Owls do cry

Description:

Set in provincial, pre-1940 New Zealand, this novel explores the Withers family and in particular Daphne. When one of Daphne's sisters, Francie, dies at the rubbish dump where the children search for treasure, a crisis is provoked which leads Daphne to a mental asylum where she is given shock treatment. Her voice from 'the Dead Room' haunts the novel with its poetic insights.

subjects: Fiction, general,  Mentally ill,  Fiction,  Families,  Electroconvulsive therapy,  Alienation (Social psychology),  Nineteen forties,  Social life and customs,  Manners and customs,  Fiction, historical,  New zealand, fiction,  New Zealand Women authors,  Biography,  New Zealand Authors,  Mental illness

People: Janet Frame

Times: 20th century