Reviews for Theoretical aspects of chemical reactivity

The average rating for Theoretical aspects of chemical reactivity based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-12-29 00:00:00 Mark Elliott I managed to stumble across this author's early work written under the pseudonym Laramie Dunaway when I read the excellent Hungry Women. There were two others almost as good that followed, and I was very happy to see there was another book by the same author when I found this one written under his real name. This is the story of Dr. Season Gottlieb, a brainy woman who has nonetheless drifted through her life as if it belonged to someone else. She's got it good, working in a day clinic treating sniffles and sprained ankles and engaged to a man she's built a relationship with for eight years, but it all comes apart the day her fiancé snaps and guns down five people in the waiting room of the clinic before he himself is killed by the police. Suddenly, Season is at loose ends, unsure of what to do with her life anymore. She decides she wants to be an angel of mercy to the families of those who were killed at the clinic, so she adopts a disguise and a false name and begins tracking them down so she can try to do some good in their lives. Unfortunately, her every attempt backfires. Finally, when she's just about out of options, she meets David, the ex-husband of one of the victims, and when things don't immediately backfire, she decides to stick around to see what she can do to enrich the lives of David and his two teenage charges, Rachel and Josh. Even though David doesn't know her real name, it disturbs Season that in almost no time at all, she feels closer to him than she ever did to her dead fiancé Tim. She's just about to move on before she can irrevocably damage David's family, when a story from the evening news interferes. Someone has been kidnapping young girls and leaving cryptic notes, and because of her almost photographic memory of trivia, Season is able to figure them out. As she had been unable to do any of the good she set out to do, Season is determined that she is going to help the police catch the kidnapper before leaving David behind and going back to her own life. However, nothing goes as planned, especially since her feelings for David are deeper than she wants to admit. I enjoyed the Laramie Dunaway books for their offbeat stories, rich characters, and laugh-out-loud humor. This one fell flat. The story felt forced, and Season was not a very interesting character. I also did not agree with some of the mentality. A fifteen-year-old girl getting pregnant because she was tired of being a virgin is tragic, not normal, and a seventeen-year-old boy who runs a numbers ring and sells his family's secrets to the TV news for money is not just angry, he's a sociopath. I also have a hard time agreeing with the line of thinking that teenage kids should be allowed to do whatever they want because they're old enough to make their own decisions, while their childishly selfish behavior is tolerated because hey, they're just kids! Rachel turns to religion when she realizes she doesn't make good decisions on her own, which is a good thing, but only because she chose an established religion instead of a cult. If she had joined a cult, she was 15 and capable of making her own decisions, so nobody would have done anything to stop her. I could cut David and Season a smidgen of slack because they were not actual parents and didn't have a lot of practice, but I still found their mentality toward the kids, and the kids themselves, distasteful. While stories wherein basically nothing happens and we've just spent a couple of weeks or months with a bunch of characters doing mundane things going nowhere always seem to gain critical acclaim, I find myself less than entertained. Unfortunately, though I enjoyed the Laramie Dunaway books, this book did not follow through on the quality. I'll keep my eyes open for more books by Obstfeldt in the future, though, because his early work was very good.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-05-19 00:00:00 Jason Madrak A fast moving and easy read that certainly keeps your interest. A doctor whose fiance goes berserk and kills five people (in the doctor's clinic), leads the doctor first into depression, and then on a mission to help the surviving relatives of those killed. Her exploits are funny, bungling, but earnest. She is actually arrested for trying to give away $50,000 to the first survivor she located (you'll just have to read it to find out why). The story is at times very sexy. I found it interesting that the sex scenes, written by a male author, but from the female protagonist's point of view, were very good - and mostly funny. Lots of introspection goes on in everything she does, and her photographic memory of lots of minutiae make for comically pleasant, but insightful, diversions. If you are ready for a break from deep, dark and/or dense novels, or from your non-fiction reading, this will bring you laughs and an uplifting perspective on life.