Product Description

Ava Sing Lo has been accidentally killing her mother's birds since she was a little girl. Now in her twenties, Ava leaves her native San Diego for the Salton Sea, where she volunteers to help environmental activists save thousands of birds poisoned by agricultural runoff.

Helen, her mother, has been haunted by her past for decades. As a young girl in Korea, Helen was drawn into prostitution on a segregated American army base. Several brutal years passed before a young white American soldier married her and brought her to California. When she gave birth to a black baby, her new husband quickly abandoned her, and she was left to fend for herself and her daughter in a foreign country.

With great beauty and lyricism, The Book of Dead Birds captures a young woman's struggle to come to terms with her mother's terrible past while she searches for her own place in the world.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1924850 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04-22
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .64" h x 5.34" w x 8.00" l, .43 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

From Booklist
Ava Sing Lo is the daughter of Helen, a Korean woman forced into prostitution on a segregated American army base, and one of the clients she serviced. All of her life, Ava has sensed that her mother, often depressed and withdrawn, is ashamed of her past and her daughter's dark skin. Helen is fascinated with birds, which seem to encompass for her some vital message about fragility and survival, but Ava has been accidentally killing her mother's pets since she was a little girl. Now Ava wants to head to the Salton Sea, the site of the worst bird die-off in American history, where she also hopes to repair her fragile relationship with her mother. This first novel is the winner of Barbara Kingsolver's Bellwether Prize for a work of socially and politically engaged fiction; however, Brandeis' novel suffers, at times, from overly fraught symbolism and an awkwardly tacked-on subplot. The author is at her best in her lyrical descriptions of nature and in the finely detailed portrait of the emotional tug-of-war between mother and child. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
“[A] vivid tale of a woman learning to save and cherish life.” (San Francisco Chronicle )

“THE BOOK OF DEAD BIRDS is a story of healing--a skillful, textured weaving of dark and light.” (Donna M. Gershten, author of KISSING THE VIRGIN'S MOUTH )

“Lyrical, imaginative, beautifully crafted, and deeply intelligent. Before anything else, its characters take you by the heart.” (Barbara Kingsolver )

“[It] has an edgy beauty that enhances perfectly the seriousness of its contents.” (Toni Morrison )

“A moving and perceptive first novel.” (O magazine )

“Brandeis’s writing is sensitive, lyrical and diverse.” (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel )

“A uniquely inventive novel.” (Rocky Mountain News )

“The plight of the mother and daughter is … heartbreaking.” (Kirkus Reviews )

“Moving … powerful and strangely interesting.” (St. Louis Post-Dispatch )

“An emotional story forged in crystalline prose.” (Bust Magazine )

“Intricate and elegant ... a novel that illustrates a compelling search for meaning that is ultimately familiar.” (Denver Post )

Donna M. Gershten, author of KISSING THE VIRGIN'S MOUTH
“THE BOOK OF DEAD BIRDS is a story of healing--a skillful, textured weaving of dark and light.”