Autobiographical work, describing the 1920s slum childhood of a Scottish girl. She recalls the "characters" in her lane, days out in the country...and the fraught (but not always) relationship with herr mother:
"Those rare moods of communication between Janie and her Mother more than made up for the other thoings lacking in their relationship. And yet, if these moments had never existed, it would have been so much easier for Janie in the years to come."
Janie ends up "put into care." ( )

Kesson’s autobiographical novel The white bird passes tells the story of a young girl growing up in a slum district of a Scottish small town (Elgin) in the years after World War I. It could easily have been the Scottish A tree grows in Brooklyn, but that’s not the way Kesson wants to go: her heroine is a wonderfully sharp observer, refreshingly free of any sort of conventional morality. She revels in the way her neighbours - whores and petty criminals - somehow manage to maintain their dignity by defying authority and supporting each other at times of trouble. Of course, we readers get to see a bit further than little Janie, and realis e the adult misery behind the defiant attitude, and the way no-one in the community is really strong enough to maintain the mutual support when their own survival is at risk. It’s not an uplifting story, in the usual sense, nor is it a story of triumph over adversity - in Janie’s world, it’s pretty clear that adversity will get you every time. But it is a magnificent, very Scottish, account of how important it is to be proud of being human and keep on struggling for the impossible. ( )

I've just re-read this and it's as poignant and beautiful a book as I remember. Based on the reality of Jessie Kesson's upbringing in the 1920s in the poverty yet vibrant communal life of one of the historic closes of the cathedral city of Elgin in Morayshire in Scotland, it's ahead of its time in the impressionistic writing style and packs a real emotional punch. ( )