So I’m Off on a Bit of Travel and REALLY Hope it Doesn’t Look like The Travelers by Chris Pavone… :)

Have you read this one? Do you know him? He’s author of The Expats and The Accident – GREAT books, full of interestingly flawed characters who are all too human in both foibles and redemptive qualities. There are believably unbelievable elements of drama and intrigue and great, complex plots full of twists and turns… But they don’t exactly endear one to the concept of travel, teehee, especially this latest one.

Amazon will give you a summary of the plot, you know I don’t do those. What I do is tell you why it’s good. This one boils down to the characters, completely. It had a great beginning, then got a little draggy for a bit, but I persevered because I loved Ex-Pats so much – and am I ever glad I did… By the end I was literally ignoring husband and children, pretending I didn’t hear alarms and tromping toddler feet, just so I could finish the last bits and see how it was all going to end (perfectly, by the way). There are a ton of fun things to read about that would NOT be fun to live – as with most really enjoyable books, in my opinion – and there’s just enough paranoia to keep you watching over your shoulder both while reading and after (and yes, I am speaking from experience, since I’ve been thinking about it ever since finishing yesterday). It feels like good old fashioned Nelson DeMille or John le Carre or Graham Greene – intrigue around every corner, no clue who you can trust, no idea what is going on until the author leads you to connect all the dots. Excellent story development that tracks character development – an instant recipe for success in my book…

You see, The Husband and I are getting ready to head off on a spot of travel ourselves (sans children, hooray!) for a little exceedingly well-deserved and well-needed break this week. Now, unlike Will and Chloe Rhodes, we will be traveling together, so that takes some of the paranoiac edge off – but we won’t be spending all of our time that way, since he likes to metal detect and fish and I like to sit on my butt and read until my legs go numb. And after reading this one, boy oh boy, am I going to have to bite my tongue to not ask who he talked to while he was off on his own… (teehee) Actually, that’s not true – The Husband is not a big fan of people in general (teehee), so I’m pretty well safe. Although he does work in chemicals, so maybe I should worry anyway… (That will make sense after you read the book. If you don’t, don’t worry about it, just trust me – it was a pointed comment.)

Regardless, this is a great read – it got me thinking about every “chance” encounter I’ve ever had, particularly on business trips (I used to take a fair amount back in my lawyer/pharmaceuticals days), and wondering about the things that go on behind the faces we all wear (both individual and corporate). It’s a great book, and I even talked The Husband into reading it while on our trip – and he’s literally good for one physical reading book a year (he does audio books all the time because he drives a LOT for work, but doesn’t have a ton of time for what I snobbishly insist is “real” reading, ala books), and he picked this one, which should also tell you something. Of course, that something could simply be that he was just too lazy to pick one on his own or that he got sick of listening to me rave about this one, teehee… Regardless, pick it up – then you won’t have to listen to me either!

And once again, a ton of great quotes – I love the lessons without being lessons thing that I seem to keep stumbling across in fiction lately. Although these may more properly be characterized as incredibly astute observations on the human condition than life lessons – what do you think? Regardless, they’re excellent examples of what I love about Pavone’s writing…

• He stares at the wall, at that outdated world map, his eyes hopping around all those cities and countries that don’t matter anymore.  Bulgaria? It’s hard to believe that Bulgaria was once considered critical to America, a domino that needed to be propped upright. And now? Now what’s important to America? Is there even such a construct anymore? Or is there only what’s important to Halliburton or ExxonMobil, to Microsoft or Apple, to Coca-Cola and Walmart.  Does anybody care?
• Everyone is acting all the time. Smiling and laughing, great to meet you, that’s awesome. Wearing this and not that, keeping quiet when you want to scream, saying things you know aren’t true. You do it every day, Will, and you did it before you ever met me. We all do. That’s what keeps society going. That’s what life is. Acting.
• “I am not just some…housewife.”  “No,” he says, knee-jerk. “Of course not.”  “I have a master’s degree.”  He’s heard this before, and not just from his wife. There’s no shortage of women whose graduate degrees have transmogrified into heavy chips on their Pilate’d shoulders.
• Will doesn’t understand how an individual can amass such a fortune, can’t comprehend a system in which any activity can be rewarded in such vast disproportion to all others. What can a person have done to deserve this? This cannot be earned money. This is either stolen money or invented money.
• She doesn’t want to be reachable, doesn’t want to be findable, and that’s not so easy. It was only fifteen years ago when people used to go on vacations and weren’t heard from for a week or two, in Guatemala or Tanzania or New Zealand, or not even so exotic, just a weeklong rental in Rehoboth, camping in the Poconos. They didn’t post pictures on social media, they didn’t answer calls or emails or text messages. Vacation meant you were just not around. Perhaps you were missed or needed or wanted, perhaps not, but either way, everyone dealt with it.
• The list of things Elle wishes she hadn’t done is long, and continuing to grow. Icky things and stupid things and ill-considered things, as well as a few things – perhaps more than a few – that would be described by most people as very bad, as evil things. She’s beginning to suspect that what she’s been doing for the past few months might be an unparalleled amalgamation of many of the ways that an endeavor can be regrettable.

Honestly, this man is so unbelievably facile with language, I just love it…  He has an incredible talent for encapsulating the pathos of Everyman(woman), and for bringing the banality (and possibly even the inevitability?) of evil in everyday modern life into a focus that is crisp and biting, yet somehow still manages to make said evil feel like a slide down a twisty playground slide rather than a conscious choice made by evil people…  That’s one of the most disturbing and most enjoyable aspects of his stories, to my mind.  Definitely check him out!