Vivian Zenari reads from Deuce
Gilda Peterborough has always worried about her twin, but when Pete deletes his Facebook page, she goes to red alert. Meanwhile, Pete and Gilda’s mother Beth frets about both of her twins, neither of whom seem to be thriving. When Pete abruptly decides to move away from Edmonton to Montreal, Gilda decides to track him down. Beth tries to help by befriending Pete’s former co-worker.
Pete (a.k.a. Philippa, a.k.a. Phil) is intersex, a biological fact Gilda believes is the root of all Pete’s social problems. As far as Pete is concerned, however, the problems all lie with his twin, who is always on his case. Both Beth and Gilda hope to find Pete and somehow reconcile the family’s unresolved past, which is haunted by the influence of Ralph Peterborough, a father who has never accepted his children for who they are.
In Montreal, Pete meets Philip McDonald, owner of the bed and breakfast where he and Beth lived when they were on the lam more than twenty years ago. Through Philip, Pete meets members of the LGBTQIA+ community and expands his quest for liberation in ways he never expected.
"In prose as deceptively straightforward as her characters, Vivian Zenari has created a tale revealed in layers, peeled away one after another, surprising the reader with the poetry and turbulent complexity beneath the surface. With compassion and true insight, she tells of a family navigating secrets, lies and identity, travelling through time as fluid as gender.Deucereminds us that we can invent our own game with our own rules. And the win, when it finally happens, is so much more satisfying than we anticipated."
—Darrin Hagen, author of The Edmonton Queen
https://www.inanna.ca/product/deuce/