Polar Vortex
Shani Mootoo
Some secrets never die...
Priya and Alexandra have moved from the city to a picturesque countryside town. What Alex doesn't know is that in moving, Priya is running from her past from a fraught relationship with an old friend, Prakash, who pursued her for many years, both online and off. Time has passed, however, and Priya, confident that her ties to Prakash have been successfully severed, decides it's once more safe to establish an online presence. In no time, Prakash discovers Priya online and contacts her. Impulsively, inexplicably, Priya invites him to visit her and Alex in the country, without ever having come clean with Alex about their relationship or its tumultuous end. Prakash's sudden arrival at their home reveals cracks in Priya and Alex's relationship and brings into question Priya's true intentions.
Seductive and tension-filled,Polar Vortexis a story of secrets, deceptions, and revenge. It asks readers: Are we ever free from our pasts? Do we deserve to be? (FromBook*hug Press)
Polar Vortexis on the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlist.
Shani Mootoois a writer and visual artist who has been longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. Her debut novel was 1997'sCereus Blooms at Night.
Giller Prize jury citation:"A keen meditation on the complexities of identity and desire,Polar Vortexis the unsettling examination of a failing marriage. In a small, southern Ontario town, Priya impulsively invites an old suitor, Prakesh, to spend the night and his arrival triggers the fault lines in her relationship with Alexandra. Conflicting wants and untold truths drag the past into the present. Memories cascade and clash as Mootoo masterfully dismantles the stories the narrators tell themselves in language as unsparing as winter."
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From the book
I stormed past her, out of the main part of the house and to my studio. At once I remembered the installation three altarpieces made for a gallery exhibition that had taken place years before I knew Alex based on that old recurring dream, the one I awoke to just a short while ago. Pieces of it three dark brown beer bottles are stored on a shelf, there for all to see. I'd removed the original labels from the bottles and made my own for each. Alex had once, a good while ago, held up one of the bottles and examined the label, but didn't pay it more than cursory attention. I had observed this but offered no explanation. The label on the bottle she held is a composite photograph of a bride and groom standing around a Hindu-like altar, a square box filled with dirt low on the ground. At the centre of the altar a fire burns brightly. The bride wears a red wedding sari. Behind them is a wall of red paper decorated with gold paisley. The marrying couple is arranged so they seem to be praying together, their eyes fixed on the fire in the altar. Prakash is the man in the photo. I dressed up and posed for the photo of the woman, but my face is hidden behind a veil.
From Polar Vortexby Shani Mootoo2020. Published by Book*Hug.
Why Shani Mootoo wrote Polar Vortex
"Polar Vortexis about Priya, a Trinidadian Indian lesbian who cameto Canada at a young age. Shedoesn't know what the possibilities are for her,living as a lesbian. What she knows, is that she will struggle with family. She is trying to figure out if it is possible to keep her family through marrying a man.
"I know a lot of people, particularly Trinidadian Indian men, who are gay but have married women. That is unfair to do to the woman. Some of the women know, but they're kind of trapped, or maybe there's good money involved.
In the end, love to truly love and to truly be loved that's authenticity. You want authenticity.- Shani Mootoo
"In the end, love to truly love and to truly be loved is authenticity. You want authenticity. That's what I was trying to get to with this book. Priya is living a life of constantly trying to figure these things out."
Read more in her interview with CBC Books.
Interviews with Shani Mootoo
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