The Bird House: A Novel

This is the story of a mother haunted by a secret she has long kept hidden. Now as she grows old, she finds she must come to terms with an act she committed as a young mother…the secret she kept will come out.

As Grandma Ann Biddle assists her 8 year old granddaughter Ellie with a school project, she finds herself questioning her memory of the past. She finds herself wondering what is actually a memory, and what is her impression of the event. Ann is no longer sure what really happened, or the way things really happened. She isn’t sure if her recollections are things she created to protect herself from the truth, and the pain of the past. She knows she must face the facts before it is too late.

Ann’s daughter-in-law Tinsley is Ellie’s mother. She feels the need to protect her own daughter from Ann. Unsure of Ann’s health and tenuous grip on reality, Tinsley feels responsible for monitoring the bond, as well as past secrets and their effect on the family’s future.

Time will tell. Secrets always come out, one way or another. Family shares your history. These three generations of women will come together because of heartbreak, but ultimately for healing. Indeed there is strength in numbers, and in love. ( )

I liked Bird House, however it touched a cord..I am in my 60's and am having memory problems as well as health. Maybe it was just too real, which says something for how well Bird House is written. Until now, I would have not believed that all families had secrets, but they are coming home in my family too. We sit with a room full of secrets and I so identified with Annie. I loved Standing Still, and Bird House comes in second. ( )

Interesting characters & setting. At times the story seem to veer from family drama to a mild horror story but settled back into family drama with a life lesson. ( )

My review may be read on my book review blog Rundpinne: http://www.rundpinne.com/2011/03/book-review-the-bird-house-by-kelly-simmons.htm... ( )

This is one of those books I'm not even sure where to begin. Just when you think you have gotten to the crux of the situation in this one, the author pulls another surprise out of her bag of tricks. I read this in one sitting, it reads quickly, easily and elegantly. The writing is great, the plotting is amazing and the characters are intriguing. What more can you ask for in a book?

The Bird House, at it's core is about family secrets. We get to see these secrets through the eyes of Ann who is a grandmother now and trying to connect with her granddaughter, Ellie through a school project at first and then just trying to keep the connection going. Ann has been through a lot as we read her journal in the present and back in the 60s as well. The journal entries shed light on Ann's life as she is struggling with the family secrets and with the dementia that is starting to creep into her life.

And it seems like the family secrets are destined to keep on as Ann learns things about her daughter-in-law and her son as well, through Ellie and through everyday life. The insights are what make this book. The reader gets a glimpse of everything on the surface, how life looks to others and to ourselves at the time we are living it. Then the insight of reading the journal 40 years later comes into play or seeing the life through the eyes of child, really gets to the heart of what is going on. I loved the insight. I loved how it made all the lives that are intertwined in this book three-dimensional and something you could see from several sides. The lives come to life on the pages of the book. You feel for each character. Even when something seems totally wrong, you can see something in it that makes you understand why the character did what they did.

The characters in this book came to life for me, especially Ann and Ellie, who the book focuses on. Ann's journal entries really help you see the whole person even as she is starting to forget things as she is getting older. Ellie is a great foil to the aging Ann, not just in the age difference, but in the fact that while Ann is struggling to understand, Ellie just takes things as she sees them and doesn't look any further than that. And sometimes that is what we need to do as Ann learns, just take things at face value. I felt close to both of these characters and felt the connection that I like to have when I read books.

Ms. Simmons has a true gift for writing this type of novel. I look forward to going back and reading Standing Still now as well. The Bird House to me was amazing, and what I loved even more is it is written on an easy to understand level. No lofty language or things you really have to study to understand. No, The Bird House is written as real life and that is what makes the book a wonderful book, to me. ( )