A ‘strange and heady mix’

Variations on a Dream
by Angélique Lalonde 

Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 2026 
$26.95 / 9780771012600

Reviewed by Harvey De Roo

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Variations on a Dream, a first novel from an author short-listed for the Giller Prize for her story collection, Glorious Frazzled Beings, is an extraordinary work—inventive, eclectic, heartfelt, playful, angry, often brilliantly written, mingling myth and actuality, with characters waking from various ‘dreams’ into various realities. 

From its opening line—“Once upon a time…”—Angélique Lalonde’s novel lets us know the kind of world we’re entering and that a woman named Sarah has wakened from a dream castle to an unhappy marriage. In keeping with this quirky beginning, Variations makes imaginative use of several narrative levels and registers, concocting a delightful mélange. Levels: main narrative, flashback, myth, dreams, fantasies, ruminations, unexplained fragments, letters, emails, stories written by the characters, sometimes about another character. Registers: neutral, analytical, contemplative, poetic, visionary, demotic, earthy. A strange and heady mix.

The main narrative tells of a marriage, from its beginnings in the childhoods of Sarah and Trevor to meeting in university and falling in love and dreaming themselves into an idealized but increasingly disenchanting marriage. Sarah begins as a girl desperate to please an erratic father; and Trevor, as a boy with a doting mother and a disapproving father, radically changed by his discovery of his father’s misogynistic porn collection. 

Add to this his introduction to Charles Bukowski by his university buddy and guru, Sean. Lalonde’s portrayal of his awakening into masculinity through his friend’s tutelage is well realized and very funny, the dialogue spot on. All too soon, however, Trevor becomes a caricature: man as toxic. He is the stereotypical male: entitled, self-regarding, exploitative, oblivious to anyone’s reality but his own. The quality that saves him is that occasionally he provides a good laugh, as with his sexual fantasies and porn habits, for example.

The story really belongs to Sarah, its central character: idealistic, loving, giving, self-sacrificing, resourceful, desperate. Whereas Trevor is one-dimensional, Sarah is anything but in her waking into subservience, at first joyous and optimistic, then more and more desperate as she tries to make her marriage work, finally finding freedom to be who she is. She is a compelling character, in the idiosyncrasy of her thinking, and the sometimes rhapsodic flights she takes, as in her luminous inner monologue on the beach at English Bay when away from her husband.

The myth Lalonde invokes is that of Ariadne, the young woman who risks much to save a man. She is the princess who helps Theseus find his way out of the labyrinth with a thread she has given him, who loves him and is abandoned by him. This story becomes a symbol of the mired life and the attempt to escape it. In fact, it provides the book’s organizing principle, as indicated in the table of contents: “Origin Myth,” “Inside the Labyrinth,” “Thread Leading Out,” and “Dreaming.”  

Ariadne is also the name of one of the characters, who, like her mythic namesake, proves a guide figure. She is a stunning young woman Trevor and Sarah meet in college, whom Trevor idolizes but hasn’t the courage to approach, settling instead for Sarah. She too is enamoured of Ariadne, is ‘awakened’ by her. They become intimate friends, at one point having a night of glorious sex brought on by mushrooms. This section of Sarah’s first awakening is deeply moving. Her loving connection to Ariadne, a friendship that allows her to be herself, is radiant with the language of a blossoming heart. But Sarah chooses Trevor as the more feasible partner and commits to him utterly.

Ariadne becomes a more complicated figure as years later she reappears as Masha, a beautiful young woman who is the spitting image of her. Masha has starred in a porn film by a feminist, who presents the sex as fulfilling to and controlled by the woman, unlike typical porn. (One of the strengths of the novel is its frank portrayal of sex and sexuality.) Husband then wife come across this film separately (she finding it on his computer); both are turned on by it. A young student comes into Trevor’s classroom one day: the very same Masha. As you would expect, complications ensue.

Masha takes Trevor’s writing class, where she produces a marvellous meditation on beauty, its cost to a woman in a world of male desire—which is really what Lalonde’s novel is exploring: how to find yourself as a woman and your own person in a world of male dominance, where your role is one of subservience and nurturance of children and husband, with little thanks in return. How to find sexual realization and satisfaction in a world of male sexual imperatives, often misogynistic. Masha’s story makes good use of the power dynamics too often found in a university: male professor praising female student to get in her pants. Fortunately, she recognizes Trevor as the predator he is and deftly avoids him. Her instinct proves right, as she soon meets Yuna, a student who was once his sexual victim.

But it’s Sarah’s journey that is key. Her sacrifices are many, within the marriage and in leaving work as a journalist after four miscarriages to stay home and make babies. Always resourceful, however, she creates a successful blog for women like herself, finding her voice in this outlet. Initially, Trevor is thrilled at the birth of his first daughter and writes moving entries in Sarah’s blog. While flattered by the response, he quickly tires of the gig, and Sarah takes over—writing it for him. He in turn becomes resentful of a wife who is no longer at his sexual beck and call, no longer paying full attention to him, and he grows jealous of his daughters. 

Sarah’s resourcefulness turns downright quirky, as when she dresses as her husband to write ‘his’ contributions, trying to become him in order to humanize him, creating an imaginary ‘Pretend Internal Trevor,’ a sympathetic figure there to help her. Or, after she has grown to hate her husband, trying to seduce him as a last resort, wearing outlandish garb. At times she feels too delightful to be true, with the rhetoric of the novel perhaps too much in her favour. But overall, she remains an engaging and credible character. 

Finally, the marriage, with her thankless work of helping her husband realize his dreams (while he pays no attention to hers), wears her down and leads to extreme measures. A turning point occurs when Sarah becomes so frazzled she has a couple of minor car accidents, at which Trevor insists, with rigorous mansplaining, that she get an e-bike instead, expecting her to navigate that with two small girls on board. Her attempts to argue against this absurdity lead to her going out one day and buying a car without telling him—her first act of rebellion, with the reaction you might expect. 

The final turning point and variation comes from two letters to Sarah, one we don’t get to read until the end of the novel, the other, from Ariadne. I don’t want to do a spoiler, so I won’t take this any further. I’ll just say that it invokes the myth once again, to powerful effect. Finally, while there are many stories out there about women finding themselves in a world of male oppression, this novel, with its use of myth and its many narrative tricks and an irrepressible heroine, proves an innovative and compelling variation on its theme.

[Editor’s note: in support of her novel, Angélique Lalonde will launch Variations on a Dream in Smithers on Friday February 13, starting at 7pm. She’ll also appear in Victoria at Munro’s Books on Wednesday, February 25, where she’ll be in conversation with Carleigh Baker.

Harvey De Roo was a professor in the English Department at SFU. Upon retirement, he taught opera history and appreciation in the SFU seniors’ programme at Harbour Centre. He was founding secretary of City Opera Vancouver and served on the board and Artistic Planning Committee for several years. From 2014 to 2018 he was the opera reviewer for Vancouver Classical Music (vanclassicalmusic.com); he lectures annually to the Vancouver Opera Club. He lives on Salt Spring Island. [Editor’s note: Harvey De Roo has also reviewed books by Tom Wayman, Karim Alrawi, Jennifer Schell, D.L. Acken & Emily Lycopolus, Bill Richardson, and Jana Roerick for BCR.]

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The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors: Trevor Marc Hughes (nonfiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction and poetry)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an on-line book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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