Book review: Bird Summons, by Leila Aboulela

When you read in the blurb for this book that “On a road trip to the Scottish Highlands, the women are visited by the Hoopoe, a sacred bird whose fables from Muslim and Celtic literature compel them to question the balance between faith and femininity, love, loyalty and sacrifice,” do you think “great, a bit of magic realism always spices a novel up,” or do you sigh and mutter, “we don’t really need this sort of stuff, do we?” The point is that in such cases the author is always taking a risk, moving from one register to another. Leila Aboulela just brings it off, nevertheless leaving one with the suspicion that this novel might have been more satisfying if she had dispensed with the Hoopoe.