Love Object

Britta Santowski is a freelance writer in Victoria.

Apple Ford, Ontario, is the small-town setting of Sally Cooper’s debut
novel. Narrator Mercy Brewer is a teenage girl struggling with sanity,
popularity, sexuality, and the absence of Sylvia, her insane mother.
Mercy has also developed a voyeur’s interest in her brother Nicky’s
secret passion for cross-dressing. The tale begins with Mercy, almost
17, dealing with both fond and disturbing memories of her now-missing
mother.

Weaving the past and the present, Cooper presents a complex tapestry of
the Brewer family. Through Mercy’s lens, we see that her parents,
Sylvia and Sam, have slipped into a marriage of complacency, where Sam
is contentedly engaged outside of the home and Sylvia’s intelligence,
creativity, and identity are annihilated by the tedium of housekeeping
and childrearing. We also meet the many colourful characters on the
periphery of this family’s core, including Sam’s two brothers, Larry
and Reese, and Mercy’s grandmother, Vi. Mercy’s unrelenting snooping
and Vi’s brazen and unedited tales of passion combine to unveil family
idiosyncrasies and secrets.

The chronology is sometimes difficult to follow and there are some
minor inconsistencies, but the outstanding writing and strong insights
make this coming-of-age novel an exceptional contribution to Canadian
literature.