Sorry, Celeste

Sorry, Celeste is the story of a young man with a personality disorder who writes himselves into the past of a troubled woman that once confided in him based on the stories she’s shared.



As Adam and Skyler, twin brothers, one gay, one straight, he interacts with Madelyn, a promiscuous girl haunted by her relationship with the much older Paul, seen as his possible future. While Skyler moves forward, towards Toronto, meeting the bipolar Stephane, Adam reluctantly revisits the people and places he used to be, searching for affection in the wake of a recent breakup. Falsely, he believes he’s found this in Madelyn, who finds her own world disrupted when Paul, his life in shambles, reaches out to her after years of silence amidst a mounting crystal meth addiction.



Interspersed with these stories are the confessions of an unnamed narrator regarding Celeste, an aspiring actress he used to commute to work with. Through his version of her disclosures and other details from his life, her influence becomes clear, complimenting what has already been presented. As he reinvents her, characters begin interacting with their inspirations and the book’s climax is opened to several interpretations.



Set in three cities in Southern Ontario, this multi-layered, non-linear character study is written freely, switching between first, second and third person narration and past and present tense. It examines personality, the effects your life has on others and the different ways a single relationship can be seen.