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mostlysignssomeportents · 5 years ago

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Pluralistic: 04 Mar 2020 (Brokered conventions, the Siege of Gondor, ICE risk-assessment whitebox, Chinese covid censorship, America's national immunocompromise)

Today's links

A brokered convention will produce a powerless presidency: Transformative change requires a movement, not a plan.

What the Siege of Gondor teaches us about medieval warfare: 40,000 riveting words from Roman military historian Bret Deveraux.

ICE's risk assessment algorithm only ever recommends detention: NYCLU suing to force them to admit what we've all figured out.

Probing China's Covid-19 censorship: Outstanding work from Citizen Lab.

America is uniquely at risk from coronavirus: 77 million un- and underinsured people.

This day in history:

Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

I'm coming to Kelowna, BC tomorrow! I'll be at the library from 6-8PM with my book Radicalized for the CBC's Canada Reads. It's free, but you need to RSVP (and most of the seats are gone, so act quick).

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cbc-radio-presents-in-conversation-with-cory-doctorow-tickets-96154415445

A brokered convention will produce a powerless presidency (permalink)

Hoping for a brokered convention is basically saying, "Hey, go fuck yourself" to every doorknocker and phone canvasser in your base. It says, "Let's not use votes to choose the candidate. You little people were for show. We choose our leaders by gathering the people who matter in smoke-filled rooms."

Any candidate hoping to enact a transformative program from the presidency is going to need a powerful, motivated base to whip establishment Dems into order: "I want to do it, now make me do it." Jettisoning the idea that your supporters get you nominated is the most demoralizing thing I can imagine, short of shutting off the server your organizers used to get you elected as soon as they succeed (looking at you, Barack Obama).

It's pure technocratic hubris, the kind of thing that turns promising wonks into figureheads who accomplish nothing. Saving America from plutocracy and white nationalism requires a movement, not a savior with a plan.

What the Siege of Gondor teaches us about medieval warfare (permalink)

Last spring, Roman military historian Bret Devereaux published over 40,000 words of analysis of the Siege of Gondor as depicted in Peter Jackson's Return of the King. It is by far the best use of fiction as a tool for teaching history that I've ever read.

It's in 6 parts, broken down by themes. By far my favorite section was the opener, on the logistics of sieges. I am a quartermaster by temperament, and the logistic of moving 200,000 orcs (plus trolls, elephants, siege engines, etc) is FASCINATING.

https://acoup.blog/2019/05/10/collections-the-siege-of-gondor/

"The road the orcs are on allows them to march five abreast, meaning there are 40,000 such rows. Giving each orc four feet of space on the march, that would mean the army alone stretches 30 miles down a single road. At that length, the tail end of the army would not even be able to leave camp before the front of the army had finished marching for the day." (!!)

The section on the siege's opener, part II, is likewise fascinating and contains some great craft notes.

https://acoup.blog/2019/05/17/collections-the-siege-of-gondor-part-ii-these-beacons-are-liiiiiiit/

"LOTR doesn't rely – as so much fiction does – on the 'good guys' making stupid mistake after stupid mistake in order to create tension. Instead, Gondor executes its plans admirably, and yet it is so outmatched in military might that it remains in peril."

Part III is more in the weeds on weapons and tactics. It gets into some really gnarly deep nerd stuff about the immediate preamble to a siege that I loved.

https://acoup.blog/2019/05/24/collections-the-siege-of-gondor-part-iii-having-fun-storming-the-city/

"The paths the siege towers will take must be cleared and leveled (even a slight grade will tip them over). Earthwork cover for the approach on the gate should be set up, along with obstructions to prevent the army within the city from advancing at an inopportune moment. In assaulting a fortified city with a large army, the spade is often the most important weapon. Even building a ramp right up the enemy walls to enter the city was a common and successful tactic, if the assaulting army had enough labor to do it quickly enough."

My favorite part of the section on calvary charge was the notable absence of NCOs in the orc ranks, maintaining discipline.

https://acoup.blog/2019/05/31/collections-the-siege-of-gondor-part-iv-the-cavalry-arrives/

"The orc general, Gothmog has to push through the ranks and reorder his infantry, while the orcs stare dumbfounded at the new threat. This is a task that should have been taken up by a hundred-hundred NCOs up and down the line, which speaks to problems of command structure."

By far the most intensely geeky section is in Part V, which deals with the math for calculating whether the trolls could possibly heft the hammers that deal the damage that we see.

https://acoup.blog/2019/06/07/collections-the-siege-of-gondor-part-v-just-flailing-about-flails/

"If a troll really is around 9 times as strong as a strong man, we might figure that a troll sledgehammer might be something like 81kg, and a troll warhammer only 5.76 – 13.59kg. Wildly short of the massive clubs and hammers the trolls wield in these scenes."

ICE's risk assessment algorithm only ever recommends detention (permalink)

The New York Civil Liberties Union and Bronx Defenders have filed suit against ICE, trying to force it to respond to a FOIA request about risk assessment algorithm that has put people in detention 97% of the time.

https://theintercept.com/2020/03/02/ice-algorithm-bias-detention-aclu-lawsuit/

The algorithm was tweaked after the 2016 election (prior to then, it only recommended detention for 53% of cases), and by classifying virtually everyone it evaluates as a public safety risk, it violates the law's requirement of "individualized determinations" for detentions.

People in immigration detention have yet to see a judge or be found guilty. They can be locked up for weeks or months, and detention can cost them their jobs — or even their children. The Trump administration has exponentially increased the number of immigration arrests; coupled with automatic detention-by-algorithm, this has put thousands of New Yorkers in harm's way.

Investigative journalists and activists have previously shown that the algorithm was changed to eliminate all possible outcomes (bond, release, etc), so that it could only recommend detention. So the problem here isn't the usual one of not knowing how the black-box works. We know exactly how it works. You ask it, "Should this person be detained?" and it says "Yes."

"The no-release policy is particularly tough on people with disabilities or health problems. 'This practice of widespread detention is both cruel and needless.'"

Probing China's Covid-19 censorship (permalink)

Citizen Lab's new report on Chinese coronavirus censorship is outstanding. By decompiling the YY client (which stores blacklist words on the client-side) and probing Wechat (which uses server-side blacklisting), they build up a detailed picture of Chinese epidemiological censorship.

https://citizenlab.ca/2020/03/censored-contagion-how-information-on-the-coronavirus-is-managed-on-chinese-social-media/

Most importantly, they demonstrate how the Cyberspace Administration of China's threat of "thematic inspections" of platforms to ensure coronavirus censorship led to indiscriminate blocking of vital public health information.

It's "authoritarian blindness" in the making, "where people too scared to tell the autocrat the hard truths makes it impossible for the autocrat to set policy that reflects reality"

https://pluralistic.net/2020/02/24/pluralist-your-daily-link-dose-24-feb-2020/#thatswhatxisaid

"Censorship of COVID-19 content started at early stages of the outbreak and continued to expand blocking a wide range of speech, from criticism of the government to officially sanctioned facts and information."

By contrast, the sheer volume of "sarcastic homonyms or word play related to COVID-19" that appear on the blacklist are really a testament to the ingenuity and spirit of Chinese netizens.

"A number of these keyword combinations are critical (e.g., "亲自 [+] 皇上," by someone + emperor), criticizing the central leadership's inability or inaction in dealing with COVID-19 ("习近平 [+] 形式主义 [+] 防疫," Xi Jinping + formalism + epidemic prevention). Many of them refer to leadership in a neutral way (e.g., "肺炎 [+] 李克强 [+] 武汉 [+] 总理 [+] 北京," Pneumonia + Li Keqiang + Wuhan + Premier + Beijing)."

America is uniquely at risk from coronavirus (permalink)

Among rich countries, the USA is uniquely vulnerable to coronavirus. Thanks to its title to "by far the worst system among rich countries, it is much worse than that of many poorer countries when it comes to confronting a fast-moving epidemic."

https://theweek.com/articles-amp/899359/why-america-vulnerable-coronavirus

The US has 77m un/underinsured people. "and the vicious, right-wing ideology of the Republican Party has wrecked the government's ability to manage crises of any kind, " with "unqualified cronies" running important agencies.

"Now they are resorting to the only thing they know how to do really well — lying, concocting conspiracy theories and blaming Democrats and the media for any bad news. It does not bode well."

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago EFF is hiring a new IP lawyer https://web.archive.org/web/20050307005314/http://www.corante.com/copyfight/archives/2005/03/04/ip_attorneys_eff_wants_you.php (the ad that led to the hiring of Corynne McSherry!)

#10yrsago Guardian column on LibDem proposal to block web-lockers https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/mar/04/web-lockers-digital-economy-liberal-democrats-wrong

#1yrago Fox News was always partisan, but now it is rudderless and "anti-democratic" https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/03/11/the-making-of-the-fox-news-white-house

#1yrago Leaked memo suggests that Google has not really canceled its censored, spying Chinese search tool https://theintercept.com/2019/03/04/google-ongoing-project-dragonfly/

#1yrago Terra Nullius: Grifters, settler colonialism and "intellectual property" https://locusmag.com/2019/03/cory-doctorow-terra-nullius/

#1yrago Tim Maughan's Infinite Detail: a debut sf novel about counterculture, resistance, and the post-internet apocalypse https://boingboing.net/2019/03/04/gnu-slash-apocalypse.html

#1yrago Financialization is wearing out its welcome https://www.ft.com/content/a9f13afc-3c3d-11e9-b856-5404d3811663

#1yrago How the patent office's lax standards gave Elizabeth Holmes the BS patents she needed to defraud investors and patients https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/03/theranos-how-a-broken-patent-system-sustained-its-decade-long-deception/

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/), Slashdot (https://slashdot.org/) and Kottke (Kottke).

Hugo nominators! My story "Unauthorized Bread" is eligible in the Novella category and you can read it free on Ars Technica: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-near-future-tale-of-refugees-and-sinister-iot-appliances/

Upcoming appearances:

Canada Reads Kelowna: March 5, 6PM, Kelowna Library, 1380 Ellis Street, with CBC's Sarah Penton https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cbc-radio-presents-in-conversation-with-cory-doctorow-tickets-96154415445

Currently writing: I just finished a short story, "The Canadian Miracle," for MIT Tech Review. It's a story set in the world of my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation. I'm getting geared up to start work on the novel now, though the timing is going to depend on another pending commission (I've been solicited by an NGO) to write a short story set in the world's prehistory.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: Disasters Don't Have to End in Dystopias: https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/01/disasters-dont-have-to-end-in-dystopias/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020.

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a very special, s00per s33kr1t intro.

17 notes · View notes

riikkamhaynes-blog · 6 years ago

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👏Book review👏 or analysis... whatever

Koston enkeli (the angel of revenge) by Juha Ruusuvuori (published 2014)

The table of content

Introduction (synopsis)

No spoiler review (the writing, dialogue, the pacing + ending, the characters)

Spoilery overview of the plot

The bullshit

Things I liked

What can the writers learn from this?

My rating

Recommendations

Introduction

I found this book in my local bookstore. It was on sale for five euros. It would’ve been around 30 on normal occasions. The cover was cool, the name was intriguing and the price was fair. This book promised to be a psychological thriller about gender roles and the downfall of relationships. Keep that in mind...

My thoughts on it?

Synopsis

The book has two main protagonists; Mia and Harry. They are an old married couple. Mia hears a rumor that Harry could have cheated on her with another younger woman. The prologue shows a murder taking place. Neither the victim nor the culprit is named and their identities are completely ambiguous.

It’s essentially a psychological whodunnit story.

The book is written in Finnish and, as far as I know, hasn’t been translated into English. It’s not a big loss if you ask me.

Non-spoiler review

The chapters were written in a bizarre style. There were no spelled out chapter breaks. There was nothing where you would see “chapter 1, chapter 2, etc”. It may not sound like a lot but it does make a difference when you’re reading. Did I like it?

Look, this format is actually quite common in some nonfiction books but this is the first fiction I’ve read that utilizes it.

Since it is a mystery, I don’t mind an ambiguous narrative and a different format, in fact, if done right, it would enhance the story. I just didn’t like it in this book.

Now, I’m not saying that this failed entirely. The format did help the ambiguity of the story, even if the way it did that was by confusing the f*ck out of me. It almost merged the two POV characters into one. It might have worked.

I do question the need for this formatting choice. I personally didn’t care for it. My main problem is that I don’t feel like this book really benefited from it. I do not think it would’ve made a difference if the book was formatted normally. It was just a big meh for me.

The writing

I have no problems with the actual writing. I found it to be quite wonderful and vivid (even though the book didn’t really describe the setting). The sentence structure was okay (in a way that the length varied). The lack of adverbs was delightful.

What I’m trying to say is that the writing was simply

The Dialogue

It was written in a way that turned it into blocks of unintelligible garbage.

For some unknown reason to man, this author decided not to include ANY dialogue tags. It was just as confusing as it sounds. I found this to be incredibly hard to follow. I don’t that style added anything to the narrative.

More than that, I feel like this style took away from the entertainment value. I love dialogue. It brings the characters alive... but not when it’s written just as another paragraph.

The dialogue was written as the characters telling the reader what was said.

Example:

I told Harry that I was down to fuck if he did the dishes. He told me that he would see to it as soon as we left the funeral.

(That never happened in the story, don’t worry.)

I think that type of dialogue is okay when used when it needs to be used (like in small talk and greetings). It, however, does take away from the showing aspect of the story. We all know that you should show, not tell and this type of dialogue tells. It breaks the immersion when used with conversations that would be better when shown.

There is another problem with this writing choice.

Dialogue helps to break up the normally bland look of the page. Let me show you what I mean by examining these two pages (u don’t gotta read them):

Isn’t that just beautiful? Doesn’t it make you ooze with anticipation to read it?

Then check this out:

The latter one looks way more appetizing. The chances are that you even tried to read specific parts in it. This is because most humans don’t digest big chunks of information easily. I’m not saying that you NEED to have dialogue on every page, in fact, you shouldn’t have it in just to fill space.

That being said, an entire book made out of bricks of plain text with nothing to break it up is going to drive not just the characters to homicide, but the reader as well.

(Both of the examples I gave were of fictional texts so the argument that one is meant to be factual will not hold. Even with textbooks that are meant to convey information, the text shouldn’t be a brick wall because it hinders the amount of information the reader is going to actually pick up. The page is often broken up in textbooks with diagrams and pictures.)

You can also break up the text by doing certain parts in different styles, eg bold and italic. I use this a lot to highlight certain words and sentences so that the reading experience is more interesting.

Conclusion:

Avoid big blocks of bland text because the human subconscious doesn’t find them visually interesting and can often be put away by it.

On a side note; if you plan to have a no-dialogue book, at least break it up in the writing formatting. I would be careful with a no-dialogue book since it’s hard to pull it off. It would put a lot more focus on your writing ability and all of your weak points in writing would pop up like a line of motherfucking erections.

(Not everyone is affected by the bricks as much as others are. I would be wary of it but you definitely shouldn’t freak out if you have it in certain parts of your manuscript. Just make sure that the whole book is not made out of it.)

The pacing

The book was an easy read partly due to the fast pacing. The start was fast and the snippets to the murder helped to keep the reader interested. I didn’t notice any inconsistencies until the very end of the book.

Ah, the ending. The most important and meaningful part of a book... I am disappointed.

We all know what the three-act structure is. It is universally the most popular guideline for the pacing, tension-building and story structure. In essence, tension should rise as the story nears the end. There is a big climax and then everything is tied together, the reader left satisfied.

That’s how it went here, riiigghhhht?

It felt flat.

The author clearly tried to set the tension up, but it failed because we were given too much information and the events leading up to it were unrealistic.

The ending felt flat party because we knew what to expect. And although we didn’t know for sure whodunnit, we knew pretty much what else would have to happen before the end. To me, it felt like the author didn’t put that much effort into making the ending surprising.

He made it clear who was going to die and the only “surprise” was the killer (but it feels like I’m picking at straws when I call that a surprise). It was quite clear that he thought he was being smart by writing it the way he did, but I’m not buying it.

For me, it felt like the pacing was the highest at the start and the middle and that the ending was like a depressing mudslide.

It also felt like there was no structure in the story. I couldn’t pick up when each act was ending. It was confusing.

The characters

One is a cheating whore, the other one is a paranoid cunt.

The paranoia I can understand but it became unhealthy real quick and the cheater turned out to be a huge prick out of the blue (this person was portrayed as a reasonable person prior to the reveal so it didn’t make sense).

I did actually like seeing these two people descend into complete madness. I can give that to the book. Their psychological journey was fun to watch even if there were big parts of the book that let me down.

I enjoyed both viewpoints and it was a very entertaining read. I didn’t personally like either of the POV characters but I can forgive that because they kept me interested.

This book only had two side characters. Their personalities were consistent and reasonable. I could easily believe that they were real people.

The only character I didn’t believe could be a real person was the cheater as their personality kept on swinging and changing depending on the situation. They suddenly changed their morals without explanation. It was super inconsistent and could’ve been fixed by establishing their motives more clearly.

One of this book’s strong suits is the way the author wrote the characters. There was one big inconsistency, but everyone was written in a way that kept the reader interested.

Spoilers from here on out

Spoiler overlook of the plot

An unnamed person gets shot in an unknown location (a bible quote is cited by the killer)

Mia and Harry are having a family vacation. Mia finds out that Harry was seen speaking to another woman in a smoke break.

Mia goes on a big manhunt to expose Harry and basically starts stalking him.

They do a bunch of anniversary shit, have sex a couple of times, Mia is a possessive cunt, the story plays around with the whodunnit question (and whether Harry actually cheated or not).

Mia gets more and more paranoid because Harry smelled like perfume after he left a huge party (and other small things)... because that makes sense.

Harry is a cheating cunt, wow, who woulda thought...

Mia hires a private detective to catch Harry

Mia has a hissy fit and punches a mirror because she is salty of her fading looks and that her husband is going after a younger hot black chick

She is frustrated because nothing turns up from the detective instead of being happy

She fucks with the detective

Harry breaks up with Melissa (we find out that they were together for over a year...)

Mia and Harry come clean about their misadventures

Harry throws a hissy fit because Mia slept with another guy... once... when he slept with another bitch for over a year... classy.

They somehow live in peace for six weeks bc there is a time skip (because their life totally would be uneventful after a situation like that... and we as the reader don’t need to see that shit)

They try to live their life and everyone is jealous and angry

A person is seen going to a hotel and shooting Melissa

There is this weird time skip where we see Harry in a psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane and Mia goes out the see him...

The end...

The bullshit

1. At first, I thought the author did the mystery well in a sense that we never knew for sure who it was, but then he kept on giving. He never stopped. He set up everything so clearly against Mia that we knew it was not going be her. We could tell that the killer would be the only character not presented as a suspect (Harry).

That is a classic strategy in mystery but it was overdone in this one.

It got to the point where everything was spelled out as a possible solution and I stopped caring. There was no tension because we knew too much. Please take notes because this happens all too often.

Give enough information so that the reader has questions. Don’t tell the answers to all possible outcomes and only leave the reader with “which one is it gonna be” because it will be boring. If we know what will happen with each option, we will not care about which one it’s going to be (since we basically know the ending in that instance).

Am I making sense? I hope so.

To be fair, the reader never knew for sure who the killer was and that did keep some “tension” in the story. I remember being like “ok, I know basically everything but I wanna keep going bc I wanna see which option the author picked.” It’s not a grand reaction to a mystery, but it’s something. It could’ve been worse.

2. The setting of the story is barely described. I get the point. It’s a psychological mystery. The story is about the journey of this couple. I do however think it’s necessary to at least let us know if it takes place in 2010 or 1960... To know the general time period would help us to relate to the characters more. Mia’s position and social standing would be way worse if it was the 60s whereas, in the modern day, she would be doing just fine.

Timelines are important in psychological stories because they tell a significant amount about how the character would interact with the world they live in.

3. Their relationship fell apart super fast. They have been together for over 20 years and a simple rumor from a shaky source was enough to break it up.

I call bullshit.

4. The book promised to talk about gender equality stuff but it never did. There were no scenes where Mia was treated badly or Harry being treated better. The story takes place in the modern day (I assume) Finland. If you’re gonna say that you will speak about sexism, at least pick a setting where it’s more common and a bigger problem.

A note from my reading diary:

Now that I think about it, maybe the gender role thing isn’t a troll. Mia is shown cooking and it’s made clear it’s unusual and that she is a bad cook. She is possessive, which is usually portrayed as a masculine trait. Then Harry is quite calm and collected, interested in reading and such, which is normally seen as feminine.

That was the only gender role thing I found from the book. I don’t need a book to speak about feminism but when it claims to touch the subject, I damn well expect it to do so.

I also feel like having a female character have masculine traits and vice versa isn’t enough material to claim that your book talks about gender roles. It’s not a big deal. If I have one gay character in my book, it doesn’t make it an LGBT themed book since it’s barely talked about in the context of the story.

My point is that I don’t feel this book has enough substance in it to claim it’s talking about gender equality. To me, it seems to talk about the psychology of murder more.

(I feel like I need to mention that this book was published in late 2014. If I remember correctly that was around the time when the whole feminazi thing started becoming increasingly mainstream and talking about it would give you a shit ton of exposure. Maybe to mention gender roles as being a big part of the story was just a good marketing strategy. I don’t mean to offend the author, this is just a theory based on my experience of the book.)

5. We as a reader never got to really know the characters past. It might not be such a big deal to some people who are there for just the ride, but for me it really was disappointing. I feel like knowing their pasts would help to add some mystery because then the reader has to come up with how the past could affect their psyche today and thus add more to the psychological mystery of the story.

For a psychological story not to speak about the childhood of its characters is extremely weird and disappointing.

I feel like the book would’ve benefitted from letting the reader know.

6. This book introduced this big question of “did they do the cheating” and it was presented as the big thing only for it to be explained within like the first 60 pages. Umm. I feel cheated. pun intended.

I don’t think you should give the reader this huge mystery only to reveal it even before the middle. I totally took me off guard and I almost stopped reading because that was the thing I felt the book was presented as the most meaningful thing (ie, all the characters went on an on about the possibility and the wrongness of it).

The book is on thin ice. It needs to give me another big question that will make me want to read because right now I have the plot all figured out. Don’t pretend to be a mystery novel just to answer all the questions BEFORE YOU GET TO THE FUCKING MIDDLE PART.

~My reading diary

7. Mia is insanely paranoid and obsessive it has never before surfaced in their +20 year relationship? Bullshit. My reading diary really did summarize it the best.

Another thing I don’t really get is Mia’s obsessive and possessive behavior, more so how it hasn’t come up before. It’s made clear that they are older and have been together for a long time. How is this the first time she has gotten this suspicious? How have they not fallen out before? You need to keep in mind that so far, she has no actual evidence of him cheating? She only knows that Harry once spoke to a pretty girl on a smoke break. SO WHAT. Then he has come home and smelled like a woman's perfume, AFTER A PARTY. I don’t think that’s enough to accuse someone of cheating. You can only imagine how freaked out Mia would be when Harry is over at a woman friends house. If she gets obsessed with so little evidence, how have they stayed together for over 20 years??? I call that a plot hole. No rational man would let that slide.

8. I didn’t like how this book made Mia the stereotypical older woman who is insecure about her fading beauty. WE NEED CONFIDENT OLDER WOMEN IN FICTION. PLEASE.

9. The fucking mirror smashing scene. I will let my diary speak for itself.

Mia undresses in front of a mirror. Her mind warps and she sees her body transforming into that of Melissa’s. She calls Mel a bitch and a whore. Classy. She seems to feel insecure about aging. Why can’t there be a story about older people feeling confident?? She’s not even old. She said that she’s 37. NOT OLD. She also described Melissa as having a “cruel smirk”. Please don’t make Melissa a cold-hearted bitch. PLEASE.

Oh, and Mia also punched the mirror. As you do. In fiction. WHY DOES EVERY ANGSTY BOOK HAVE MIRROR SMASHING IN IT?????? why. She didn’t even clean it up. She just went in and took a bath. And now she has a fever. Nice.

Harry is confused about how it happened. He thinks that Mia slipped but it’s obvious she hit the mirror. If her knuckles are bleeding and a mirror has been smashed, it would be obvious that she hit it. Am I slow or something?

omg. Mia is possessed by a demon. Harry was sulking about how “he is supposed to love Mia, why is everything like this all of a sudden” when he hears screaming from Mia’s room. She sits up, apparently still sleeping and says: “leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord”. OMG. She is insane. Citing the bible whenever she can is really creepy. How is Harry not scared for his life??? I WOULD BE HORRIFIED. Then Mia just falls asleep again.

10. A private detective was hired to catch a cheater. I have no words. It’s ridiculous.

11. Mia constantly slut shames this Melissa. I do not appreciate it. I can forgive it because Mia obviously is insane but it’s still annoying.

12. Mia sees cheating as an act of revenge. I can see where it’s coming from but I don’t believe a 40-year-old woman would think that. It’s something I can see angsty highschoolers doing...

13. Harry brought Melissa into a student cafe to break up with her. Where is the logic behind that? Then he has the audacity to freak out when people find out about his inappropriate relationship with a student...

14. The 180 Harry made. He started off as this rational dude. Then it just fell apart. We found out that he had been cheating on Mia for over a year. The Harry at the start of the story wouldn’t do that, then he gets pissed when Mia cheated once, SHE CHEATED ONCE AND HE IS HAVING A HISSY FIT. Bullshit.

His character didn’t regain any of his original traits. I think it’s bad writing. You want the characters to keep at least some of their original personality.

Check out this video which explains it further:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9SK0Jhk7Pw

15. The six week time skip near the end makes no sense, serves no purpose and completely deflates the last bit of tension.

There is no way they could’ve been at peace for that long with nothing notable happening. Bullshit.

17. The tension deflated like a fucking limp cock around the middle and it never got up. I feel like the author tried too hard to lure me in within the first 60 pages, and from there on the tension and my interest in the story plummeted.

18. Conclusion. Harry was the killer.

I hate it. There are so many things wrong with this...

The killer at the start cited a specific bible quote. Harry was in no way religious and NEVER cited the quote whereas it was almost like Mia’s motto. INCONSISTENT.

The killer at the start was highly religious (we could tell by their thought process bc it’s a 1st person). The only scene I remember Harry being religious is a throwaway sentence of him skimming the bible.

Harry was sane and his thought process wasn’t plagued by murderous thoughts, whereas Mia was going on and on about how she would murder for her loved ones and on some occasions, she even fantasized about murdering Melissa.

Mia had a bigger motivation to murder. She was cheated on for over a year, she has a grudge on Melissa (because she is more beautiful, younger and because Harry wants her more than he wants Mia), she is incredibly insecure, constantly feels like people are out to break her seemingly perfect marriage. Speaking of which, she holds her long-lasting marriage as a badge of honor and would do anything (kill) to keep it going. She is a control freak (as shown with her interactions with Harry) and she is extremely deranged near the time of the murder.

Why would Harry kill Melissa? He wanted to make things okay with Mia, he is mad because Mia cheated on him once, that’s it...

Harry was extremely anti killing before the murder whereas Mia was all for it. It would take a lot to persuade him to do it and we know that his motivations are minimal.

Harry being the killer (and it being written like this) breaks Mia’s character. Because he was the killer, Mia is simply a paranoid bitch who has wet dreams of murder.

I’ve already mentioned that we got like no hints and clues that Harry would do it, whereas everything was set up against Mia. The conclusion was obvious.

Things I liked

the start was good. I really liked the small snippets to the murder. It did keep me invested. This book started off strong. I was immediately invested in the story. I wanted to see who will kill who and if Harry actually cheated. Then the story went downhill.

The psychological journey of MIA, fuck Harry. He was a mess

Mia descending into madness

Mia being crazy for murder

Mia growing a backbone as the story went on

I want Mia to top me

What can writers learn from this?

when writing a mystery, don't make the characters do things that don't match their personality just because you need to confuse the reader. it’s bad storytelling and will break the reader's immersion.

Make sure that the characters arcs are finished and they have a proper conclusion.

you need to make sure that all of the clues you drop tie together. if they don't, the reader will feel like they were cheated on.

My rating

2/5 on Goodreads.

Recomendation

I would only really recomend this if you wanted to study storytelling and what works and what doesn’t. I don’t think it’s a lifechanging book that you have to read.

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