Accidents Happen, by Louise Millar

Accidents Happen: A Novel by Louise Millar
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Mildly spoilerish.

This book was sent to me as a galley by Atria Books, through Galley Alley, and it's the second in a row that I've read containing the theme of "sad woman who has been through trying times is befriended by and falls in love with a 'too good to be true' guy who turns out to be too good to be true". This might even be a trope at this point, or at least a trendy theme in psychological thrillers. All I can say is that it is a delicate thing to write this kind of story so that the reader believes that the heroine is vulnerable but not overly credulous.

The story takes place in present-day Oxford, following the tortured daily existence of Kate, a 30s-ish woman with an eight-year-old son, who lost her husband in the recent past. Kate sees her life as a series of unlikely tragedies, feeling she's had more than her share of loss and accident. She's become obsessed with statistics and safety measures almost to the point of agoraphobia. Her husband's parents and her sister-in-law are naturally concerned, but their high-handed ways of demonstrating this concern are a huge source of friction. Kate meets a visiting statistics lecturer one day by chance...or is it? He seems literally to have written the book on the statistics of safety, and when Kate screws up her courage to talk to him they start a tentative friendship which immediately changes her outlook on life for the better.

Louise Millar skillfully sets her scenes in a detailed way that draws you in to the moment. The characters speak naturally and we spend just enough time in their heads to know what they're thinking without drowning in internal monologues. I found myself fully a quarter of the way through before I took a break.



**************More obvious spoilers*************





I subtracted one star from a perfect five for a couple of reasons:

1. The "sad woman needs a man to feel better and have a happy life" trope. I'm not saying this doesn't happen, but I prefer stories where the sad woman meets somebody who helps her find her happiness without needing to be the ultimate source of that happiness, if that makes sense.

2. Kate, our protagonist, is massively credulous to the point of stupidity. I would buy her being snowed by our Bad Guy if she were a 20-something college girl full of blind naïveté, but she's a 30-something woman with a child and an amazing menu of adventurous life experiences. I just don't believe her being so gullible, especially considering her paranoid obsession with security and safety. Bad Guy asks her to do some pretty sketchy things in the name of "bringing her out of her shell". By the second or third instance...no, after the first one I would have been very skeptical about this guy, and after a particularly creepy scene involving being stranded in a rural village with a gang of potential gang-bangers I would have punched this guy's lights out and called it quits.

The payoff is decent by the end, and the pacing is good. I always enjoy stories that take me to places I'd like to visit, in this case Oxford, England and environs. It's a nice couple of hours' reading.

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Redshirts, by John Scalzi

Redshirts by John Scalzi
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book is to SF novels what "Galaxy Quest" is to SF movies. It's not the same story, or even the same kind of story, but it has the same weight and tone and lovingly pokes fun at a beloved SF world. This is not to say it is pure book candy, as there are places that grow amusingly metaphysical. Don't overthink these moments; you'll just give yourself a headache. You'll laugh, you'll cry (well, get misty, anyway), or maybe you'll shout "SCALZI!!!" like Brandon Sanderson.

Read it. You can get through it in a long afternoon or a couple of days of light reading. If you enjoy Douglas Adams, Star Trek, or campy SF of any kind, you'll thank me.

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Among Others, by Jo Walton

Among Others by Jo Walton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So far it's like a trip down memory lane for me. I haven't read as many of the SFF novels as Morwenna, but where our lines do cross it's fun to hear her natter on about them as a teenager. I'm not a huge fan of first-person, and in this case you're stuck in the head of a fifteen-year-old, so it can get a bit droll at times. At that age the world revolves around you, and everything is a CRISIS. She tends to overreact to many situations in an overt and external way, which always drives me crazy in a person, but it's utterly believable and consistently written. I'll scribble a real review when I finish.

****

As is often the case, I finished this book and dashed off to other things without writing a review. Part of the reason is that while I enjoyed it for the most part, I didn't find it as engrossing or fascinating as so many others seem to. Do not let my tepid reaction stop you from reading it. I do think it's worth anyone's time... but I felt like the arc was a slow climb up a very low hill to a moderately interesting climax about fifteen pages before the end. Part of my reaction is because I'm usually not a big fan of first person perspective, and especially when one is stuck in the head of a teenager for 75,000 words or so. Even when I was that age I had little patience for the "it's all about ME" thing, and as a crochety old lady I have none at all.

Still, it was nice to re-visit so many of the things I read as a teenager and through my college years and see them through fresh eyes. Give it a try.

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Podcast files: irksome omissions

I've become a bit of a podcast junkie, especially since the electrical troubles started in my car and the radio/CD player no longer works. I just download podcasts on to my phone and listen to them as I drive. This helps me keep awake during my zero-dark-thirty commute to Port Townsend three days a week. If I'm really tired, it helps keep me awake on the way home, too.

Soon I hope to delve into the realm of podcasting myself, mostly as director/engineer for my historian husband who really needs to have one. That said, I listen to 'casts with an ear for what works and what doesn't; what seems smooth and professional, and what is grating and amateurish. I like short intros with minimal music. I like folks who get to the point and dig into it. I don't like constant background music in a 'cast longer than 30 seconds or so. I loathe team podcasters who talk over each other. I am utterly bored by teams who drone on about in jokes and digressions of digressions. I like people who keep up a steady pace without seeming rushed. I cringe at speakers who punctuate every single sentence with "um", "er", and "uh" over and over and over. Stop that.

I really appreciate folks who add album art to their files. It's one of those "metadata" things that really isn't that hard to add, and it makes for a nice "at a glance" visual branding thing on a smart phone or Mp3 player. I really REALLY appreciate folks who have taken the time to actually give their sound files titles, track numbers, and other markers. Again: this is not rocket science. It's really annoying to have to do this oneself so when one is perusing files on one's Mp3 player one sees things like "The Bobcast_Episode_12_flirting with quirts" instead of "TB20dkhfdkl19dl.mp3" or just "Bobcast". Note: don't go looking for a Bobcast, because I just made it up.

I will go so far as to make my own album art for a 'cast that I like enough to download several episodes of. I like to be organized.

Island Apart by Steven Raichlen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book resonated with me perhaps more than any other novel I have ever read. I'll still always have works like "Lord of the Rings" at the top of my favorites list, but LotR is more of a "I want to be there" and "this journey is important to me" kind of experience, "Island Apart" feels like the author got in to my head while he was writing and concocted a tale just for me. The setting, Martha's Vinyard, is an East Coast version of where I live in the Pacific Northwest. The male lead in the story is an extreme version of me: reclusive, introspective, and wary of painful contact with other humans. He's perfectly content in his solitude and comfortable living life his own way. The other islanders refer to him as "the Hermit", and it fits.

I'm a big fan of Rosamund Pilcher, and this is basically her style but told by a Yank in a Yank setting, with the requisite flashbacks to an earlier time and gentle explorations of interpersonal relationships in a colorful setting. Skillfully drawn characters galore. The female lead does a bit of overreacting at one point, dangerously close to the "psycho-harpies" who annoy me in cheap romance novels. But it's a brief, solitary moment and doesn't mar the story at all.

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Feeling a little blue

Next month it will be a year since my cat Gimli disappeared. I still grieve about it. I still miss him terribly. He was amazing: so full of life, such a huge personality, such an imp. I loved him a lot. I haven't been this broken up since my first cat, Isis, died in 1988. I don't know why I bond so strongly with some of my cats. Maybe it's because certain of them have personalities that synch with mine in some mysterious way, and that fulfills a need for me that I don't fully understand. I've had so many disappointments, so many dreams squished, made so many bad decisions in my life, and maybe the affection of these inscrutable creatures is a kind of psychological balm. They're always there, consistently loving, yet unpredictable and fascinating. They know when I'm hurting and are content just to sit with, or on, me and commiserate.

A quick lick on the nose or a head butt from a lithe, sinuous, amazingly athletic predator goes a long way to make up for slights or other fallout from humans who really should have more understanding. That feline companionship is truly comforting when I'm sick or in physical pain. I always feel terrible when they're hurt or sick and my efforts to soothe or heal them don't seem to be working, or just take longer than I'd like to see results, because they're always there for me. They are perhaps not exactly my "children", but I am responsible for their well-being. I love them, and can't imagine life without them.

If I die while still harboring cats or any other animals in my life, I can only hope that some caring individual would take them in and care for them until the end of their lives. I guess I should set up a will with a section in it for just such a contingency. My husband is a good man, but I wouldn't want to burden him with the care of so many animals after my passing. He enjoys the cats on his good days, but taking care of animals isn't something he ever asked for. As I write this, a very old lady cat is sitting in my lap. She started out semi-feral and is now retired from the feral life. I hope I can end my days as gracefully as she is doing, and with my fur as unruffled.