Welcome to Litsy!

Trigger warnings for pretty much every page in this mesmerizing #feminist work that defies categorization: dystopian science fiction? contemporary realism with a touch of fantasy? poetry? Whatever genre doesn‘t matter because even though I sometimes felt like I‘d lost the narrative thread, the imagery kept drawing me onward. The part about the Montreal massacre (of 14 women in 1989) particularly hit home. Layered, troubling & compelling. #Canadian

Beneath my
house the
seasons
moved in
waves. I
despised the
rank,
custardy
sunlight. The
arrogant
needlework of
winter.

At first the Townspeople brought offerings,
sugary wine and chocolates in obscure flavours:
fire, copper, pavement-after-summer-rain.

Each day, we would set out striving to forget the previous one. Each night, a minder would bring us a pill the size and colour of a cherry, and after swallowing one, darkness would drop over our heads like a photographer‘s cloth. Each morning, the sun set its burning face at our bars. We were guarded by a dog with a face like coughed-up meat. […] And yet, once I could think, I thought: This life is manageable.

Down the street, elderly men floated out of the nursing home like pressed flowers from a novel, cotton balls scotch-taped to the insides of their arms.

I am panting / I am climbing / The mountain on the outskirts of Town / The Oracle will be found at its summit / My mouth is full of my own dust / Lines from my own poems / Rise unbidden in my mind / Humiliating me

5🌟This book is a contemplative look at the brutality and misogyny against women and of their survival in a small town. Peter's has done a beautiful job using different writing styles and voices to share this dark yet at times humorous tale. I really enjoyed this book! I read it in one sitting. Its slim but very dark and raw, it really packs a punch! I loved the mix of poetry and prose and all the vivid imagery.
#bookreview #bookblogger