Fling! by Lily Iona Mackenzie

Fling!

by Lily Iona Mackenzie

Pen-L Publishing, 2015

ISBN: 978-1942428206

255 p.p.

When I first agreed to review Fling! I was somewhat skeptical. All I knew about Lily Iona Mackenzie’s novel came from the title and a brief summary and, based on that, I expected a vaguely smutty beach read. I have never been a particular fan of the romance genre and the idea of a ninety year old woman even being interested in sex, let along looking for a fling in Mexico as the premise of Fling! goes, struck my cynical twenty-three year old self as improbable.

When I received my copy, however, I began to consider the various manifestations and definitions of the word “fling” and to suspect that the novel was about much more than some fleeting May-December romance. In her preface, Mackenzie offers the following definitions for her title:

1. a brief period of indulging one’s impulses

2. a usually brief attempt or effort

3. a brief sexual or romantic relationship

4. a Scottish Highland dance

5. a novel by Lily Iona Mackenzie

I was sold before I even turned the first page. No more than twenty pages in, I struggled to put it down, drawn in by the brief interlacing point of view chapters that leap chronologically and geographically between Scotland, Canada, and Mexico. To say that I was pleasantly surprised by Mackenzie’s charmingly offbeat novel would be an inexcusable understatement. Captivated by the surreal plot, eccentric yet relatable characters, and simple but vivid language, I quickly confirmed my suspicion that Fling! was about far than just a fling (which, in the age of Tinder, has taken on something of an unsavory connotation). With all the lighthearted fun of a fling, this novel also explores the importance of restoring fractured familial relationships, coming to terms with mortality and transience, and maintaining a certain joie de vivre no matter what your age or circumstances.

All of this takes place in the exuberant heart of Mexico, where reality and magic, the dead and the living commingle to fantastic effect. The stars of the story are ninety year old Bubbles, who amazes everyone with her vivacity and apparently limitless zest for life, and her middle aged hippie daughter Feather, who feels a little overshadowed by Bubbles and struggles with lingering resentment toward her mother from adolescence. When Bubbles receives news that her mother’s ashes have been found in Mexico City after being lost for seventy years, she convinces Feather—who was planning to take a solo art sabbatical in Mexico—to bring her along and make a stop in Mexico City to retrieve the ashes. Once in Mexico City, the two women deviate considerably from both their itinerary and normal way of being. The story takes a turn for the magical as Heather, Bubble’s mother, comes to life—like instant milk—after Bubbles adds water to her ashes. Heather’s long deceased parents—Anne and Malcolm, Bubble’s grandparents and Feather’s great-grandparents—appear shortly after, and the Scottish brood, reunited in Mexico, stays for the trip of their life/afterlife.

The narrative reaches the first of several phantasmagoric climaxes when a local tribe mistakes Bubbles for fertility god Eineeuq and kidnaps her a few days of festivity and worship. Bubbles, thrilled, soaks in the adoration and celebration she has always lived and yearned for with signature gusto. It’s a definite high point in the narrative but the story is far from over. Heather, cautious and somewhat repressed and resentful, experiences a personal renaissance through a fling with a sexy, soulful shaman. Through serendipitous human connection, the rejuvenating power of sex, and just a touch of magic, Heather sheds old neuroses and embraces a more joyful view of herself, the world, and her lovable but flawed mother. I’ll save some of the surprises Mackenzie still has in store for you but rest assured that the rest of the narrative, just as life-affirming and magical—without being saccharine—as the preceding pages, is a fitting denouement to the wild ride she has taken us on thus far.

The only lingering critique I have of Fling! is perhaps its title and the transience it so strongly implies. While the novel is full of rollicking flings and short bursts of mini-climaxes, the healing effects of Bubbles’ and Feather’s experiences are clearly long-lasting. Indeed, the novel seems to resolve (or come close to resolving) some of the most age-old tensions between eternity and transience, life and death. While the experience of reading Fling! for the first time was a fleeting one (as all our experiences are), its lessons and magic have stayed with me and will continue to do so as with all of our more meaningful flings.

***

Lily Iona MacKenzie has published reviews, interviews, short fiction, poetry, travel pieces, essays, and memoir in over 145 American and Canadian venues. Fling! was published in July 2015 and Bone Songs, another novel, will be published in 2016. Her poetry collection All This was published in 2011. She also teaches writing at the University of San Francisco, is vice-president of USF’s part-time faculty union, paints, and travels widely with her husband.