Andretta Stone is Wrong About Melissa (the Friend) Who is Also a Bear (Chapter 1)
(written 26 November 2005)

The thing about authors is that they can't always be trusted. They face an influx of material - facts and fictions - and sort them in a way that seems appropriate...to them. Appropriate for a single narrative. Knowing that, we can't really fault Andretta Stone for getting it wrong. She's concerned with Chloe, you see. Who wouldn't be - Chloe is special. She is able to see auras (which regular people don't have), and she can suck up supernatural powers like a vaccuum. That's fantastic. I mean, I'm really excited by that. Chloe has friends who are just normal. They show up when nothing interesting is going on. They may think that they're the interesting part of the narrative, and they might have been in the past. But what do one's dating conquests or career promotions mean when one's friend is meeting vampires and sirens and dragons and that thing with the wings (I'm not sure what they call him)? Chloe's friends are a chorus - they respond to her but aren't allowed their own narratives. With this in mind, it's no wonder that Andretta Stone neglected to mention that Melissa has a wee special power: she can turn into a bear. Not a Were-Bear or some other magic bear but a garden (forest) variety bear. Problems with being a bear in a magical chic-lit narrative:

1. Bears don't have magical powers, but people who turn into bears must have magical powers.

2. Bears aren't useful in a magical capacity. In fact, bears aren't particularly useful in a non-magical capacity unless you are having a lot of people over for fresh salmon or are having turf wars with a gang of campers at a KOA campground. Or (as I indicated) you need to infiltrate a zoo.

3. Auras. I'm thinking that if people don't have them then bears wouldn't have them, either. Screw the "magic" that it takes to change from one to the other; natural is natural.

4. They can't wear clothes, therefore they can't wear sky blue.It is a very nice gesture to want to include one's friends in the narrative of one's life - fake or real. But this inclusion is pointless if the friend is not given her own requisite amount of glory. I say that Andretta Stone should take Melissa's name out of the narrative if she can't be a bear.