Nina BerkhoutRecensioni

The writing in this book is excellent, with well developed characters. The story itself is so, so sad. A mom (Constance) who dreamed of being an actress and feels trapped in her housewife role, A dad (Henry) who'd like to be an artist but works as a janitor. And two sisters. The eldest is Vivienne , a beautiful child pushed into the beauty pageant world by her mother. And Edith, in love with a boy who loves her sister. No character has more than fleeting moments of happiness throughout the book.

That said, it's a compelling read about the bond between sisters. Beautifully written.½

Dawn doesn’t need complications in her life. She’s busy brooding day after day over her flamed-out opera singing career, spending hours each day streaming her last, humiliating performance. It wasn’t what she expected for herself, but she’s on hiatus now while her voice heals, and at least now she and her husband of five years, Ash, have time to start the family they’ve always wanted. So the last thing she needs is her brother-in-law, Tariq, whom she barely knows, moving in with them. Nor does she want to tutor a bunch of quirky, amateur whistlers in need of a coach.

Tariq, who didn’t even attend their wedding, nor did he stay long at Ash and Tariq’s father’s funeral, shows up the very next day, with African Grey Parrot, Tulip, in tow. And Dawn, who storms down to her agent’s office after meeting with the whistling group, finds out that her contract with the opera company requires her to work or she doesn’t get paid. So, Dawn trudges back to meet with the amateur siffleurs (whistlers), angry and short-tempered in her dealings with them. And, she gets roped into taking Tariq to his chemotherapy appointments, as her husband can’t cancel his twice daily stops at his aging mother’s house, both breakfast and dinner, for a visit.
hat Tariq wished, without ever actually voicing his preference.

The novel is one of pain and loss, struggle and redemption, and finding that new path in life, as the one we thought we were on doesn’t always lead us where we thought.

#NinaBerkhout
#WhyBirdsSing
#NetGalley

An opera singer who has “flamed out”, a suspect marriage, a brother-in-law with cancer and a remarkably interesting African Grey parrot that ties everything together made for a very enjoyable reading experience. Life can be so tricky – one day you are a sought-after Opera singer, the next day you are lucky to be teaching whistling. One day it is your fifth wedding anniversary the next day you are being assaulted by your brother-in-law’s Congo African Grey Parrot. You just never know what the next day is going to bring but Dawn is about to find out and I went along for the ride.

Nina Berkhout has given each of her characters a distinctive voice which range from aggravating to laugh out loud funny. Her descriptions of the narrator’s operatic disasters are so cringe worthy that you cannot help but pity poor Dawn Woodward in the most positive way. She has drawn equally strong characterizations of the major and minor characters and it just all works so well. Thank you NetGalley and ECW Press for a copy.

Really 4.5 stars.
I received an advance copy from ECW, thank you.

This book is delightful, quirky, heartwarming, poignant, funny and sad all at once. The book covers friendship, ambition, and acceptance.
Dawn is a opera singer, who had a disastrous performance hurting her voice and her pride. She has sequestered herself at home with her husband Ash, who's a workaholic, so basically she's alone and in a rut. During her recuperation, her contract calls for her to teach a class at a local college. Reluctantly she agrees to this, and at the same time Ash tells her that his brother, Tariq, will be staying with them. Tariq is sick with cancer and Ash has offered that he stay with them. Tariq has a parrot that goes everywhere with him. When Dawn walks into the class she's going to teach, she finds a group calling themselves the Warblers. The Warblers are a group of mismatched characters, bonded by the love of whistling. Tariq and his parrot Tulip join the class, and what ensues is a heartwarming story of friendship, bonding, acceptance, and memories.

This is a well written but exceedingly bleak story of two sisters, Vivienne and Edith, growing up in Ottawa, Canada in a dysfunctional and loveless family. Their parents married when the girls' mother, who had come to New York from France to pursue fame and fortune, got pregnant. Their father (at the time a struggling artist in New York) did the "right"(actually, very wrong!) thing and so begins the terrible story of the family's apparently unending unhappiness. Her own dreams unrealized, Con, the girls' mother primps, preens, and pushes the beautiful elder daughter, Vivienne, through endless childhood beauty pageants, placing the family in debt in order to do so. Later, Vivienne, a talented artist begins the downward spiral of addiction from which Edith, who lives in Viv's shadow, attempts to rescue her. Berkhout's story is layered and accomplished, but the subject matter is certainly dark and depressing. I was sufficiently interested in the sisters to complete the book, but it is not one I'd recommend, nor am I convinced that I'd read anything further from Berkhout.½

A slim volume of vignettes and poems which build a picture of the time Berkhout spent on a Bahamaian island establishing a community museum. She thinks about love, the sea and sandflies a lot. It's also funny, elegeiac and beautiful.