I loved reading this family tale, with a strong bird theme throughout. I was surprised that the author was not a firm birder herself because the references all seemed very apt and quite passionate but, as I read in the acknowledgements, if she wasn't, she is a little bit now. All the bird mentions worked really well for me. Aside from that theme, there's the subject of homelessness and the housing crisis, while ironically a 30-year-old character is able to purchase a beautiful flat in London (outskirts but still) working in social housing services. Another weird fact was that this character mentions not everyone having a mobile phone in her university years, which would be around 2005. I found this bizarre and it wasn't even necessary for the action to develop. Other than that, this was pretty engaging and made me cry.