Birdie

December 7, 2015
Lindberg's debut novel is a twisting, darkly funny, heartbreaking, sometimes brilliant and sometimes incoherent tale situated in the complicated inner life of Bernice "Birdie" Meetos. Bernice is a Cree woman who was born and spent her childhoood on a reserve in northern Alberta. From there, she is sent to a Christian school, foster care, and a psychiatric hospital, and eventually ends up living on the streets of Edmonton, Alta. Finally, she moves from Alberta to Gibsons, B.C., ostensibly in hopes of meeting a native actor whom she idolized as a teen. Throughout much of the book Birdie has taken to her bed in her room above Lola's Little Slice of Heaven, the bakery in Gibsons where she works. There, in waking dreams, she begins to deal with the emotional and sexual abuse she endured as a child as well as the death of her mother. The novel's timeline and plot are difficult to follow as they move between Bernice's past and present, waking and dreaming, concrete reality and spirit world. The book's strength lies not in its larger story but in its small moments, particularly when Birdie is reflecting on her childhood. Lindberg is a Cree and Métis lawyer and a professor of law and indigenous studies at two universities. If her next work of fiction has better structure and a more coherent narrative, she will also be an important voice in Canadian literature. Agent: Carolyn Swayze, Carolyn Swayze Literary Agency (Canada).