Review of Cherry Bites

Cherry Bites

Alison Preston is living proof that you should watch out for the quiet ones. When the soft-spoken Norwood resident isn't delivering mail for Canada Post, she's penning literary mysteries that reviewers have called "deeply creepy."

Preston has published four books, all partially set in Winnipeg. Many of the spooky plots take place in her own neighbourhood.

Her latest book, Cherry Bites, is the story of a woman who committed a horrific crime against her baby brother when she was just four years old. That crime sets the tone for the troubled relationship between the two siblings that colours the rest of the book.

"Writing keeps me sane. It enriches me, and makes me feel complete, as though I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing," says Preston, who has an English degree from the University of Winnipeg. "I'm sure I'd feel a huge hole in my life if I didn't write."

A love of language came early to Preston, who's kept a journal since she was in Grade 3. "I've always enjoyed writing," she says. "I wrote poetry as a teenager. Pretty horrible stuff, I'm sure."

"I never decide what to write before I sit down at the computer. I just start writing, and one thing leads to another," she says. "My ideas come from a combination of memories, what's going on in my life at any point in time, and imagination."


— Holly Moncrieff Winnipeg Free Press

More Reviews of this title

Cherry Bites

Alison Preston put Winnipeg, at least the Norwood Flats section of it, on the mystery map with The Rain Barrel Baby, her first novel featuring policeman Frank Foote. That book showed great promise. Her second, The Geranium Girls, was equally good. Cherry Bites is her best, with an excellent family-history plot and plenty of atmosphere.

Cherry Ring was not a happy child in 1954. She detested the baby brother who had usurped her place as centre of the Ring family. So one day, in a jealous rage, she bit brother Pete on the face. This was no tiny nip, but a full-bore, skin-ripping bite through the cheek. Pete required skin grafts and was scarred for life. Cherry knew she'd been naughty, and she was sorry, but that bite marks a divide between her and Pete that lasts a lifetime.

They grow up, and Pete simply ignores Cherry. It's as if she doesn't exist for him. Her mother never trusts Cherry again. Her father dies when she's 9 and, finally, when she's in university, her mother and Pete move away. Cherry can finally live her own life, free from guilt.

Forty years after Cherry's bite, she's settled and happy in her Norwood Flats home. Then strange things start to happen, and Cherry wonders if you really can ever leave your past behind, even if you were just 4 when it all started to go wrong.


— Margaret Cannon The Globe and Mail

Cherry Bites

Within the first few pages of Winnipegger Alison Preston's third self-proclaimed mystery novel Cherry Bites, it is evident the story will not be a happy tale with a gift-wrapped, Christmas present ending.

In the prologue, we get our first glance of Cherry Ring, t then four-year-old- who is taking a bite out of her newborn brother Pete's face.

The year is 1954 and the place is Winnipeg. The reason is sibling jealousy (as Peter has not even been around long enough for full-blown sibling rivalry). The incident is a moment of sheer panic--and at the same time it bears more influence on Cherry's life than she could have ever imagined.

At the time of the biting, Cherry is not an overtly malicious child, but rather a mixed-up emotional derelict, whose life only deteriorates as the story unfolds.

When Preston brings the reader into present day in the first chapter, the story really starts, as Cherry begins to consiously tell an invisible audience her story.

Her motivation is simply stated at the start of things: a cluster of three events have just happened to change Cherry's life forever, while at the same time answering all the questions acquired throughout her misguided upbringing.

The first event, the strange and unexplained delivery of her dead and estranged mother's journal, kicks Cherry's already fragile world into a tailspin and provides the basis for the rest of the novel. Once she starts to read the journal, she presents questions we know will be answered through the two remaining events.

If Preston's novel falters at all, it would be through a slight bit of predictability. The second and third events are easily guessed--although they still provide suspense, tension and incredible motivation to keep reading.

It is nearly impossible to explain the events without revealing the novel's most riveting parts and a complete explanation runs the risk of deterring a potential reader from picking the book up--which would be a tragedy in the literary world.

Cherry Bites is an intriguing and constantly interesting piece of fiction that deserves all the attention it can get.

Preston manages to completely engage the reader in Cherry's life, explaining her mutual hatred for her estranged dead mother, her non-committal lifestyle, and her non-relationship with Peter with more unspoken tension than words.

Through three points of view--Cherry's present day narrative, flashbacks, and readings of Cherry's mother's journal--Preston unwinds the strangely simple details of one woman's extremely complicated life in a skillfully executed post-modern masterpiece that leaes the reader wondering why they've never heard of this local author before.

And when they will hear from her again.


— Julie Jorbal The Projector

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