An audio book.
On a delayed Australian plane flight an old lady passenger suddenly gets up and tells people at what age they'll die and the cause of their death. We get the PoV of Leo, 43, who will die in months from a work accident (he overworks, neglecting his family); Sue, 63, (who'll die at 66 of pancreatic cancer); Allegra (a pretty, efficient air stewardess who will self-harm); Paula, 36 (with 2 kids - one will drown at 7, the other will live to 103); Ethan, who's back from a funeral (who'll die of assault at 30); Don and Eve who've just married (Eve's spouse will kill her).
We get first a paragraph from the PoV of Cherry, the old lady, then longer snippets that often have a connection with the surrounding material. After the incident she recalled nothing about it. Her mother was a psychic, her father died young, struck by lightning. Her fiance died in Vietnam. She married David, a rather uncaring man half-Korean doctor who was sterile. Good sex but they didn't like each other much. She started to drink. Her husband started sleeping with Stella. They divorced. David and Cherry decide to adopt. Cherry's mother dies, but not before Cherry gets a reading from her - Cherry recognised the tricks. Cherry remarries. After 30+ years her husband dies on a plane (the same route as the strange flight).
Interrupting Cherry's story are the lives of the various characters. Ethan, fancies his wacky, rich house-mate Jasmine who brings home a man then breaks up with him. He becomes obessive, violent and suspects Ethan. Allegra continues sleeping sometimes with pilot Jonny. She bad back pains. Don knows that he has murderous thoughts while sleepwalking so he handcuffs himself at night or sleeps in a different room. Then 3 people (2 nearly 100 years old) die at the predicted age. The survivors take precautions, just in case. They start getting in touch with each other. The ones who'll die old start taking risks.
Cherry still hasn't been identified. Then after a 4th death (faked for publicity) the predictions begin to come unstuck. She releases a statement saying that she had a mental incident on the plane. In an epilogue we discover that the boy who should have drowned at 7 went on to win a swimming gold medal - after the flight his mother had made him do many swimming lessons, so he survived an incident at sea went he was 7.
A probability theme (fallacies etc) is sustained - Cherry's an actuary. I like the details - how someone pushes aside a headphone with a thumb when spoken to, how the atmosphere in a room changes like in a classroom after the teacher's lost their temper. But I was never convinced by the Allegra character.
Other reviews
- Adele Dumont (The far-fetched plot of Here One Moment wouldn’t matter so much were its characters memorable. But there are just so very many, and post-flight they mostly lead their own separate lives, only really reconnecting via a Facebook group. As a result, there are none of the complicated group dynamics that made her other novels so compelling. ... wit is fleeting, and not enough to rescue a narrative that is too baggy and a host of characters who are ultimately forgettable.)
- Anne Logan (Would men connect with this book as much as women? Likely not, as there were considerably more female perspectives, and at times, the men could be infantilized a bit (in good humour, but still, I noticed it). Does Moriarty have a bunch of male fans? Again, probably not)
- libgirlbooks
- capsulenz
No comments:
Post a Comment