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Whir of Gold
Sonny, an aspiring musician, and Mad, a young woman down on her luck, struggle to survive in the mean streets of Montreal.
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
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December 27, 2019
“Leaving a little puddle isn't what counts. It's making it in the big one.”
There is something to be said about a book that can just slip you into its world. I’m sure many readers have experienced this sensation where you’re tugged into the pages. Where every chapter ends with the thought of “just one more”. This book did that.
Sinclair Ross’s stories unfold slowly and spend a lot of time folding in on itself. Like the process of making a croissant, the story seems to revisit itself—as if it’s reflecting on itself while we are reading it.
“You can have a slouch in your mind as well as you back.”
Whirl of Gold is about struggle, circumstances, and that borderline point where we wonder if our dreams are helping us or wasting our lives. Sonny, the protagonist, is a clarinet player who is struggling to make it big. Waiting out the winter season in Montreal, he spends his days toiling in the abundance poverty provides to life and worrying over his future. His neighbour Charlie, is a suspicious fellow who is trying to coerce Sonny into his “plan”. As Sonny is caught between the urge to give into Charlie’s schemes, he is also caught between his desires to make it. And finally, we have Mad, a waitress who decides to spend time with Sonny because he’s one of the good ones. Caught in this tug-of-war between Charlie and Mad, Sonny has to decide what he wants to do with his life, and where he wants to take it.
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