Her husband has died, she had no other family, and hers is a lonely life that has caused her to grow a brittle shell. And then in the first chapter, we meet his mother Joyce years later, living out the final years of her life in an old age home. He is survived by his parents, aunts and uncles, and cousins. The book begins with a death notice from 1984, John Sparks dead of a sudden illness at the age of 31. The darkness was so subtle you might have missed it in this deceivingly light novel, and it is this darkness that Francis tackles in this latest book. Fruit ended with Peter Paddington on the cusp of his teenage years, his dawning awareness of his homosexuality, of a darkness on the horizon. Whereas Brian Francis’ novel Fruit (which should have won and nearly did win Canada Reads 2009) was a hilarious little story with an undercurrent of sadness, his second book Natural Order is a sad huge story with an undercurrent of hilarity.
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