...and there is no reckoning or recognition of guilt, ever. No. This novel ends sour. It tells the reader that people don't really change, and if you get shit on by your relatives, going back to them is a way to heal...which is painful to believe.
October 3, 2023
I didn't really understand the flow of this story and how all the bits fit together.
Did it matter?
Not so much.
This is too realistic at times and highly emotional as a result.
Definitely recommend!
Did it matter?
Not so much.
This is too realistic at times and highly emotional as a result.
Definitely recommend!
August 2, 2017
4.5
Once I stopped trying to fit this story into a linear timeline, something magic happened. Something clicked, and it was beautiful. I wept as I finished the book, it has been awhile since this happened. I am genuinely grateful to the author for writing this book.
Once I stopped trying to fit this story into a linear timeline, something magic happened. Something clicked, and it was beautiful. I wept as I finished the book, it has been awhile since this happened. I am genuinely grateful to the author for writing this book.
March 13, 2016
A very big book. A book that requires slow reading and re-reading. A book that forces your imagination to use its peripheral vision.
September 18, 2016
Okay, here's the thing: I..........did not understand this book.
It's told in a very non-linear fashion. There are some magical realism elements involved, as the main character effectively spends the duration of the book on a dreamquest. It deals with some incredibly difficult topics, including sexual abuse of children, homelessness and alcohol abuse in Indigenous communities, rape, and the disappearance of Indigenous women in Canada. So it's not exactly a light and easy ready.
The blurb claimed that it was "darkly comic", but shockingly, it's just.....dark.
So. I liked the characters. I liked the emphasis on women supporting each other. I liked the writing. I even liked the non-linear storytelling. But ask me what this book was about, and I honestly couldn't tell you.
It's told in a very non-linear fashion. There are some magical realism elements involved, as the main character effectively spends the duration of the book on a dreamquest. It deals with some incredibly difficult topics, including sexual abuse of children, homelessness and alcohol abuse in Indigenous communities, rape, and the disappearance of Indigenous women in Canada. So it's not exactly a light and easy ready.
The blurb claimed that it was "darkly comic", but shockingly, it's just.....dark.
So. I liked the characters. I liked the emphasis on women supporting each other. I liked the writing. I even liked the non-linear storytelling. But ask me what this book was about, and I honestly couldn't tell you.
January 16, 2016
I really enjoyed the risks Lindberg took with the narrative, and was invested in the stories of Birdie, Maggie, Skinny Freda, Val, and Lola. Parts of the book were very dark--Lindberg was not afraid to tackle violence and abuse--but these elements were integral to the narrative.
However, some of these same risks made the story a bit inconsistent and unwieldy. The alternate perspectives of Maggie, Freda, Val, and Lola came late in the story, and would have been beneficial earlier. I found their sections some of the most engaging. There was a repetitive feeling to Birdie's sections that, while purposeful, distanced me from her.
But the story will stay with me. And I find myself still wondering about Maggie, whose final section in the novel hit me like a punch to the gut.
However, some of these same risks made the story a bit inconsistent and unwieldy. The alternate perspectives of Maggie, Freda, Val, and Lola came late in the story, and would have been beneficial earlier. I found their sections some of the most engaging. There was a repetitive feeling to Birdie's sections that, while purposeful, distanced me from her.
But the story will stay with me. And I find myself still wondering about Maggie, whose final section in the novel hit me like a punch to the gut.
December 23, 2021
My daughter bought me this book for my birthday/Christmas gift. I was stoked to read an Indigenous book by a Canadian Indigenous author, being an Indigenous Canadian myself.
I connected to this amazing story in so many ways. I saw myself in Birdie. I'm sure a lot of us do. I also saw myself in Freda though, and not just in name. The story of these five women was powerful. It was told in the most interesting way, I feel like it is still resonating through me as I write this review.
Pretty incredible debut novel!
Miigwetch to my daughter for gifting it to me!
I connected to this amazing story in so many ways. I saw myself in Birdie. I'm sure a lot of us do. I also saw myself in Freda though, and not just in name. The story of these five women was powerful. It was told in the most interesting way, I feel like it is still resonating through me as I write this review.
Pretty incredible debut novel!
Miigwetch to my daughter for gifting it to me!
July 27, 2021
Liked some parts of it. But this was way to "abstract" I think for me. Don't know the perfect word to use here but I had difficulties following the story. Some parts of it was captivating and very intresting but for the most part I was rather confused with the whole audiobook. Not sure if it would have been better if I had read it instead
February 24, 2019
An unequivocal five stars. This book is fantastic and will take its place among my favourite Indigenous reads - and my favourite overall reads. Birdie is an extraordinary character, and the way Lindberg tells her story is, quite simply, incredible. She weaves together memory and myth; the natural world and the "supernatural"; Indigenous, intergenerational and personal trauma; contemporary cultural landmarks (The Beachcombers!) with traditional ceremony.
And omg Birdie. Brutalized, tormented, abandoned ... she retreats into herself to save herself, to transform herself. This book is nuanced, it's sensitive, it provides a deeply contextualized look at what is underneath the surface of things, just as Birdie herself sleeps but underneath, travels travels travels. Also, it's very funny; gorgeously written; and its characters are beautifully well-articulated (maybe not the men, but who cares about them - this is a novel about women, and for good reason). Profoundly feminist and thoroughly Indigenous, the healing journey that Birdie takes - a journey that unites memory and experience, the 'then' and the 'now', and that allows the coming together of her own fragmented personality and her spiritual and physical selves - is at once individual and also that of multiple First Nations (Birdie is mixed, Cree and Métis) and then those First Nations within the colonizing nation state of Canada.
Exceptional, truly an amazing debut novel. I read it via audio performed beautifully by Alyssa Bresnahan.
And omg Birdie. Brutalized, tormented, abandoned ... she retreats into herself to save herself, to transform herself. This book is nuanced, it's sensitive, it provides a deeply contextualized look at what is underneath the surface of things, just as Birdie herself sleeps but underneath, travels travels travels. Also, it's very funny; gorgeously written; and its characters are beautifully well-articulated (maybe not the men, but who cares about them - this is a novel about women, and for good reason). Profoundly feminist and thoroughly Indigenous, the healing journey that Birdie takes - a journey that unites memory and experience, the 'then' and the 'now', and that allows the coming together of her own fragmented personality and her spiritual and physical selves - is at once individual and also that of multiple First Nations (Birdie is mixed, Cree and Métis) and then those First Nations within the colonizing nation state of Canada.
Exceptional, truly an amazing debut novel. I read it via audio performed beautifully by Alyssa Bresnahan.
March 30, 2016
I finished this book a week or so ago and then listened to all the Canada Reads episodes. Although I LOVED The Illegal and think Lawrence Hill is a master MASTER of the written word, I was very disappointed this book did not win as I think it is the book every Canadian needs to read. I was very disappointed with the comments made about the book on Canada Reads, especially by Farah Mohamed who was critical of the first 100 pages being hard to follow. The first 100 pages are challenging but they are so jutisfied by the ending and the overall message and theme of the book. Finding a true home and healing is not an easy, linear process and the structure and style of the book reflect that. Bernice (Birdie) Meetoos is a beautiful and inspiring character and her journey is unique and challenging and therefore demands a unique and challenging prose. Shelagh Rogers said Birdie rewards the serious reader and Bruce Poon Tip (who defended it on Canada Reads) said if you read and didn't get it, try again and try harder. He believed in the book so much he is putting 10,000 copies into Canadian high schools over the next few months. Read this book. It is beautiful and as we journey through reconciliation with our indigenous people in Canada it is the book that we all need to read.
February 18, 2016
I know I'm supposed to love the Canada Reads books as epic-Canadian-classics-in-the-making, but I have to say strongly disliked this one. The dream-like quality the author was attempting was muddy and much of the discussion of important current issues in First Native communities, and the important and beautiful symbolism was lost in the use of multiple narrators, multiple time settings and the conscious/unconscious state of the protagonist.
An important subject. But the methodology meant the meaning was lost.
An important subject. But the methodology meant the meaning was lost.
December 10, 2023
This was my second time attempting to finish Birdie. I had a really difficult time with this novel the first time I tried reading it, and I experienced the same feelings around the second time. It was only around page 150 that I started to appreciate Birdie and the story being told.
It is a sad story. Birdie, the main character, is a beautiful Cree woman who endured many hardships in her life that led to her being in Gibsons, British Columbia. She ended up here due to her obsession with Jesse, a character from The Beachcombers who is an example of a hardworking, successful Indigenous man, something that Birdie has little experience with. There is emotional, sexual, physical, and mental abuse present in Birdie's story. Her past has seemingly dictated her future until Birdie goes within herself and flies away. Lola, her bakery boss in Gibsons, her auntie Val, and cousinsister Skinny Freda try desperately to get Birdie to come back and habit her body form. Birdie spends weeks? months? disassociated from the world. She relives memories, visits old wounds, understands past relationships with her uncles and mother, and takes readers on a journey of the challenges she has faced. She is cared for by the three strong women in her life who fear that they are losing her Earth form. What they realize is that Birdie is even more resilient and stubborn than they thought.
Birdie's story is fluid and tenses shift as Birdie has the ability to go between past, present, and future. Cree words have been woven in beautifully throughout the novel. The ending was poetic and I felt that it tied all loose ends up. I am glad that I gave Birdie another chance. The second half of this novel was where the story really took hold for me.
It is a sad story. Birdie, the main character, is a beautiful Cree woman who endured many hardships in her life that led to her being in Gibsons, British Columbia. She ended up here due to her obsession with Jesse, a character from The Beachcombers who is an example of a hardworking, successful Indigenous man, something that Birdie has little experience with. There is emotional, sexual, physical, and mental abuse present in Birdie's story. Her past has seemingly dictated her future until Birdie goes within herself and flies away. Lola, her bakery boss in Gibsons, her auntie Val, and cousinsister Skinny Freda try desperately to get Birdie to come back and habit her body form. Birdie spends weeks? months? disassociated from the world. She relives memories, visits old wounds, understands past relationships with her uncles and mother, and takes readers on a journey of the challenges she has faced. She is cared for by the three strong women in her life who fear that they are losing her Earth form. What they realize is that Birdie is even more resilient and stubborn than they thought.
Birdie's story is fluid and tenses shift as Birdie has the ability to go between past, present, and future. Cree words have been woven in beautifully throughout the novel. The ending was poetic and I felt that it tied all loose ends up. I am glad that I gave Birdie another chance. The second half of this novel was where the story really took hold for me.
December 4, 2017
This book is very relevant because it deals with the issue of missing indigenous women in Canada.
My rating of three stars is based purely on how much I "enjoyed" it.
I didn't really. It is written in a stream of consciousness writing style which I had a hard time with. Were it not for the cover description and certain reviews I read, I would have had a hard time understanding what was happening. The subject matter is a lot to take in. Birdie, a Cree woman from Northern Alberta, travels to Gibsons, BC where she gets a job at a bakery. At some point she goes into a type of catatonic state and relives various parts of her life which includes sexual abuse from male relatives, her mother leaving then going missing, the wisdom of her grandmother, homeless on the streets of Edmonton, a stay in a sanatorium and finally the strength of the family.
This is all told in a non-linear fashion. Her aunt, cousin come to Gibsons and together with the bakery owner Lola they set to heal her.
The authors intent is clear, but not heavy handed. She humanizes missing women and tells their story.
If you don't like stream of conscious writing with a story told in a non-linear way you might prefer The Break, another book written by an indigenous Canadian author, although it's not about missing women.
My rating of three stars is based purely on how much I "enjoyed" it.
I didn't really. It is written in a stream of consciousness writing style which I had a hard time with. Were it not for the cover description and certain reviews I read, I would have had a hard time understanding what was happening. The subject matter is a lot to take in. Birdie, a Cree woman from Northern Alberta, travels to Gibsons, BC where she gets a job at a bakery. At some point she goes into a type of catatonic state and relives various parts of her life which includes sexual abuse from male relatives, her mother leaving then going missing, the wisdom of her grandmother, homeless on the streets of Edmonton, a stay in a sanatorium and finally the strength of the family.
This is all told in a non-linear fashion. Her aunt, cousin come to Gibsons and together with the bakery owner Lola they set to heal her.
The authors intent is clear, but not heavy handed. She humanizes missing women and tells their story.
If you don't like stream of conscious writing with a story told in a non-linear way you might prefer The Break, another book written by an indigenous Canadian author, although it's not about missing women.
July 21, 2018
I’m not sure how to rate this book. I started it then put it down, the started it again. It took time to trudge through. It was interesting. It is very well written... but in an unusual way... It was at times difficult to read and difficult to understand.
It is not written in a typical linear format. It jumps in time and topic. Actually it “shifts” .
But it is interesting because it encompasses indigenous culture yet it includes global themes of love and relationships, struggles, family, hardships. While there are many dark topics and events there are also a few satisfying and happy times.
Not only was it difficult to read, it is hard to explain.
Yet it is very much worth reading. In fact, I will read it a second time, but not too soon.
So back to rating it... it deserves more than a three stars but until I can better understand and explain it, I can’t ...explain it. :/
It is not written in a typical linear format. It jumps in time and topic. Actually it “shifts” .
But it is interesting because it encompasses indigenous culture yet it includes global themes of love and relationships, struggles, family, hardships. While there are many dark topics and events there are also a few satisfying and happy times.
Not only was it difficult to read, it is hard to explain.
Yet it is very much worth reading. In fact, I will read it a second time, but not too soon.
So back to rating it... it deserves more than a three stars but until I can better understand and explain it, I can’t ...explain it. :/
January 25, 2024
Beautiful. Poetic. Disorienting. Heartbreaking. Hopeful. Transformative. Difficult. Infuriating. Encouraging. Reckoning. Healing. These are a few of the words that I could use to describe my feelings about this novel.
I started listening to this on audiobook and knew within the first few minutes it was not the correct format for me to consume this story so I switched to the text. Lindberg's style is unique. Shifting verb tenses and timelines are interspersed with dreamacapes and poetic snippets of storytelling and tied together with words and definitions from the Cree language.
Birdie's journey is a difficult one. There is not a clear resolution, but a sense that she has reached a certain degree of healing that will allow her to move forward. The characters felt so real to me and I have a sense they will remain with me for a long time.
I started listening to this on audiobook and knew within the first few minutes it was not the correct format for me to consume this story so I switched to the text. Lindberg's style is unique. Shifting verb tenses and timelines are interspersed with dreamacapes and poetic snippets of storytelling and tied together with words and definitions from the Cree language.
Birdie's journey is a difficult one. There is not a clear resolution, but a sense that she has reached a certain degree of healing that will allow her to move forward. The characters felt so real to me and I have a sense they will remain with me for a long time.
June 4, 2017
Two stars may be unkind, but I didn't like Birdie much. One has to be careful when giving a poor rating as it is easy to mistake a poorly written book with a well written book about a subject matter that either holds no interest or is not appreciated. In my opinion, this book has flaws with both style and content. Stylistically, I can't stand reading about other people's dreams or out-of-body experiences. And the constant shifting of time between past and present made the story hard to engage in and strained the believability of the characters. Content-wise this is the second highly rated book I've read this year (the other is A Little Life) whose main thrust is to heap as much physical and mental abuse as possible on a single character. Then, to generate maximum sympathy and goodwill from the reader, the mistreated individual is surrounded by guardian angel-like figures there to inform us of how wonderful the poor character is before they attempt to rescue them. I believe someone in my book group referred to it as "trauma porn". While less egregious than A Little Life I find this approach to storytelling to be emotionally manipulative and ultimately unsatisfying.
February 28, 2016
I found this novel very difficult to read. Right from the beginning I could not catch the thread of what the story was about. By reading to the end of the novel I now understand the seriousness of the subject matter and I sympathize with the horror of experiences so difficult that one must go to extremes to cleanse oneself of such horrible memories. However, the way the novel is structured makes it one of the most difficult reads I have come across in a longtime. I wish I was in a bookclub where I could discuss the book from different vantage points. Since this is not the case I have to say that I can not recommend this read to anyone.
December 13, 2017
I had a hard time with this book. It's emotional and heartbreaking. It's disjointed and hard to follow. Time isn't linear, there are dreamscapes, memories, real-time. It all blends together.
The stories of Birdie, Val, Maggie, Lola and Freda are sad at times but show such resilience and strength. It's the strength these women show that shines through.
I listened to the audio and am not sure if that lead to the feeling of disjointedness and detachment I felt. The subject matters of abuse, homelessness and poverty are heavy. This story says so much. I'd like to read this in print and see if it gels better.
The stories of Birdie, Val, Maggie, Lola and Freda are sad at times but show such resilience and strength. It's the strength these women show that shines through.
I listened to the audio and am not sure if that lead to the feeling of disjointedness and detachment I felt. The subject matters of abuse, homelessness and poverty are heavy. This story says so much. I'd like to read this in print and see if it gels better.
November 18, 2016
This book is a wonderful portrayal of the strength of women and the families they create to support one another. It's also a brilliant look at the life of an individual indigenous person and the community to which she belongs. The writing style was challenging for me, but also very rewarding. It was a lovely use of native language and storytelling that really made the story come alive. I thoroughly enjoyed this book.
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