After the literature of the Holocaust comes the literature of the Holocaust’s children. Spared the immediate horrors of the Second World War, they are left with the more subtle task of witnessing the witnesses – interpreting the agonies and desires, often unspoken, often unspeakable, that shaped their parents.

This slim collection by a two-time Journey Prize nominee recounts, in 11 linked tales, the experiences of the Birnbaum family: mother Hannah, father Ernst, son Avi, daughter Rachel, and their extended family and friends.

The German-Jewish Ernst and Hannah, escapees from the Nazis, land briefly in Israel, then spend most of their lives in Montreal, changing with age and the altering landscapes. A spirited Hannah in Germany grows hopeful and dogged in Israel, clinging and fearful in Canada. Ernst, who forces the move to Canada, becomes a harsh, self-enclosed man, baffled by his wife and his own ability to continue surviving. In one small jewel of a story, “In This Corner,” the 81-year-old Ernst avidly watches wrestling on TV while Hannah flings bitterness and scorn at him. The choreographies and injuries of the wrestling are replicated in the marriage’s ancient dance.

Rachel, who narrates many of the stories, plays the role of post-Holocaust witness, alternately resisting and reaching out to her troubled parents. Much of Song of Ascent is made up of the ordinary marital and intergenerational stuff of families, but when history breaks into the moment – as Ernst tries to prevent Rachel from seeing a concentration camp scene on TV, in Hannah’s swift account of a cheerful uncle gone insane in a day – these quiet stories and their mainly plain language can lift off the page.