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At the Bottom
of the Sky
by Peter Dubé
Montreal: DC Books,
2007, ISBN-13: 978-1-89719-019-7, 120 pp., $18.95 paper.
The eleven tales comprising the slim volume At the Bottom of the Sky limn a territory where art flirts with madness and friendships are imbued with an unsettling degree of instability and paranoia. Montreal author Peter Dubé illuminates the lives of a gang of urban compadres whose identities are defined by social rebellion and intellectual one-upmanship. But this potentially rankling mise-en-scène is redeemed by the author's descriptive powers and luscious use of poetic language.Though this short-fiction collection is set in Montreal, each story is named for a character in ancient Greek (and in one case, Roman) mythology. The interlocking tableaux focus far more on setting and character than plot, leading the reader through a demimonde of Goth bars, gay cruising grounds, twilit street corners, and even into the literal bowels of the metropolis. Against the backdrop of these subversive settings, first-person narrator Thom and his friends question their relationships, and in some cases, their sanity.
In "Actaeon," psych-ward inmate John complains to the visiting Thom about the fact his meds are being increased, in the next breath offering an elaborate conspiracy theory about the disappearance of government scientists. Walking the grounds, they revisit earlier days together, reminiscing about work in videography and touring with bands. In this short scene, Dubé creates a revealing portrait of one man's seeming disintegration. But before he gets out the door, it's Thom who lurches into fantasia, as he glances at a passing old man and conjures up surreal fantasies of him.
The story "Janus" is named after the god of gates and doorways--in it, Thom navigates the passages of an abandoned building where men congregate for sexual encounters. Eventually, in a taut and efficient scene, he finds what he is looking for, comparing the moment of orgasm inside another man to a pilgrimage to a holy river. The tale is more grounded and less esoteric than it sounds, and it works as art, as well as erotica.
Not every entry packs the same punch. "Lycaeon" and "Menelaus" are a pair of letters exchanged by Thom and Adrian, whose disappearance from the circle of friends figures loosely across all the stories in the book.
In "Lycaeon," Adrian tells Thom of meeting a stranger in a bar and instantly embracing him. Dubé establishes a touching moment that will resonate for anyone who has ever made an unexpected emotional connection with another person. But we subsequently learn the man was Thom himself, a revelation that feels a bit too perfect. Thom writes his response to Adrian in a coffee shop across the street from the home of their mutual friend Terrence, a visual artist prone to destroying his own work. As Thom watches Terrence paint over his own windows, an agitated and seemingly mentally ill man stands on a street-corner pulpit offering warnings about alien abduction. But the "crazy person" just feels like an overt symbol here, somewhat hollow.
Yet elsewhere, Dubé's imagery is less determined, more oblique and haunting. In "Paris," a short reflection on estrangement between friends and former romantic partners, one man sees himself in the other's sunglasses, and the author's description infuses the scene with an almost psychedelic emotional power.
Some of the strongest moments of At the Bottom of the Sky are achieved the few times Dubé combines his love of poetic detail with a strong narrative drive--such as "Cerberus," about the trespasses of urban explorers, and the final story "Charon," in which a city bus driver asks all of his passengers to join him in finding out what happens when societal rules are collectively broken. I don't want to reveal the plot--I'll just say that it's a delightful end to an unusual, ultimately rewarding book.
Shawn Syms has work forthcoming this fall in The Journey Prize Stories 21 (McClelland & Stewart) and I Like It Like That (Arsenal Pulp).
Buy this book at McNally-Robinson Booksellers.