The Host by Stephenie Meyer published in 2008

The Earth has been taken over by parasitic creatures whose species goes from planet to planet, inhabiting different life forms. When one of the more experienced aliens is inserted into a human, she finds that this one isn’t about to be taken over without a fight. The host body, Melanie, is desperate to get back to her hunky boyfriend and her younger brother, and she soon convinces the alien, named the Wanderer, to leave life with her own species and take off on a life threatening journey to find the few surviving humans.

After getting lost in the desert for days, and then finally being found by Melanie’s uncle and reuniting with Melanie’s lost love, the alien must find a way to convince the humans that she has truly left her wayward, invading species behind and wants learn to function as part of the human community.

I found this first part of this book  very hard to stick with - the alien is too easily convinced to throw away her entire life and alienate (no pun intended) herself from her species. And, since most of the human males she meets have a tendency to beat her up, threaten to kill her, and starve her, it’s hard to understand why she doesn’t take off again.  If I had been able to access another book, I don’t think I would have stuck with this - but I was camping and had nothing else to read so I kept reading and I’m glad  I did.

The first person narrative is engaging and works well for this plot. Myers is a skilled writer who kept me reading once I decided to just “ride along” with the shaky early set up. The Wanderer talks about the other life forms she has invaded/inhabited and for all of us who enjoy alien lit, these are fascinating and fun. The love story is a bit complicated but also fun and the end finishes this story and also leaves enough for a sequel.

The last two thirds of the book are worth reading and it’s worth spending your time with this book. 

Am I a reviewer or am I a bitchy whiner...?

I know that's an odd title for a blog post, but it is what I'm asking myself today. I just finished reading Fragile by Lisa Unger. She's a top selling mystery writer and, sure enough, she can keep you turning the pages. This book begins with a missing teen who may have run away or who may have been abducted. This sets the town on edge and brings up the past for several of it's long time residents, all of whom have fought their own memories of a teen who went missing, and was found dead, during adolescent years. The heroine of the story is a psychologist, the mom of the missing teens boyfriend - and that's where I lose it with this book.

You see, I'm a therapist, with a successful practice for almost 3 decades. And, this leading character, Maggie, is just not okay in that role. The author claims to have interviewed and relied on a therapist, but I can't imagine what his or her credentials were, or how he or she felt about the consulting after reading the book. The author has Maggie breaking boundaries, or having none at all (she's pleased she has a cell phone so her clients can call her day or night, weekday or weekend - I don't think so honey), and she refers to one of her clients as "the neurotic" - aside from being insulting -it's also not a diagnosis nor the way any therapist would think of a client. And, when it comes to trauma treatment, Maggie has all the therapeutic skills of my 9 year old daughter.

Yes, I know this is a fiction and we all take liberties to support the narrative and move the story along- but an accurate portrayal of a therapeutic practitioner would have allowed for the same thing - and it wouldn't have been so, so wrong. As a therapist I was annoyed that the writer didn't respect my profession enough to get it even halfway right. And, I'm sure there are few police out there who are equally irritated because even I could see that the liberties with that profession were rife.

So  - who has the problem - me or Lisa Unger? Am I just being bitchy to want to have my profession portrayed within the boundaries of reality? Or am I right in believing an author should respect her readers by ensuring at least some degree of accuracy in how he or she portrays the professions of the characters? Will I read another of her books - I don't know. There are lots of good mystery writers out there and most others do a better job of presenting their character's professions - I'll likely go with them.

Reading influences...

On one of the writers' pages I participate in (yes, I get how bad that grammar is) - the question was asked - do you read books that are in the same genre in which you write? For me, the answer is no - I write in several genres - YA, fantasy, mystery, short story, and non fiction. What I read is normally dictated by what is available at the airport because the only time I have to read is on business trips and I buy something to get me through the trip. I know some people fear plane travel because they worry they might crash - not me, I fear plane travel because I worry I'll trapped on a plane for several hours with a book I don't like. 

I know that if I planned ahead then the books I bought would be very different - it seems that all the books at the airports I frequent are in the top 20  best sellers and are either about vampires or serial killers. I don't really like either, but since I can only choose one, I go for the serial killers. If I planned ahead and bought a book at real book store, it would more likely be something historical - more likely set in Asia or in WW2.

I devored Amy Tan's early books and I recently read the fictionalized account of Pearl Buck's early life in China by Anchee Chin and loved that. Of course, my all time favorite book is The Book Thief by Markus Zuzak - I don't expect to ever again read anything that innovative and well written. I also recently read Drood by Dan Simmons. That stunned me because I hadn't realized that a writer could take such bizarre liberties when writing a fiction about a person who actually lived. I don't like what Simmons did, but it was a good read and again, very innovative. 

I expect to start reviewing books very soon and I'll be using a Kindle for that. The Kindle will free me from airport book store choices and it will be interesting (to me) to see what tweaks my interest. 

Do you read in your genre?