Imagine getting an assignment: You must write a novel and include a quote from Shakespeare and an allusion to birdwatching in each and every chapter. Could you do it? I know I couldn't, or that if I did it wouldn't be worth reading, but that's exactly what Jamie Langston Turner has done in this novel, and she makes it look effortless. Of course it helps that her main character is an 80 some year old woman who was married to a Shakespeare scholar and whose main occupation is watching the birds at the feeder outside of her window. 
Turner, in her usual relective manner, has this character, named Sophie, observe the world around her with great detail and insight.  You wouldn't think an elderly woman who stays at home all day and watches TV would create much of a story, but through Sophie the reader learns about Patrick and Rachel, who are struggling to reconnect with people after the tragic kidnapping and death of their children.  They reach out to their neighbors, who have one daughter who is severly disabled and another who is a teenager on the verge of self-destruction.  And they also connect with Sam, a black man on parole after being jailed for a burglary attempt.  And of course there is Sophie herself, whose own troubled past includes a husband who was shot to death by his son.  As Sophie thinks about quotes from Shakespeare and about birds, the reader also sees how God is at work behind the scenes, bringing together unlikely people to form a family of sorts and to reveal His love. 
I highly recommend this book, but read it when you have the time to do some reflection of your own.  And you might also be inspired to brush up on your Shakespeare or to do some birdwatching afterwards.  After all, who knows what you might learn from it?