Lost in a Good Book

[avram]

I’ve finished Lost in a Good Book, the second Thursday Next novel. It’s got a better middle than the first book — Jurisfiction is just more fun than SpecOps. But holy crap, that ending. The resolution for the main plot relies too much on other characters just showing up and helping Thursday out when it’s convenient for the author. (And I’m not just talking about the coincidence stuff. I thought that was handled well, with Thursday having to think to get the coincidences to pay off for her.) And the resolution for the sub-plot, damn, there are at least three kinds of major stupid in it:

First, I can’t believe that a police chemistry lab could fail to identify a sample of dessert topping. At least, not if they’re minimally competent.

Second, if I had a blob of nanotech that could dissolve any organic matter it touched, I wouldn’t hold it in magnetic bottles. I’d stick it in a solid non-organic container. A tin can, a titanium box, something along those lines.

Third, if I could travel through time, and I wanted to get rid of a frozen blob of lethal nano, and I had three minutes before the thing thawed out and ate my hand, I’d leave right away and drop the thing wherever I was planning to drop it; I wouldn’t waste time sitting around telling people how much I’d miss them. But what I’d more likely do is use my power to freeze time that I had displayed on every single previous appearance I’d made in the two books. The author even has Thursday mention that her dad isn’t freezing time, but doesn’t bother to even provide a plausible speculation for the reason.

Comments

Dessert topping?

[(Anonymous)]

I can’t believe that a police chemistry lab could fail to identify a sample of dessert topping.

It might be a floor wax.

[cheshyre]

Like I said, the third book is better. And if I think of the 2nd book as largely setup for the 3rd, I remember it a bit more fondly.