A Large Harmonium by Sue Sorensen Published by Coteau Books Review by Michelle Shaw $19.95 ISBN 9781550504606 Sue Sorensen’s debut novel introduces us to forty-two year old English lecturer Janey as she navigates her way through life as a mother, wife and academic. Janey, aka Dr Janet Erlicksen, is deeply in love with her music lecturer husband, the sexy Hector, and frequently bewildered by her adored toddler, the strong-willed Little Max. Although she’s fairly proficient at juggling the demands of the academic year, less academic pursuits have a disconcerting habit of distracting her, such as the urge to write a murder mystery with her mother-in-law as the victim when she should instead be deciding on a viable research topic. Sorensen deftly introduces us to the multi-faceted characters that fill Janey’s world including Hector’s best friend Jam, a charming French horn virtuoso who travels around Canada playing with various brass quartets and sleeping with women in all ten provinces… he’s still working on the territories. Then there’s the grim Beatrice Haight, one of Janey’s fellow lecturers, who is organizing a conference on twenty-first century notions of decadence (the thought sends Janey into gales of laughter) and the “fabulous” Blanche Grimm, a…