Sunnybrook: A True Story with Lies

By claiming that she's had experience at a child guidance clinic, Diane fakes her way into a counseling job at the Sunnybrook Institution for the Mentally Handicapped. Her experience, however, was as a patient, not as an employee. At Sunnybrook she finds the patients more lively, creative, and sympathetic than the tired, harried staff. And at home, her relationship with her girlfriend starts to suffer after Diane meets the wild, edgy Shirley-Butch at a bar. Writer and artist Persimmon Blackbridge uses her straightforward prose as well as images of her intense, funny sculptures and assemblages to convey the complexities of Diane's story. The narrative is supplemented by optional readings in the margins that suggest variant realities. Both the content and the innovative form of this book remind us that our stories are many-textured, that everyone has a different version of reality.