This is a finely crafted novel about everyday people having everyday lives over a period of some 50 years. The author looks at life, death, love, hate, injury and healing, and all in all does so in a simple prose that draws you in and makes you really care about what happens to the characters.

However, if I have one small criticism, it is that the book is simply not long enough to give all of the detail of the lives of the characters, and it is this which stops it from being a truly spectacular novel. For instance we know that one of the children born will grow with some sort of physical or mental burden, but it is only hinted at until she is almost fully grown. Perhaps this is what makes the book so tantalising - the prospect that more will be revealed later, but I found that there was often insufficient to whet the appetite.

But in the scope of the novel it is a small criticism, and it is well worth reading.

While A GOOD HOUSE is not a riveting and fast paced book, it is a good read that breaks from the currently popular literary attitude that life is full of HORRIBLE, UNREAL and INESCAPABLE tragedies. There are tragedies that occur, but they are truly human events that can be dealt with courageously. They are things that may happen to our own families. It's an interesting journey through several lives, kept very readable by the author. Happiness intertwines with sadness. Deception runs throughout, not used to damage, but to soften or comfort already damaged lives. For a first time novelist, I have to give Burnard the thumbs up, she handled things quite well. And I appreciate her respect toward her characters' intimate lives. So many currently popular novels overlook the fact that the reader can create scenes in their own minds, that they can't understand what happens during sex without having it all spelled out there on the page. Burnard tastefully and respectly handled this far to often degraded topic. She left it to the imagination, something hard to find these days. Thanks to the author for not offending my belief that love is and can be sacred. In all, A GOOD HOUSE rates as a good book, I'm glad I took the time to read it, It was well written--even though it wasn't a page turner.

This is a beautiful book. It lulls you and pulls you into the world of a Canadian family from the war years on -- a group of ordinary, decent people who brave life's usual difficulties: kids' accidents, the deaths of loved ones, troubled children, good people undone by old age. You can tell that this author loves people: the stuff of ordinary life, she seems to say, is worth our attention. As an American reader, I enjoyed this book because the characters also seem a little exotic in their own way (if you can think of Canadians as exotic). These are fairly stoic people, a little repressed, moral, genuinely preoccupied with the importance of acting decently. This is not a book that relies on fabricated drama or cute characters to grab your attention. Instead what you get is the wisdom of an author who really knows people, and who is able to capture the small and great events in their lives with beautiful, precise language. This is also a novel that acquires momentum and becomes more profound with every page. The portrait of Mr. Chambers in his old age is powerful, moving and brilliant.