Bottle Rocket Hearts
CBC Books | Posted: August 2, 2018 6:31 PM | Last Updated: August 2, 2018
Zoe Whittall
Welcome to 1990s Montreal. It's been five years since the OKA crisis and the sex garage riots; the queers are rioting against assimilation, cocktail AIDS drugs are starting to work and the city walls on either side of the Main are spray-painted with the words YES or NO. Revolution seems possible to 18-year-old Eve, who is pining to get out of her parent's house in Dorval and find a girl who wants to kiss her back. She meets Della: 10 years older, mysterious, defiantly non-monogamous and an avid separatist. Their explosive beginning and volatile relationship paves a path for the personal and political to collide on the night of the referendum. (From Cormorant Books)
From the book
MONTREAL GENERAL HOSPITAL WAITING ROOM
DECEMBER 1996
DECEMBER 1996
A fluid that tastes like floor cleaner is dripping down the back of my throat. I'm jittery, and he's making the other people in the waiting room uncomfortable. We are waiting for Della, who's locked up somewhere inside the hospital. We are not family. We're waiting on faith that eventually we'll be allowed to see her. This is somewhat ironic because we've been avoiding her for a number of weeks; her pessimism and anxiety had been like a cheese-grater across our hopeful faces. We are bothering the nurse at the front desk, but we don't mean to. We hold hands, kids scared of what we don't know.
From Bottle Rocket Hearts by Zoe Whittall ©2007. Published by Cormorant Books.