by Ann-Marie Macdonald
Knopf Canada, Toronto, 480 pages, $28.95
reviewed by Carolyne A. Van der Meer

The first few pages are snapshots, descriptions of black and white photos from timeworn cameras, and for a brief moment we are reminded of Morag Gunn surveying her childhood album in Margaret Laurence's The Diviners. But what emerges from these faded sepia prints with their torn corners and bent edges is Ann-Marie MacDonald's first novel, Fall on Your Knees, a tale that hauntingly sears its images into our memories.
MacDonald, a Toronto playwright and actor, is probably best known for Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), an award-winning play that self-consciously pokes fun at Shakespeare's Othello and Romeo and Juliet. Her acting experience in numerous productions, for both screen and television, has garnered her a Gemini award as well as a Genie nomination. It is no surprise, then, that Fall on Your Knees, without being theatrical or melodramatic, is alive as though it is being performed while our eyes skim the pages.
Set mostly on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, and partly in New York City in the swinging twenties, Fall on Your Knees is a harmonious mix of laughter, sorrow, scandal, and simple magic. A story of epic length, it begins with James Piper, an ambitious young piano tuner and repairman who takes a Lebanese child-bride, Materia, the daughter of one of his clients. Estranged from her family for eloping with this enklase (a derogatory term for an Englishman), Materia is soon pregnant and trapped in an unhappy union, a state of affairs all too obvious at the outset. She gives birth to Kathleen, who grows into a green-eyed redhead with a divine voice, her vocal chords a personal gift from God. While James lavishes attention on Kathleen and instructs her in music and singing, Materia, but a child herself, is unable to love her little daughter. When James realizes his feelings for Kathleen are laced with lust, the child is sent off to school, and James's desire for Materia reawakens.
Mercedes and Frances are born with little time in between, and MacDonald's weave becomes decidedly more complex. When spoiled Kathleen is sent off to New York to pursue a career as an opera diva, Mercedes and Frances take centre stage, their characters as different as they are unforgettable. The slightly pious Mercedes and the clever but naughty Frances make for a unique brand of entertainment. Before James's taste for little girls can cause harm to his two younger daughters, he goes off to fight in World War I (but, much to Materia's chagrin, comes home alive).
After the war, Kathleen suddenly returns, the fourth sister, Lily, is born, both Materia and Kathleen die, and MacDonald's plot, though blanketed in a kind of magic dust, becomes more sinister and mythical. The circumstances of Kathleen's return come to light, as does the mystery surrounding Lily's birth. With waves of hell-bent hilarity and mind-gripping fear, Fall on Your Knees takes us on an unexpected journey, where we encounter incest, homosexuality, and crime -- and, despite these shattered lives, calm. While we twist and turn along the story's path, never quite knowing what to expect, one thing is obvious: MacDonald's voice as a novelist rings out loud and clear, and there is no doubt she is here to stay.

Carolyne A. Van Der Meer is
a Montreal writer and editor.

Copyright © 1996 Duthie Books Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Literascape is a Trademark of Duthie Books, Ltd.
Information Desk -=- Order Desk -=- Webmaster