2024/090: All the Little Bird Hearts — Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow

2024/090: All the Little Bird Hearts — Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow

... in a painting, the artist intends all the uncomfortable truth he has put there, somewhere within the beautiful image, to be read. In life, the opposite is more often true. [loc. 1264]

Sunday is neurodivergent, raising her teenage daughter Dolly alone (though Dolly's father, who Sunday calls 'the King', is still around: Sunday works in his parents' greenhouse) and accustomed to a solitary, quiet life. Then she befriends, or is befriended by, glamorous new next-door neighbour Vita, and is beguiled by Vita's kindness and her childlike demands. Sunday is not very good at people, but Vita and her husband Rollo welcome her and Dolly, and don't seem fazed by Sunday's insistence on dining solely on white food and cold fizzy drinks.

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