RIS ID
8789
Abstract
[Extract] “Sex”, my father said, “isn’t all that it’s made out to be. People talk about it as though they know what it is. Well don’t be fooled. No one’s really an expert ... unless they’re French Canadian”. He nodded seriously, and then smiled. “Like father like son, eh?” I agreed, gulping, wondering what my mother thought of all this. For the moment she was holding her peace. My father spread the Men’s magazine on the table. “This, though. This isn’t sex. These are pictures. It’s not real life.” I knew there was a moral in all this. I was hoping it would be expressed entirely in words. I’d put them on the table earlier in the day, my guilt forcing me to confess that a friend had given them to me. I was eight years old. I’d never seen such things before.....
Publication Details
Turcotte, G, 'Secrets' in Flying in Silence: A novel, Cormorant Press, Canada, February 2001. Shortlisted for The Age Book of the Year. Book chapter 'Secrets' also published in Heatwave: Penguin Australian Summer Stories, 5, Penguin, Melbourne, 2003, 208-220.