The critically acclaimed Birdy is an inventive, hypnotic novel about friendship and family, love and war, madness and beauty, and, above all, "birdness". Wharton crafts an unforgettable tale--one that suggests a notion of sanity in a world that is manifestly insane.
For schoolteacher Thomas Abbey there was no writer to equal Marshall France, a legendary author of children's books who hid himself away in the small town of Galen and died of a heart attack at the age of forty-four. Tom and his girlfriend Saxony, wanting to write France's biography, arrive in Galen, where they discover the writer's fiercely protective daughter Anna is waiting for them. Before long, they realise that this idyllic little town and its inhabitants - both human and animal - are not quite what they seem: France's magic has spread beyond the printed page . . .