Nadine-Sander Green’s debut novel Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit is a page-turner
Pity, that is the first feeling I get while reading Nadine Sander-Greens coming-of-age novel, Rabbit Rabbit Rabbit (recently published by House of Anansi Press). Feelings of pity soon turn into feelings for the protagonist, Millicent. As the atmosphere and landscape of the Yukon shape in the reader’s mind, the protagonist is running into a toxic relationship one would like to prevent her from.
The story drew me in from the first page.
Millicent is a shy 24-year-old reporter coming to Whitehorse to work for a local newspaper called Golden Nugget. The protagonist has no experience in media work, nor does she know what to do at a press conference. Do I have to run after the premier like the other journalists? she asks herself during a press conference. Millicent studied creative writing and wanted to be a poet. She has no experience in journalism. When she is assigned to interview a filmmaker living in a converted school bus, she falls in love with him. Soon the affair turns toxic.
Millicent is very green and doesn’t have a clue about the Yukon when she arrives there in September. She describes Whitehorse as a city with two faces: If one doesn’t look too closely, Whitehorse was like a small city down south, with hotels, shops and tourists. But there is another side to it, with dark winter, seasonal depression, poverty, and people living in Walmart parking lots. Pascal, the eccentric filmmaker living in the school bus, tells Millicent what her life could look like. They could travel and be artists; she could write her poems and he could make films. Millicent will soon discover that he is lying to her about film assignments which don’t exist. She doesn’t see the red flags because she doesn’t have much experience in relationships. As a reader, you feel the red flags immediately. Suddenly, Pascal is pushing her away from her family. When Millicent moves into the school bus with Pascal, things get worse.
There is more to the novel than a love story that turned toxic. Nadine Sander-Green writes about land issues in the territory. She uses The Vista as a synonym for The Peel. In her book, elections are coming up and First Nations want to protect The Vista from mining. A fictitious company named Gold Power wants to build a mine in The Vista. Like Millicent, Nadine Sander-Green came to the Yukon to work as a reporter for a local newspaper. She covered the reporting about the Peel Watershed back in 2011 when the First Nations took the Yukon government to the Supreme Court—and won.
A scene that stands out for me in the book is when one of the reporters of the Golden Nugget says to Millicent that he and Millicent are stealing. Because they drive up from the south, take jobs, land, and stories. And then they call it home. “Isn’t this the same as stealing land?” is the question the co-worker asks her. A question that makes one think. Is telling stories about the North, stealing? Nadine Sander-Green tells the story of Millicent and the Yukon land issues, with care and purpose. The author has lived in the Yukon on and off for eight years.
Nadine Sander-Green said, in an interview with the Cranbrook Daily Townsman newspaper, that it took her almost a decade to write this book. It went through many drafts and went from being similar to her story, to a more fictionalized plot. She makes it clear that it is not a memoir; it’s fiction. And anyone who has ever experienced a toxic relationship can relate to the story.
As the author said in an interview with CBC, it can happen to anyone. Because love bombing and promises of toxic people are so compelling. When you fall for it, you are blinded and can’t see the red flags pointing in the direction of a toxic relationship.Like Millicent, Nadine Sander-Green came to the Yukon to work for a local newspaper, the Whitehorse Star. She grew up in Kimberley, British Columbia, and has lived in Victoria, Toronto and the Yukon. She also worked in a variety of jobs, including for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society in the Yukon. She met her partner in the Yukon and they moved to Calgary, where they are living today with their family. Nadine Sander-Green completed her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Victoria and her Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Guelph. In 2015, Nadine Sander-Green won the RBC PEN Canada New Voices Award for writers under 30. Her writing has appeared in the Globe and Mail, Grain, Outside, in carte blanche magazine and in many more publications.
