Can a man have it all?

The warmth of a solid family and the challenges of a fruitful career?

These questions lie at the heart of Limerence, a fun novel exploring the lives of two people seeking very different ways to be men. One’s a stay-at-home dad, the other a freewheeling libertine. Both struggle with addictions to limerence, that Leonard Cohen longing for something new that drives so many men to leave behind what’s good in pursuit of what seems better.

A car crash in southern Manitoba flings lives apart like planets ejected from the solar system. A man with no future staggers dazed from the wreckage and vanishes. A man with no past arrives in Halifax and creates a new life.

Cain Cohen denies he ever was Sam Stiller, but the past is catching up to his present. People who knew Sam insist he is the same person as Cain, but he rejects them, repeatedly insisting he’s not Stiller. Is he right? Or is he deliberately trying to shake off his old identity and assume a new one?

As the mystery unfolds, the novel probes deeper questions about manhood. Old ideas of how to be a man celebrate the stoic breadwinning father, but they’ve fallen out of our culture. Newer ideas, like taking time off to raise your children, barely make a dent. Men are left to explore the unmapped terrain alone, shaping the future without anyone noticing.

Drawing wisdom from the great Canadian poet Leonard Cohen, William Shakespeare and Steve Perry, Limerence dives deep into the new world of new men and asks: What does it mean to be a man?

Jon Tattrie is a journalist whose ancestors arrived in Nova Scotia with EdwardCornwallis. This is his third historical book, following Black Snow, a novel setin the 1917 Halifax Explosion, and The Hermit of Africville (see page 10), abiography of one of Canada’s longest-running political protesters. The Hermitof Africville was a finalist for the 2010 Democracy 250 Atlantic Book Awardfor Historical Writing. Tattrie lives in Halifax with his wife.

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