April 20, 2006

 

by Billie Livingston

Random House Canada, 2006

 

By John Burns

 

For those of us who’ve wondered where strippers go when they hang up their pasties, Vancouver’s Billie Livingston provides an imaginative and nuanced answer. It’s not the answer a lot of guys might be looking for, but there you have it: desire, it turns out, doesn’t belong just to the guys.

 

Vivian Callwood—smart, prickly, emotionally stunted—is more than a little conflicted when her mother dies at the start of this sophomore novel. “I had anticipated this scorpion dance of ours might fade away in my forties,” she funks the day of her mother’s funeral. “But she hadn’t given me the luxury of time. I was furious with her for it.”

 

The fury dissipates over the next 450 pages, as Vivian comes to terms with her mother’s life and death. A conveniently uncovered trunkful of memorabilia sets our hurtin’ heroine’s sights on her mother’s wayward teen years. It’s quickly apparent to Vivian that her mother was an exotic dancer, moll, and Rat Pack hanger-on until she was (maybe) pushed out of the life by the CIA, Bobby Kennedy, and a bunch of stern but loving goodfellas. It’s also increasingly clear to the reader that Vivian’s modern-day plans to start an on-line porn company with her nogoodnik Vancouver boyfriend may not go any further than her mother’s once-upon-a-time burlesque career.

 

Redemption runs rampant in the novel; Cease to Blush is hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold/journey-to-self-discovery chick lit, and the chances of a bittersweetly happy ending are as high as Vivian’s boyfriend. (Other characters—various riffs on confidants—are less compelling.) What makes the book fascinating is Living?ston’s willingness to let her narrator make whole chapters up. Vivian, lost and alone, with nothing but scraps and hearsay, constructs a credible past for her mother. Is it true? Undoubtedly not. Is it authentic? It’s balm to Vivian’s grieving heart and a razzle-dazzle tour of the glam-tastic ’60s, so why not?