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Unsettling Time, by Bretton Loney.Β
Unsettling Time rapidly became one of my favourite historical fiction novels as I raced through its pages. Perhaps that should be historical speculative fiction, as author Bretton Loney uses Halifaxβs Noon Gun and a bad fall to throw a SMU lecturer named Ryan from our time to the founding summer of the city in 1749.
Twelve years ago, when I was writing Cornwallis: The Violent Birth of Halifax, I would spend hours walking around the old city, trying to see the lost world under our modern city. It was frustrating as a biographer to have to stick to what I could prove about life back then, rather than what I felt or knew to be true.
Loney has no such limitations and launches a fun, fast-paced murder mystery. We get a vivid look at the city cutting itself out of the woods in a hot, bug-troubled summer, with fears and bigotry bubbling inside the forest that became downtown Halifax.
βThey carefully picked their way over large, moss-covered rocks and the limbs of fallen trees whose brittle, broken branches were as dangerous and sharp as the spikes on a medieval war club. Through breaks in the foliage on their left, Ryan could see a large body of water. They broke through the tree cover and gazed at a fantastical panorama. More than a dozen large sailing ships gently bobbed at anchor.β
Itβs our first glimpse of Halifax Harbour in its first summer, and things heat up from there. Loney is a stickler for historical accuracy, and the world he built on the page is a dead ringer for the birth of the city. Edward Cornwallis makes a cameo, but most of the story dwells with a small band of friend Ryan makes as he tries to get back to the future.
What was it like for gay men in 1749 Halifax? Black people? Acadians? Women? What really drove and filled daily life? Loney did his research for the black-and-white sketch and then let his writerβs heart paint it in full colour. The central romance will leave you heart-bonded to people who lived 270 years ago.Β
Unsettling Time is a great gift book. Buy five copies today and give them out to uncles and cousins and friends who are interested in history, particularly Canadian history. And read it yourself. It is one of those special books that makes its mark on the city. Every time I pass Grand Parade’s St. Paul’s Church (where the first Tattries were married in 1752), I think of Brett’s brilliant account of the first service held there.
If you’re in Nova Scotia, you can buy it at the Dartmouth Book Exchange, Carrefour Atlantic (Historic Properties) and Atlantic News. Brett will launch the book Saturday October 25 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. in the Halifax Central Libraryβs BMO Community Room.
He’s invited me to grill him mercilessly on historical details (I think that’s what he said) so I’ll be there to join the celebration.
Photo of me at St. Paul’s Church by Roslyn Tattrie.