This collection of short stories was, for the most part, very well-put-together. All of the stories were at least interesting, and while there were a couple that I didn’t like as much, overall the collection really does contain good work Connie Willis has written.

If you like screwball comedies and science fiction (and they go together way better than you’d think) you’ll enjoy this book. Willis is also a wonderful social satire writer. Even though the book was written nearly fifteen years ago, most of the issues she discusses are relevant.

My favorites in the collection were “Even the Queen”, which deals with an issue faced by all women, “Spice Pogrom”, which is a seriously, seriously screwball story about aliens and miscommunication which actually portrays cute little girls as bratty, “Time Out”, which deals with motherhood and midlife crises and the chicken pox, “Chance”, which is about regrets and how one little event can change a person’s life forever, and “At the Rialto”, which I’d read before but which was just as funny the second time around.

For the record, Connie Willis is a genius.

That is all.

In other news, today we’re going to go have a small family get-together in the afternoon. My brother wants us all to play board games, which is always fun, except that my siblings are two of the most competitive people on the face of the planet. Our attempt to play Cranium last night went disastrously badly. I mostly blame the fact that my brother, who was the reason for this, was chugging Captain Morgan the entire time. I’ve also discovered that I do not like rum unless there is also Coke in the glass containing the said rum. Captain Morgan, to me, tastes more like flavored rubbing alcohol than anything else does.