Singing Sky

Susan Patrick is a librarian at Ryerson Polytechnical University.

Childhood memories of the Depression era on the prairies form the basis
of this collection of short stories. In these reminiscences, Margaret
Creal captures not only the atmosphere of time and place, but also the
restricted worldview and emotions of the child, of (sometimes misplaced)
guilt, fear, embarrassment and love, now reviewed from the perspective
of an adult. Although the stories detail the ordinary daily events of
life growing up in a less-than-well-to-do minister’s family, they are
peopled with an array of interesting characters—an unbalanced
immigrant who has a breakdown, an eccentric schoolteacher who becomes a
British Israelite, a glamorous bachelor uncle who takes her to meet the
Governor General, a disliked friend whose married older brother becomes
a love object. The stories are capped by an evocative description of the
adult author’s visit to her mother’s birthplace on the Isle of
Lewis—of the proud inhabitants and the rugged beauty of the geography.
These detailed stories are enjoyable reading and provide a valuable
portrayal of a bygone era, but it is the author’s sense of humanity
that shines through the writing and stays with the reader.