"I think I'll call myself Gretel in this book. It's not really my name. My name is really Jessie Barfoot, which is a perfectly respectable name, I guess, except that there's nothing respectable about me. That's one of the reasons we moved to Toronto. I've reached the age of fifteen and a half, and we're going to get a New Start."Old secrets and new starts stand at the centre of The Corner Garden. Questions of being good-and very bad-are intertwined in a story that moves between occupied Amsterdam during the Second World War to modern mongrelized Toronto.Jessie Barfoot is precocious, witty and wounded, a female Holden Caulfield whose standards are too elevated for ordinary life. She's been raised by single mother Michelle, a part-time student and sometime cab driver. When Michelle marries a charitable lawyer, Jessie feels only dismay.I consider myself far too young to have learned the meaning of pro bono, she tells her diary, much less feel its impact upon my so-called innocent life.After the new family moves to Toronto, Jessie's curiosity is piqued by their cranky next door neighbour. Originally from the Netherlands, Martha van Telligen is a superb gardener with a secret she's guarded ferociously since she was Jessie's age. Yet once Jessie charms her way into the garden, Martha's past begins a slow bleed into Jessie's uncertain present, threatening both their futures. Lesley Krueger is an award-winning novelist. Her latest novel is Far Creek Road, published by ECW Press in 2023. Lesley's previous novel, Time Squared, was published in 2021. She has written four other novels, two short story collections, a travel memoir and a children's book. All are available as e-books, most on Draft2Digital.Lesley writes a free Substack newsletter, Alive to the World, in which she reviews books, writes about researching her novels and tells stories from her adventures. You can subscribe for free at lesleykrueger.substack.com
