Fear the Mirror

A fusion of biography and history, art and politics, told through the lives branching off one family tree.

In Fear the Mirror, Cora Siré brings together thirteen stories of moments that have marked the dark intersections within her own history. A feminist mother who fled Estonia. A father who arrived in Canada with nothing but a violin. A Catalan boy whose parent is dying. A love triangle among novelists. Bodies stolen in the night and never found. Blending essay, memoir, and fiction, the Montréal author draws on her encounters in Latin America and elsewhere to compose loving and conflicted portraits – of family members, writers, filmmakers, and gravediggers – culminating in the persistent legacies and strange alchemies that haunt the person she sees in the mirror. In this masterful fifth book, Siré has written her most urgent, beguiling, and personal work to date.

AUTHOR

Cora Siré

Cora Siré lives in Montreal. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in anthologies and magazines such as Descant and the Literary Review of Canada. She has been a finalist for the Quebec Writers’ Federation/CBC prize and received honourable mention for the Winston Collins/Descant poetry prize. Drawing on her encounters in realms ranging from Argentina to Vietnam, her work explores themes of exile, identity and the redemptive power of art.

Reviews

“The collection resonates with childhood recollections, poetry, historical references, and intriguing characters, not the least of whom are a strong-minded mother and an elusive grandmother. The memoirist narratives in this collection are rich in rhythms that reveal lives complicated by war, displacement, and immigration.” – Montreal Review of Books