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  • Published: 28 May 2014
  • ISBN: 9780141391946
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 272
  • RRP: $32.99

The Bird's Nest




The unsettling story of a young woman's descent into mental illness, from the author of The Haunting of Hill House

Elizabeth Richmond is almost too quiet to be believed, with no friends, no parents, and a job that leaves her strangely unnoticed. But soon she starts to behave in ways she can neither control nor understand, to the increasing horror of her doctor, and the humiliation of her self-centred aunt. As a tormented Elizabeth becomes two people, then three, then four, each wilder and more wicked than the last, a battle of wills threatens to destroy the girl and all who surround her. The Bird's Nest is a macabre journey into who we are, and how close we sometimes come to the brink of madness.

  • Published: 28 May 2014
  • ISBN: 9780141391946
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 272
  • RRP: $32.99

About the author

Shirley Jackson

Shirley Jackson was born in San Francisco in 1916. She first received wide critical acclaim for her short story 'The Lottery', which was published in 1949. Her novels - which include The Sundial, The Bird's Nest, Hangsaman, The Road through the Wall, We Have Always Lived in the Castle and The Haunting of Hill House - are characterised by her use of realistic settings for tales that often involve elements of horror and the occult. Raising Demons and Life Among the Savages are her two works of nonfiction. Come Along With Me is a collection of stories, lectures, and part of the novel she was working on when she died in 1965.

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Praise for The Bird's Nest

The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable ... It is a place where things are not what they seem; even on a morning that is sunny and clear there is always the threat of darkness looming, of things taking a turn for the worse.

A. M. Homes

Shirley Jackson is unparalleled as a leader in the field of beautifully written, quiet, cumulative shudders

Dorothy Parker

Shirley Jackson is one of those highly idiosyncratic, inimitable writers ... whose work exerts an enduring spell

Joyce Carol Oates