This time next year is the phrase that sums up the yearnings of each member of the Birdsong family. For Julia Birdsong, the redheaded, stubborn, and attractive mother, it is a house in town--away from the tenant farm in Alabama on which she lives--a house with running water, an indoor toilet, and all the amenities. This is a story in which the deep relationships among the members of the family, the simmering antagonisms between the parents, and especially the awareness of love between child and parent, are real and moving.