The Angel of Solitude

Janet Money, formerly the sports editor of the Woodstock Daily
Sentinel-Review, is a freelance writer and editor in London, Ontario.

It’s hard to know whether it’s the translation or the original that
makes this novel difficult to comprehend. Paragraphs extend for three
and four pages; sentences encourage the mind to wander, the eye to skim,
and the fingers to turn the pages faster and faster without any
understanding of what’s going on. There is certainly a lyricism to
this prose, but it’s so hypnotic that it takes away from whatever the
point of the novel—if there is one—might be.

Eight Montreal lesbians living in community are the focus of the novel,
and their thoughts, dreams, reflections, and adventures make up the
plot. Beyond that, it’s hard to understand and harder to explain. This
is surprising from the author of Nights in the Underground, which was
also about a Montreal lesbian community, but one portrayed in much
sharper lines.