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My Dark Vanessa, Kate Elizabeth Russell

“My Dark Vanessa” is among the most anticipated books of the spring, billed as “Lolita” for the #MeToo generation. It is the story of a bookish 15-year-old scholarship student named Vanessa Wye and her 42-year-old American-lit teacher Jacob Strane. And make no mistake, Vladimir Nabokov, author of the stillcontroversial 1955 novel, is never far from sight. The title references verse from his “Pale Fire,” which the predatory Strane draws to the attention of his star pupil early on: “Come and be worshipped, come and be caressed, My Dark Vanessa.”

Those beguiling words give a sense of the teacher’s gentle, loving seduction, his grooming, his manipulation of his young student. He smiles, winks, pats her shoulder, tugs her ponytail and tells her she’s special, that they are soul mates, as he presses her bare thigh with his leg, strokes her knee, gives her books (including “Lolita,” which she reads obsessively), then kisses her, touches her intimately and ultimately has sex with her. At every step, he asks her explicitly if she wants to go further, and she does, making her complicit in what they both know would be considered a crime and the consequences for him would be ruinous. If there is a power imbalance, she feels it is in her favour.

She is adamant he has not harmed her. He is adamant he is not a pedophile.

Both are wrong. Vanessa’s story unfolds along dual time frames, in 2000, when she is 15, and 2017, at 32. As an adult, Vanessa is underachieving as a hotel concierge, getting drunk, getting stoned, sleeping with older men. Over the years, Jacob and Vanessa have never lost sight of each other. But now she is too old to excite him.

As the story begins, Jacob urgently contacts the adult Vanessa, to make sure she’s still onside. Another student has accused him of sexual assault. Vanessa assures him she won’t give him away. In some ways, she still thinks this is a love story. “My Dark Vanessa” would make an adventurous pick for any book club. I guarantee spirited debate about first love, taboo sex, loyalty, consent and pedophilia.

But it won’t be an Oprah book-club selection. She dropped “Vanessa” from her list just as it reached bookstores, after Latinx writer Wendy Ortiz accused Russell, in effect, of appropriating her trauma, documented in her memoir, “Excavation.” The brief Twitter tempest prompted Russell to defend herself by acknowledging that “Vanessa,” while fiction, draws on her own experience.

Framed, S.L. McInnis

This first novel has been on my radar because S.L. McInnis is a Toronto writer and “Framed” has been enthusiastically blurbed by Samantha M. Bailey, another local talent whose own debut, “Woman on the Edge,” has been on bestseller lists since November.

“Framed” is a thriller with a large dash of police procedural, set in Los Angeles and told from the shifting perspectives of its five main characters. The plot turns on Beth, a failed classical pianist, and her former roommate from music college, Cassie, a mischievous wild child. She comes to stay with Beth and filmmaker husband Jay, who desperately needs money to finance a project. Beth and Jay don’t know that Cassie has just escaped a botched drug deal that left four people dead, nor that she’s carrying a bag containing loads of dough. Her criminal boyfriend, Rick, wounded in the melee, is hunting for her and the $1.2 million. Sex, death, money, music and a secret that binds Beth and Cassie. What more could one want?

Sarah Murdoch is a freelance contributor for the Star. Reach her at smurdoch49@gmail.com