Something So Sweet weaves together two people’s lives in end-of-the-20th-Century Toronto and Ottawa. Suicide, addiction, sex, murder, and an almost-blind seer who reads cigarette butts like tea leaves, this contemporary fiction novel is meant to shine a tiny light on the imperfect trajectory of damaged people.

Spanning nine months, from October 1997 to June 1998, Something So Sweet follows the lives of Dirty and Henry, two people who never formally meet. The story gives us alternating, month-long windows into each of their lives until the final, terrible moments in June, when they both appear in the same hospital room: one to commit murder, and the other to atone for their sins.

In this distinctly Canadian riff on The Odyssey, it is like the Coen Brothers’ “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” meets Alanis Morissette’s “Jagged Little Pill”. (click the cover for more)