Raspberry Vinegar

Joan McGrath is a Toronto Board of Education library consultant.

A dozen separate but linked episodes piece together the kaleidoscopic life of a small girl. Her existence is more dreadful than she realizes, for the unpredictable violence and ugliness of a house of drunkenness is all she has ever known. Like all children trapped in such circumstances, the nameless girl has learned lessons of survival and deceit, and of premature independence. Shunted from place to place, she makes a refuge wherever, briefly, the chance is offered. Hers is a life of so much pain, yet from the cracks between, an eager spirit snatches at the tiny slivers of joy life allows. A haunting collection of searingly autobiographical fiction.