Heyday

Woodrow's engrossing tale of love's complexity and occasional terrible fatality contains two largely parallel plot lines. Separated by a century, they are connected by their setting (Toronto Island, in Lake Ontario) and equally nuanced and insightful views about romance's highs and lows. In 2006, photographer Joss is sequestered at her island home, grieving the sudden death of her wife, Bianca. Trying unsuccessfully to envision the future, Joss is also taking stock of a marriage that never overflowed with ardor and a life getting smaller and more timid year by year. The alternating chapters feature Bette, the strong-willed 17-year-old daughter of a spiritualist and a suffragette. During the summer of 1909, a chance meeting with tomboyish Freddy, a slightly older and much poorer carny at a Toronto Island midway, alerts Bette to a new world of adventure and strong feelings she is uncertain how to interpret. Aside from facing the unspeakable taboo of being lesbian in Edwardian Canada, orphaned immigrant Freddy is fending off a pair of awful older men and planning an escape. In both periods, the women dream of Coney Island's amusement park as an idyllic place that, once visited, will grant them the freedom to begin again. Woodrow (Spelling Mississippi) captures bygone and recent Toronto with graceful prose. (Sept.)