Seasoning Fever

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

In Susan Kerslake’s first novel in 12 years, two teenagers, Matthew,
“drunk on dreaming,” and his young girlfriend, Hannah, abandon the
differing comforts of their eastern Canadian homes and embark on a
journey of physical and mental hardship before settling precariously on
a hardscrabble patch of untilled western prairie.

In just over three years, the dewy-eyed pair claim land, construct an
earthen-floored cabin, acquire a cow and a horse, plant a minimal
garden, suffer trespasses from marauding Indians, suffer interminably
from year-round prairie wind and weather, become acquainted with a
paucity of neighbours, and bear a son and a daughter. Matthew is saved
by an apparitional Native from freezing to death, Hannah is accosted by
a neighbour’s son who wants her to run off with him, and they are both
befriended by a mysterious travelling cowboy troubadour. Throughout
their settling in, Matthew never shakes free of his dreams of a bigger
spread and appears willing to sacrifice his relationship with his wife
and even his life to fulfill his fantasy. Hannah, a sadder but wiser
realist, turns to her children for comfort while bemoaning her fate and
decrying her deteriorating marital relationship.

Kerslake’s novel is first-class literary fiction, polished and
poetic, evocative of time and place, resplendent with imagery, and
populated with cleverly drawn characters that are revealing of the human
condition. Seasoning Fever is a book to be read and reread for the
pleasure of its language, the subtlety of its story, and the
universality of its insights.