Endings and Beginnings

The stories in four of the book’s five parts are defined and shaped by the central characters of those parts each experiencing an ending and a beginning. The pattern is established in Part 1, in which its protagonist, Fia, experiences the end of a dull relationship and the beginning of a new phase of her life (in terms of her sexual orientation), and also a new relationship. For her, both the ending and the new beginning are positive. In Part 2, however, the ending for its protagonist, Inuk, is negative: he feels forced to abandon a life that he loves and values and go into exile. There, and as a result of a period of self-examination (as manifest in the letters and journal entries he writes), he seems to finally acknowledge his sexual orientation towards men – a new beginning, but one that seems ultimately negative...