Tuesday Special: Consider the Sunflowers with Elma Schemenauer

Elma Schemenauer

http://elmams.wix.com/elma

Inspired by a prairie Mennonite heritage

As a child I loved to hear coyotes howl on our family farm about halfway between Saskatoon and Regina, Saskatchewan. I enjoyed riding on the hay rack, taming half-wild cats in the barn, and attending our country Mennonite Church in a white dress made from my mother's wedding dress.

I especially enjoyed my Mennonite relatives' stories about the Old Country (Russia), their voyage across the ocean, and their new life in Canada.

My relatives' stories and my own experiences inspired my 1940s-era novel CONSIDER THE SUNFLOWERS. Its main characters, Tina and Frank, enter into a marriage that's troubled from the beginning. She's a transplanted Vancouverite who feels lonely with nothing but open pastures and fields around her. A few trees around the house would help. But Frank doesn't want trees. They'd make him feel trapped. He needs to be able to see the whole sky, uncluttered.

That's just one example of what Tina and Frank argue about. She wants to attend the local Mennonite Church and socialize with Mennonites. He shuns Mennonites because some of them scorn his mixed parentage, which is Russian Mennonite and Gypsy. He prefers to socialize with his Scandinavian and British friends, who "don't carry all that Russian baggage."

Tina and Frank's relationship deteriorates as the story progresses. He resents the fact that she neglects her daily chores to paint pictures. She begrudges the time he spends with his Norwegian bachelor buddies. When she tries to convert him to her Christian faith, he says she should accept him as he is, not try to change him.

The birth of Tina and Frank's son draws them closer together. Then the infant's death drives them apart again. Frank, mourning his lost son and discouraged about his marriage, escapes to work in a copper mine in Montana. In his absence Tina rediscovers feelings for a former Vancouver boyfriend. Is there any hope for Tina and Frank's marriage? You'll need to read CONSIDER THE SUNFLOWERS to find out!

It's 299 pages, $19.95 paperback, publisher Borealis Press of Ottawa, ISBN 978-0-88887-575-4. Ask for it in a bookstore or library. Or order online from Amazon, or Chapters Indigo, or Borealis Press,

About Elma:  Springtime on the prairie was the topic of one of the first pieces of writing Elma (Martens) Schemenauer did as a child. Writing has been her passion ever since. She's the author of 77 books including YESTERCANADA: HISTORICAL TALES OF MYSTERY AND ADVENTURE and the 1940s-era Mennonite novel CONSIDER THE SUNFLOWERS. Elma was born in Saskatchewan. She taught there and in Montana and Nova Scotia. Then she spent many years working as an author and editor in Toronto. She now lives with her husband on a sagebrush-dot\ted hillside in Kamloops, British Columbia.


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