HAV -> YYZ -> YOW

And I am home again. It was...interesting.

Genre effects (_The Falling Woman_ by Pat Murphy)

I've just finished reading _The Falling Woman_ by Pat Murphy (reviewed by J. D. Nicoll, here: https://jamesdavisnicoll.com/review/catch-me-as-i-fall ) and it left me thinking about how genre affects meaning in a book/story. In his review, he says, "This is because she has a literal sixth sense. She sees the shades of the dead. ". Read as a genre novel, I agree -- but I also found myself finding the textual evidence interesting. We are given the subjective experience of a woman and her daughter seeing things, and in fact, similar things. Is this a novel of magical powers (in-genre, of course, it is) or is it a novel of mental illness and living and coping with mental illness? Should we assume (as our genre suggests) that the ghosts are real, that they women have an extra power? Why should we assume this?