The Unseen World by Liz Moore

I read The Unseen World by Liz Moore because the guest on Sarah's Bookshelves really recommended it. I cannot resist it when people are enthusiastic about their favorite books. I have read The God of the Woods by this same author in the past and really enjoyed it, so I thought reading an older book by the same author would be a fun thing to do.

Ada is raised by her father, a computer scientist named David who is working on a very early AI named ELIXIR in 1980s Boston. David's past comes into question just as his health and memory begin to falter. Ada is taken in by one of David's colleagues and together they begin to unravel the mystery of her father's life. 

In The God of the Woods, I thought it took a bit (70-80 pages) to get into the thing. In this book, the first fifty pages were a real snoozefest. I found myself starting to think that the person who recommended this book was insane. And then I was crying on page 111 and full out sobbing by page 140. 

In same ways I have been lucky. My parents died at relatively young ages (56 and 67) and I never had to watch them go through a mental decline. My mom did suffer some brief hallucinations towards the end, but she knew they were hallucinations and honestly had so much fun with them that I couldn't help but wonder if my mom would have enjoyed psychedelic drugs when she was younger.

(This is a funny story, I think. But maybe it's only funny to me? I don't know. I'll tell and you can let me know. My mom lived on a tiny house on my sister's property and right next to her tiny house was another tiny house that my brother-in-law's mother lived in. My mom and my BIL's mom - let's call her C - got along well enough, but C found my sister challenging and didn't leave her cabin very often. My mom frequently hallucinated a man who would come and gossip about C. He called her names and was often unkind. My mom sort of knew this man wasn't real, but she would repeat the gossip as if it were from a trusted source. When I'd call my mom, this is what she would talk to me about. You know what? This story isn't funny. I'm leaving it.)

So I was caught by surprise at how emotional this book made me about aging parents. Maybe because I never really got to see it? (Add this to When the Cranes Fly South as books about aging that have made me sob.)

Anyway, outside of the slow start and the epilogue, this was such a lovely book. (Much like in Harry Potter, you should skip the epilogue entirely and let the book stand on its own without that tacked on garbage.) (How many parenthesis can I put in one post? Can I set a record?)

4.5/5 stars

*******************

Things I looked up (I might be on some list at Homeland Security after this):

There had been suicides already since the HUAC was formed. (Among themselves, they never called it the House Un-American Activities Committee, they called it the Inquisition.) Five, ten, fifteen suicides within the State department alone. (page 380) - I'm just going to leave this link here. 

Thomas Patrick Cavanagh (page 393) - an aerospace engineer who was sentenced in 1985 after being convicted of trying to sell stealth bomber secrets to the Soviet Union. He was sentenced to life in prison.

Robert Cordrey (page 393) -  a Marine private who was convicted of attempting to sell classified information about nuclear, chemical and biological warfare to the Soviet bloc and sentenced to 12 years by a military court.

Ernst Forbrich (page 393) - an East German spy who was arrested in Clearwater Beach, Florida in 1984 after he paid an undercover agent posing as an Army intelligence officer for a classified document. He later admitted selling documents to East German intelligence over a 17-year period. Forbrich was convicted of espionage and sentenced to prison.

Bruce Kearn (page 393) -  a Navy operations specialist assigned as command Secret control officer on board the USS Tuscaloosa, was arrested in March 1984 and convicted at a general court-martial for dereliction of duty, and willfully delivering, transmitting or communicating classified documents to unauthorized persons. While absent without leave, Kearn left behind a briefcase which was found to contain 147 classified microfiche (copies of nearly 15,000 pages of Secret documents), seven Confidential crypto publications, and child pornographic photographs and literature. He was sentenced to 18 months based on a plea bargain.

Karl Koecher (page 393) - usually referred simply as Karel Köcher, sometimes written as Karl Koecher (born 21 September 1934) is a Czechoslovak mole known to have penetrated the CIA during the Cold War. The Guardian wrote up a long article about his batshit life. 

Alice Michelson (page 393)- Michelson was arrested in 1984 for trying to deliver material she obtained at Baltimore-Washington International Airport from an American double agent to the Soviet KGB. She was later involved in a spy swap. 

Richard Miller (page 393) - an American FBI agent who was the first FBI agent indicted for and convicted of espionage. In 1991, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison but was freed after serving less than three years.

Samuel Loring Morison (page 393) - a civilian analyst with the Office of Naval Intelligence, was arrested in October 1984 for supplying Jane's Publications with classified photography showing a Soviet nuclear powered carrier under construction. The photographs were subsequently published in Jane's Defence Weekly. He was sentenced to two years imprisonment.

Charles Slatten (page 393) - an Army PFC who was arrested in 1984 for stealing military devices to sell to the USSR. He was sentenced to nine years in prison and given a dishonorable discharge. This was not the end of his criminal career, though, and he later set off a pipe bomb and was convicted of making, possessing, and conspiring to use a “weapon of mass destruction.” He was sentenced to another 24 years in prison in 1996.

Richard Smith (page 393) - Smith was a former army counterintelligence agent who was arrested in April 1984 for passing classified information to a KGB officer in Japan on several occasions. He claimed he was working for the US government as a double agent. He was found not guilty on charges of conspiracy and espionage.

Jay Wolff (page 393) -  former Navy enlisted man, was arrested in 1984 in Gallup, New Mexico, for offering to sell classified documents dealing with US weapons systems aboard a US Navy vessel. Wolff, who was discharged from the Navy in 1983, met with an undercover agent and offered to sell classified material for $5,000 to $6,000. According to the FBI, a tip led to the meeting with Wolff at a convenience store where he was apprehended. Wolff pleaded guilty to one count of attempting to sell classified documents and was sentenced to five years in prison.

fontanelle (page 408) - (colloquially known as a "soft spot") is a normal anatomical feature on an infant's skull where the bony plates have not yet completely fused

Hat mentions (why hats?):
Santa hat (page 62)
knit black hat (page 269)
hat and parka (page 271)
took her hat off (page 273, 321)
red winter hat (page 312)
overcoat and hat (page 321)
knitted Red Sox hat (page 356)
wearing his hat indoors (page 372)
hat rakishly askew (page 398)
pilgrim's hat or a Santa hat (page 406)

*******************

Have you read other books by Liz Moore? Should I be reading more of her books?