Trapdoor to Heaven

Sheree Haughian is an elementary-school teacher-librarian with the
Dufferin County Board of Education.

In the Eastern tradition, a soul may spend many lifetimes striving for
what is perfect. Trapdoor to Heaven may be quite ironically named; there
are no easy shortcuts to the celestial in the evolutionary experience of
the character simply identified as “the servant.” As the world
swirls into the chaos of last things, the servant “sits and lovingly
weaves sand into glass.” The memories of many reincarnations are
clarified as lyrical stories, each one as well polished and intricate as
a bit of crystal.

Choyce’s soul-in-progress seems to defy linear time. An interval in
Mesopotamia or medieval Europe may follow encounters with the
science-fiction technolust of future centuries. As eternity comes to
fruition, past and present time seem to fuse in the mind of the servant.
Straightforward narrative chronology would be somehow counter to the
essential message of this fiction. Thus, each individual tale brings
forth its own fascinating mythologies—the nurturing snakes of the
ancient kingdom of Agalpha, an implant that can revise memory, the
women’s alchemy that blocks the warring designs of the Roman Church.
Perhaps the most enduring link among these stories is the soul’s
attempt to accept and preserve humanity and human relationships with all
their many flaws and blemishes.

Trapdoor to Heaven is varied and cerebral, and bears careful reading
and rereading. Once again, Lesley Choyce has revealed the originality of
his mind.