Polar vortex

First Title Value for Searching:

Polar vortex

Personal Author:

Mootoo, Shani

Physical Description:

333 pages ; 18 cm.

Genre:

Domestic fiction.

Psychological fiction.

Lesbian fiction.

Summary:

"Some secrets never die... lesbian couple 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 Vortex is a story of secrets, deceptions, and revenge. It asks readers: Are we ever free from our pasts? Do we deserve to be?"--

Subject Term:

Lesbians -- Fiction.

Lesbian couples -- Fiction.

Interpersonal relations -- Fiction.

Stalking -- Fiction.

Secrecy -- Fiction.

Publication Info:

Brooklyn, New York : Akashic Books, [2020]

Subject:

Lesbians -- Fiction.

Lesbian couples -- Fiction.

Interpersonal relations -- Fiction.

Stalking -- Fiction.

Secrecy -- Fiction.

Ontario -- Fiction.

Domestic fiction.

Psychological fiction.

Lesbian fiction.

Female gay people

Female homosexuals

Gay females

Gay women

Gayelles

Gay people, Female

Homosexuals, Female

Lesbian people

Lesbian women

Sapphists

Women, Gay

Women homosexuals

Human relations

Interpersonal relationships

Personal relations

Relations, Interpersonal

Relationships, Interpersonal

Social behavior

Concealment

Canada West

Антарыа

Antarya

Онтарио

Οντάριο

אונטריו

Onṭaryo

Ontarijas

オンタリオ州

Ontario-shū

オンタリオ

Ontariu

Онтаріо

אנטעריא

Onṭeryo

Ontarėjė

安大略省

Andalüe Sheng

安大略

Andalüe

SAILS ISBN:

9781617758621

Available:

Library	Shelf Number	Shelf Location	Status
Searching... New Bedford Free Public Library	FIC MOOTOO	FICTION	Searching... Unknown

Bound With These Titles

On Order

Summary

It seemed like a good idea to both Priya and Alex to cement their newish, later-in-life relationship by leaving the past behind to create a new life together. But there's leaving the past behind - and then there's running away from awkward histories. Priya seems totally committed to her relationship with Alex, but she has a secret - a long-standing on-again, off-again relationship with Prakash. To Priya, Prakash is little more than an old friend, but in reality it's a bit more complicated. And, she's never told Alex. Prakash has tracked Priya down, and before she realises what she's doing, she invites him to visit. Alex is not pleased, and soon the existing cracks in their relationship widen, not least because Alex has her own secrets. Prakash has an agenda of his own, fuelled by years of resentment about what he sees as Priya's slipperiness and duplicity. Things soon come to a head and the three must all reap the consequences of their choices.

Reviews (2)

Publisher's Weekly Review

Mootoo (Moving Forward Sideways Like a Crab) serves up a slow-burning examination of identity, gender, desire, and immigration through the relationship of an older lesbian couple living on a small tourist island in Canada. Priya, an artist and Indian raised in Trinidad, narrates most of the novel while she and her girlfriend, Alex, await the arrival of Priya's longtime friend Prakash, an Indian man whose family fled Idi Amin's regime in Uganda. Priya and Alex had moved from Toronto to the rural island to concentrate on their creative work, but the mostly white setting makes Priya feel out of place. Prakash, meanwhile, had pursued Priya for years even though he was married with children and Priya was dating women. As Priya goes through the day, memories of her past drift in and out as she questions her troubled relationship with Prakesh, and Prakesh's imminent arrival puts a strain on Priya's relationship with Alex. The precise prose outlines the factures of trust and Priya's temptations, as Priya struggles with the differences between Alex and Prakash in relation to her feelings as an immigrant. Mootoo's subtle, thought-provoking tale stands out among stories of characters gripped by the past. (Sept.)

Kirkus Review

Will an old lover's revelations disrupt an apparently secure lesbian couple? Artist Priya has moved to the Canadian countryside to make a new life with Alex, her lover, a writer. But a visit from Prakash, a male college friend, threatens to expose secrets from her young adulthood she hasn't shared. After Prakash gets in touch with her after many years and Priya invites him to visit, she begins having nightmares, fearful that Prakash's revelations could destroy her relationship. Priya's short chapters of first-person narration attenuate the suspense as Alex, attuned to Priya's unease, ferrets out facts and asks more probing questions. Photographs from college show Priya and her roommate, Fiona, together with Prakash. Priya, who's never told Alex that Fiona was her lover, finesses questions on that subject. Nor has Alex, who at one point asks whether Prakash is homophobic, guessed the deeper secret: That Priya and Prakash were also lovers. Flashbacks flesh out Priya's romantic relationships with Fiona and then Prakash and recall bumpy patches in her six years with Alex. The last time Priya saw Prakash, he was married; does his plan to visit alone mean that he and his wife, Aruna, have divorced? A visit from close friends Skye and Liz raises more uncomfortable questions. The third of Mootoo's four movements is narrated by Alex, whose insight and compassion come into play after Prakash shares personal secrets that even Priya hadn't known. A final heart-to-heart between Priya and Prakash triggers still more changes. Compellingly charts the complexity of human relationships, the illusions of memory, and the corrosive power of denial. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.