Unraveled, by Courtney Milan

[rowyn]

This is the third and last book in the Turner series I've been reading. It's also my favorite of the three. The characters are refreshingly forthright about what they want, and there's a lot of good banter. The characters are lovable and their motivations clear and intelligible.

One of the things I like best about Milan's work are its contra-trope facets. This one works against the idea of the "broken hero that only the heroine can fix through the power of LOVE". The male lead in Unraveled had a traumatic childhood, and he's quite plainly traumatized by it. But he's got established coping methods, functions fine in society despite the trauma, and doesn't regard himself as "broken". Neither does the female lead. It's cute.

Another thing: in each of Milan's books, there is at least one point where one of the leads has the opportunity to pick up the Stupid Ball. This is a chance to do something profoundly awful that the protagonist doesn't really want to do. The protagonist is given a handful of quasi-sound justifications for picking up the Stupid Ball. The reader, however, can tell that doing so will damage the relationship between the two protagonists, betray the trust of one of them, and benefit no one in the long term. This will happen around two-thirds of the way through the book, so the reader knows there's still time to patch over the damage from the Stupid Ball, and it's frankly exactly the sort of stupidity one expects in a romance novel. (Like "let's be irrationally jealous of this clearly platonic relationship!") The protagonist will then consider all of the reasons to pick up the Stupid Ball and run with it. And then, the protagonist will go "Nah, forget that, it's obviously a terrible idea." THIS IS SUCH A RELIEF. It's as if your favorite sitcom looked like it was about to use that plotline you hate and you're already cringing in anticipation of how bad it will be, and then it's all "HA FAKE OUT" and the episode is about something good instead.

Unraveled does have a poorly-developed sideplot with a resolution that's simplistic and naive, so I'll mark it down for that. But the central romance is delightful. I'll give this one an 8.5.

Comments

[xyzzysqrl]

With Quantum Leap at least there's the "Excuse" that our hero has literal brain damage from the experiment, with memory loss and whatnot accompanying.

I'm not sure that show would get on the air today.

[rowyn]

I watched a few episodes way back when, and never realized he'd suffered brain injury in the initial accident. Interesting!

[xyzzysqrl]

It was only really played up in a few of the episodes and some of the books. (why no I wasn't a fan or anything.) His memory got "swiss-cheesed", as they put it, and sometimes this manifested in funny ways. It was usually used so he could dramatically REMEMBER that he had some skill at the last minute, but once they got used to playing that card he would just as often have forgotten something vital that Al needed to remind him of for the benefit of the audience.

(The novels really played up that aspect of it. One of my favorite bits in one of them is Al going to work and wondering who'll end up working where today, because Sam's futzing with the timeline keeps changing their working conditions and work roster while Al's in the chamber with him and thus protected from time-travel effects. This was of course a bit too high-concept for the TV screen at the time. I think other shows have done something similar since.)

[jordangreywolf.livejournal.com]

Actually, I find that sort of "high-concept" stuff to be quite interesting.

For instance, Al leaves Dr. Beckett for long periods of time. (This often results in unfortunate circumstances for Dr. Beckett. Where's Al when you need him? ;) ) Presumably he's NOT camped inside the complex 24/7, even though this is a 24/7 job for Dr. Beckett. Well, what if Dr. Beckett does something that sends a butterfly ripple effect while Al is outside the protective shell of the chamber?

Presumably ZIGGY would know of this (since Ziggy is able to report "You've changed time!" and such) and fill in Al on what he missed, but I could envision this resulting in some awkward moments where Al DOES NOT REMEMBER something that Dr. Beckett does (or remembers it DIFFERENTLY), because Al was part of the "future update."

I'm going to guess that Dr. Beckett simply CANNOT alter time to such a degree that it would result in a paradox that would eliminate the Quantum Leap program, etc. -- or, from a certain point of view, that would only create an unstable time loop that would collapse on itself, so due to "quantum immortality," we would only observe the final state where it sorts itself out and it seems as if amazing chance just determined that whatever the change made, the events leading to the Quantum Leap program's creation went forward anyway. :D

(That's kind of like the explanation given in the sci-fi series "Stein's Gate" for how the universe seemed so ridiculously malevolent in its interference when the protagonist attempted to deliberately change the past. And at the same time, various things that he incidentally changed in the past -- which he didn't really care about and which had no bearing on his motivation to time travel in the first place -- would still "stick," so obviously it WAS possible to change the past to what sometimes was a pretty radical degree. It wasn't that the universe cared one whit or another whether a particular person lived or died; it's that if he changed the past in such a way that he removed his motivation for going into the past -- or removed his ABILITY to go back into the past -- it created an unstable time loop; the only stable time loop would be one, no matter how improbable, in which he still has motivation and ability to invent the time machine. He doesn't "remember" all the dead-end alternatives which, from his point of view, never happened.)

[jordangreywolf.livejournal.com]

Disclaimer: I just wrote a whole ranty-rant about the final season of Quantum Leap. For the sanity of all involved, I've deleted it. That was just SO off-topic of me. Sorry! Gwendel and I have only one disc left before we're finally through Season 5.

Anyway, yes, in the early parts of the series his "Swiss cheese memory" is an excuse for them to keep introducing new skills he has but doesn't know about (piano-playing, singing, photographic memory, Shakespearean acting, medicine, astronomy, all brands of SCIENCE, etc.). In Season 5, they introduce the phenomenon of him having "little bits" of the mind of whomever it was he replaced, so in the Lee Harvey Oswald episode he keeps going psycho, and in the second part of the wretched "Trilogy" sequence, he's all Randy McLustforbrains about the woman who'd previously been his little-girl DAUGHTER in the previous leap. (Oh, the CREEPINESS!)

So, out of fairness, they have a "reason" for the idiot ball ... but, boy, that idiot ball gets quite the workout in the last season, and it's still something were a good portion of the time you can just SEE IT COMING. (Even before then, throughout the series: Oh, people doubt our hero's sanity? Here comes Al the Invisible Hologram! What are the odds that Dr. Beckett is going to have an animated conversation with him in public and -- ohhhhh, someone SEES him talking to apparently empty air? Sur-prise, SUR-PRISE! ;) )

[tuftears.livejournal.com]

Aw, you should share the rant on your own journal. So we can read it. ;) It's not like I haven't ranted a time or two about series on my journal.

[rowyn]

I am always sad when the wuf mentions deleting something unsent, too! Aww, now I can't read it.

[jordangreywolf.livejournal.com]

Seriously, I write and delete-before-posting at least 5 times as many posts and comments as those that I ever actually send or put up.

Now if only I could do that in REAL LIFE with what comes out of my MOUTH. Wow. :D

[xyzzysqrl]

I am very glad I'm not watching television with you.