Owls Do Cry

Owls Do Cry is the first novel of one of New Zealand's most acclaimed classic writers, Janet Frame. Hailed as a masterpiece on first publication in 1957, it is comparable to Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey - now reissued in our new Classics With Bite style.

"There is nothing in the world the matter with me, except that I have been bathed in a trough and dipped under a waterfall and the pine-needles picked from my scars. . ."

This is the story of the Withers family: Francie, soon to leave school to start work at the woollen mills; Toby, whose days are marred by the velvet cloak of epilepsy; Chicks, the baby of the family; and Daphne, whose rich poetic way of seeing the world leads to a heartbreaking life in institutions. A dazzling, fierce cry of darkness and joy, Janet Frame's debut novel is a poetic masterpiece and a timeless classic of New Zealand literature.