George: A Magpie Memoir

Artist, poet, and children’s author Hughes, the daughter of poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath, delightfully narrates her debut memoir about her rescued magpie, George. Based on her extensive diary entries, her memoir begins in the spring of 2007 when a single magpie chick survived after his parents abandoned their storm-ravaged nesting site. Thriving on hand-fed worms and dog food, George blossomed into an intelligent and mischievous bird who spent his youth riding on Hughes’s shoulder as she painted and revitalized her Wales fixer-upper and its garden. George loved all things red, especially rubber bands, which he stashed throughout the house, and got along famously with Hughes’s three canines. However, not all humans were fond of George’s antics, as he liked to swipe food from plates and springboard off heads for entertainment. George proved to be the catalyst for Hughes’s rescue work, which later included a crow and an owl. Interspersed within the narrative, Hughes sensitively discusses her management of chronic fatigue syndrome, back pain, and her deteriorating marriage.