“Spring Planting charts the journeys of four people, mother and daughter, grandfather and grandson, all of them trying to find a way to make it through the confusion that ordinary life often presents. The absolute confidence of youth is paralleled with the wisdom of age in this moving story that appeals to the heart and mind without ignoring the funny bone. It's about learning to listen, trusting the truth in unlikely places, and allowing oneself to laugh again. Spring Planting was the winner of the Saskatchewan Writers Guild award and another play of Brennan's, Tiger's Heart, won the 1994 National Playwriting Competition, a remarkable accomplishment and testimony to the high regard her work commands across the nation.”

— The Ottawa Citizen

“Brennan's story is simple, as two widowed neighbours in a small Ontario town, 81-year-old Garnet and 30-something Jill, try to console themselves while coping with a generation gap. Garnet, who we learn cannot read, is less than pleased that his grad-school grandson has come to stay, while Jill's increasingly angry 15-year-old daughter Caroline becomes a bitter source of frustration.

Jill's new teaching job in Alberta seems like a blessing, but for Caroline it's a curse, separated from friends, and forced to deal with Jill's abusive new boyfriend. At one point she slaps her daughter in a fit of rage, forcing Caroline to run back home to the safety of Garnet's porch. Things aren't much better between Garnet and Robert, as they too come to blows over the elder man's stubborn inability to confront the truth about his own illiteracy and the different world in which Robert is forced to live.

Spring Planting is utterly convincing in its portrayal of the ever-changing family dynamic and the importance of opening our eyes to those whose lives we touch every day.”

— The Chronicle Herald