A deserving winner of the 1999 Giller Prize, Burnard's first novel is a charming, bittersweet chronicle of a family's life in a small Canadian town spanning almost fifty years. That it is set in Canada should not be off-putting to any reader - it could truly be any family in any town such is the strength of her story-telling and her ability to create a scene so normal and familiar that memories are awakened and connections made. Throughout, it is difficult to remember that this is fiction and one suspects that Burnard, if not writing autobiographically, is at least drawing heavily on her own life given that the novel spans 1949 - 1997 and the author is in her mid-fifties. Beautiful, easy prose that is unforced and comfortable leaves one wistful for the earlier years yet hopeful for the future.