Busy day and sore wrists (I miss my desk that’s the right height nad my wrist-rest!) but I finished Midnight at Spanish Gardens a couple of days ago, and I did promise to report on the rest of it.
And … it was good, but none of the rest of it blew me away like Quincy’s story. I liked John, but the reasoning behind his final decision seemed a little weak to me – I get that it’s a question of building his own identity, but he’d done that either way. In Ellen’s case the decision made perfect sense, but I’m not sure I agree with the implications about the effects of gender.
I think my uneven reaction is probably an effect of how the book is arranged: it’s the indidivual (though linked) stories of five different people. I’d be willing to bet that many readers will have the same general reaction – loving one part, liking the rest OK – but that the most powerful part will be different for each reader.
The one thing that confused me a bit was Olivia’s story, the last one: I couldn’t quite understand why her reactions had such a powerful effect on Ariel (who, by the way, reminded me pleasantly of Gil the bartender in Patricia Bray and Joshua Palmatier’s anthology Tales from the Ur-Bar). That confusion is probably unfortunate, since I get the feeling that it holds the key to the way everything works at the Spanish Gardens.
I don’t usually do numerical ratings of books unless I’m doing one at Amazon and I have to, but if I were to rate this one I’d definitely give it a 5 for Quincy’s story, and maybe a 3.8 or 4 overall. No question I’ll be rereading it eventually; it will be interesting to see if the second reading has me teasing out more implications to everything, noticing the repetition Sherwood points out or having some other reaction entirely.