Maybe Tomorrow I’ll See It All From Heaven
Litzine, Jill Mandrake, 16 pgs, Vancouver Desktop/Geist, geist.com, $5
Reverend Sweet is back from a retreat and an encounter with a divine apparition, and she’s looking for lives to change. She even brought a song to sing whenever you’re afraid: “Maybe tomorrow I’ll see it all from heaven / I’ll eat my midnight snack in heaven just when midnight comes.”
Alice, her only parishioner, isn’t game. “[I]f you sing or whistle when you’re afraid,” she surmises, “then whoever hears you knows you’re afraid.” These two connected stories from Jill Mandrake — one told from the perspective of each character — first appeared in Prism International in 1977, but they’re not dated in the slightest. The less-than-holy reverend could be holding court in any decade, and the plot twist that arrives in Alice’s half is as unexpected now as it would have been 40 years ago.
Maybe Tomorrow is a quick and satisfying read. Mandrake’s voice is clever and unencumbered, and she establishes believable personalities in her characters in short order.