Book #81 of 2021:
Faye, Faraway by Helen Fisher
For the most part, this novel (published in certain countries under the alternate title Space Hopper) is simply a lovely story about a woman time-traveling back to visit with the mother who passed away when she was a young girl. I appreciate how the narrative doesn’t try to play coy and maintain the possibility that everything happening is only a dream, and although there’s minimal plot here, I actually prefer the slower portions where the characters can just talk and enjoy one another’s company to the showier moments of drama that sporadically pop up. The method of transportation to the past is neat too — almost like something out of The Twilight Zone, where an inexplicable artifact generates wonders but is in perpetual danger of being destroyed and ending the miracle.
I do have a few issues with this text, from a stray racial slur to the red flags of jealousy and borderline-abusive behavior in the heroine’s husband which go largely unaddressed. I wondered at one point if debut author Helen Fisher were aiming to problematize the idea of her protagonist’s happy home life as even worth returning to, but that thread never really gets pulled to my satisfaction. He’s just a jerk whom Faye loves and gaslights herself over, accepting his criticisms as though they’re remotely valid when she could rightly be standing up for herself and what’s important to her instead. That’s frustrating in an audience identification figure, but it’s thankfully a minor aspect of the book. Overwhelmingly, the focus is on this strange connection between two women decades apart, and I’ve got a feeling it’s those quiet scenes I’ll remember more than the selfish oaf.
★★★★☆
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