Paul E. Fallon's Blog

MIT’s Response to President Trump’s Proposed Contract

As an alum, I was happy to receive a copy of the letter (October 10, 2025) that MIT President Sally Kornbluth sent to US Education Secretary Linda McMahon. As a concerned American, I am happy to share the letter with my readers. May it offer us strength and guidance to stand up for our nation’s core values.

Dear Madam Secretary,

I write in response to your letter of October 1, inviting MIT to review a “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.” I acknowledge the vital importance of these matters.

I appreciated the chance to meet with you earlier this year to discuss the priorities we share for American higher education.

As we discussed, the Institute’s mission of service to the nation directs us to advance knowledge, educate students and bring knowledge to bear on the world’s great challenges. We do that in line with a clear set of values, with excellence above all. Some practical examples:

MIT prides itself on rewarding merit. Students, faculty and staff succeed here based on the strength of their talent, ideas and hard work. For instance, the Institute was the first to reinstate the SAT/ACT requirement after the pandemic. And MIT has never had legacy preferences in admissions.

MIT opens its doors to the most talented students regardless of their family’s finances. Admissions are need-blind. Incoming undergraduates whose families earn less than $200,000 a year pay no tuition. Nearly 88% of our last graduating class left MIT with no debt for their education. We make a wealth of free courses and low-cost certificates available to any American with an internet connection. Of the undergraduate degrees we award, 94% are in STEM fields. And in service to the nation, we cap enrollment of international undergraduates at roughly 10%.

We value free expression, as clearly described in the MIT Statement on Freedom of Expression and Academic Freedom. We must hear facts and opinions we don’t like – and engage respectfully with those with whom we disagree.

These values and other MIT practices meet or exceed many standards outlined in the document you sent. We freely choose these values because they’re right, and we live by them because they support our mission – work of immense value to the prosperity, competitiveness, health and security of the United States. And of course, MIT abides by the law.

The document also includes principles with which we disagree, including those that would restrict freedom of expression and our independence as an institution. And fundamentally, the premise of the document is inconsistent with our core belief that scientific funding should be based on scientific merit alone.

In our view, America’s leadership in science and innovation depends on independent thinking and open competition for excellence. In that free marketplace of ideas, the people of MIT gladly compete with the very best, without preferences. Therefore, with respect, we cannot support the proposed approach to addressing the issues facing higher education.

As you know, MIT’s record of service to the nation is long and enduring. Eight decades ago, MIT leaders helped invent a scientific partnership between America’s research universities and the U.S. government that has delivered extraordinary benefits for the American people. We continue to believe in the power of this partnership to serve the nation.

Sincerely,

Sally Kornbluth

Lyric Stage Boston

Our Town

By Thornton Wilder

Directed by Courtney O’Connor

September 19 – October 19, 2025

Lyric Stage Boston opens its 2025-2026 season with a pitch perfect production of Our Town. The cast is uniformly excellent, the timing is smooth, Courtney O’Connor’s directorial hand is firm without ever being overbearing. Truly, an excellent production.

For anyone who managed to eke through high school without having read Our Town, it’s a 1938 anchor in the American canon. Three discrete days in Grover’s Corner, New Hampshire, spread across a dozen years. The Stage Manager delivers almost half the narrative as townspeople go about their lives with spartan dialogue. Day one is May 6, 1901, in which we meet an array of local folk, both proud and small, and savor the romantic stirrings of teenage George Gibbs and his lifelong neighbor Emily Webb. Act Two, three years later, is Emily and George’s wedding day. Act Three, nine more years on, takes place in the town cemetery on the day when Emily, died in childbirth, joins a number of folks we previously met who already reside there.

Our Town is a parable about the need to pay attention. When the deceased Emily demands to revisit a day in her life, she’s frustrated—astounded—how everyone is so caught up in their insignificant moments they miss the big picture. A worthy idea for a play to investigate.

The problem, for me, with Our Town is that the audience is held at such a distance from the characters that we don’t fully feel the tragedy. The Stage Manager is the first filter of abstraction. Then, there’s the set. Our Town is almost always played on a minimal set (I saw one production with only an array of Thonet chairs). Lyric employs a series of curved plinths before a kind of backyard fence. The pieces get shuffled around to suggest a kitchen, a church choir, a cemetery, but really, they neither warm nor inform the proceedings. Finally, there’s the sheer number of characters. So many that none rise beyond caricature. There’s something fundamentally chilling about a play in which five characters are buried by Act Three and no one in the audience would even consider a tear.

I wonder if perhaps Our Town is actually a precursor to Theater of the Absurd, such is the dissonance between our intuitive desire to experience small town American life as communal and caring, whereas in the play all the caring appears to be nothing more than play acting against the reality that no one is connecting with anyone else at all.

Lyric’s playbill calls Our Town, “An American Classic for our time.” In that, I fully agree. The play wears a veneer of homespun happiness, but scratch beneath the surface and everyone is isolated, fearful, and alone. Which pretty much sums up USA 2025.

The Lyric has created a terrific production…of a play I’d rather not see.

The Hills of California

Written by Jez Butterworth

Directed by Loretta Greco

The Huntington

9/12/2025 – 10/12/2025

———-

Primary Trust

Written by Eboni Booth

Directed by Dawn Simmons

Speakeasy Stage

9/12.2025 – 10/11/2025

———-

That theater holds a mirror up to the face of society is ever-true. So, in this moment of global retrenchment and nativist fear, it’s no surprise that two major productions of the fresh season reflect domestic insularity. Each presumes our traumas are locked within our family histories, and our catharsis must emerge from the same source. Beyond that, similarities end.

Anyone who’s ever pedaled the hills of California can appreciate their unique geography. Undulating knolls of brown grass, speckled with scrub trees. Distinct, yet not difficult to navigate. Brimming with fertile promise, for given only modest rain, the hills burst into bloom, and thus fulfill the promise—the Golden State fantasy—that California offers every drifter and dreamer.

According to the Johnny Mercer hit song, “the hills of California are something to see…you’ll settle down forever and never stray from the view.” In Jez Butterworth’s The Hills of California, we never get anywhere near the view. We’re trapped in The Sea View Luxury Spa Resort in Blackpool, England, which is not luxury, has no spa, nor any sea view. It’s 1976, when four sisters come together to attend their dying mother. And also 1955, when their younger versions are being molded into their mum’s vision of the Andrews Sisters.

This being a Huntington production, the production values are grand. When the set is revealed, the audience gasps and applauds. Again when it rotates. For me, it’s all too polished. The Sea View is supposed to be old and crotchety. I want the set to sag, to creak when it turns, to reveal the weary tediousness of Blackpool life. Similarly, the double set of stairs leading to the sick room are too tall. I suppose the exaggerated height implies heaven, but the reality is when the cast climbs up or down, their journey turns comedic. In fact, the entire opening scene is played so broad the cast seems hellbent on delivering comedy, when something quite the opposite is in store.

The production finds its bearings, and begins to sing, when we slip back to 1955 and Allison Jean White appears as Veronica, the mother. She is astonishing, both in her devotion to her daughters and her ability to sell them short. Ms. White delivers a bravura performance, singlehandedly balancing the comedy and chaos. She grounds everything.

The Hills of California has a cast of thirteen, playing 23 different characters. I suppose the intention is to illustrate chaotic family life, but except for the one male essential to triggering the mother and sisters’ trauma, the extra bodies seem secondary. The four sisters and their mother—then and now—are the main event. Why all the rest?

Despite my sense that The Hills of California includes more than needed to tell its story, I was completely moved by the final scene, when generations mingle and the music perfectly dovetails with their shared trauma, and mutual catharsis. You can feel welcome moisture bringing the brown hills to vivid life.

Speakeasy’s Primary Trust is a simple production. A few elements scattered along the Roberts Theatre’ wide stage represent a book store, a bank, a Tiki bar in small town in Upstate New York. Four actors total. Lines of dialogue trail off without resolution, causing audience members to fill in the blanks. A regular ‘ping’ triggered from beyond (like someone entering a local shop) designates a change of scene, or tone, or time. Spread over a taut eighty minutes..

Kenneth is a peculiar man, likely on every medical spectrum. Twenty years working in a book store, when the owner retires and shutters the place. Anxious, he spends every evening drinking Mai Tai’s with his friend Bert. Only Bert’s not real. Kenneth is, in truth, alone. Sometimes he’s aware of his invention. But when flummoxed, Kenneth retreats to Bert, who truly offers good counsel.

Buoyed by Bert, Kenneth finds another job. He succeeds at it. Until he doesn’t. A spectacular meltdown leads to a gradual reckoning of Kenneth’s youthful trauma and the reality of who Bert was, when once he was real (no more spoiler alert from me).

Local actor Janelle Grace portrays multiple female characters with her usual aplomb, and David J. Castello is phenomenal as Kenneth. His closing monologue is brilliant: a man aware of himself finding catharsis in the only family he has left. Himself.

If you seek catharsis in a hub-bub of oddballs who come together in harmony, go to The Hills of California. If instead you want to experience the satisfaction of one man settling inner peace, see Primary Trust. Either or both, you will be moved.

The Mountaintop

Written by Katori Hall

Directed by Maurice Emmanuel Parent

Front Porch Arts Collective at Suffolk University Modern Theater

9/19/2025 – 10/12/2025

Fall theater kicked off with a bang this week; I saw four quality productions in four days. Yet The Mountaintop stands above the others, and sets a high bar what the rest of the season will offer.

On April 3, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. (Dominic Carter) arrives at Room 306 at the Lorraine Hotel, tired and hoarse, after delivering his, “I’ve been to the Mountaintop” speech on behalf of Memphis’ striking sanitation workers. He requests coffee from room service, which is delivered pronto by a very attractive maid (Kiera Prusmack). Flirtation ensues, sexual tension is high, and I think. Wow, this play is not sugarcoating MLK one bit.

About a half hour in, when MLK has loosened his tie, and it seems other accessories will soon follow, the ‘maids’ identity and purpose take a sharp turn that is both surprising yet believable, only to shift yet again into something fantastic which I will not spoil by revealing. Suffice to say that each transformation illustrates the satisfaction of a great play, beautifully executed.

There are so many challenges in making a play about a man like MLK. How to balance the myth and the man? How to create a character that meets our conceptions while adding new insight? How to be inspiring without being preachy? The Mountaintop navigates these challenges perfectly. By leading with his faults, when we finally do hear direct quotes from the man, they are tempered by his humanity. Sometimes his sentiments are voiced by the maid, which humanizes them in other ways. And sometimes we get MLK channeled through the playwright. My favorite line in the play, when the maid is egging MLK on about what in the world Black and white and rich and poor people can possibly have in common, he responds in exasperation, “What do we have in common? We are all scared.” I do not know whether MLK ever uttered those words, but they sure ring true.

Even as The Mountaintop is beautifully written, Front Porch’s production is superb. Kiera Prusmack is terrific, as a maid and in her other two identities. Dominic Carter is incredible. I’ve enjoyed Dom in many local productions, but never seen him so strong. He delivers an MLK for the ages. As the play approaches the inevitable, and MLK comes to accept the premonition of his death the following day, the modest motel room explodes in proportion and animation as director Parent takes us on a fantastic journey from 1968 to the present.

Challenging us, inspiring us: to carry the baton, and pass it on.

Produced by Plays in Place

September 20 at Eustis Mansion in Milton

September 27 at Herter Park in Boston

If you’re pumped for the 2025-2026 theater season to begin, but not keen on piling into a theater during our glorious September weather—stay outdoors and enjoy The Kittie Knox Plays.

Plays in Place is an innovative concept that, under the leadership of Patrick Gabridge, brings history to life in site-specific plays. Plays in Place has created plays performed in The Old State House, Old North Church, Mount Auburn Cemetery, and other Boston-area locations. Their newest production extends the idea of ‘place’ to the urban outdoors, the perfect locale to ride a bike!

Kittie Knox was Black woman in Boston in the late 19th century; the girl was mad about bikes! The 1890’s were a golden era of cycling. The development of the ‘modern’ bicycle with two equal wheels and a chain that connect pedals to rear wheel drive made cycling safer than earlier, awkward, big wheelers; people had more leisure time to pedal expanding networks of boulevards and parks; and for women in particular, cycling offered new-found freedom of movement. Bicycle clubs abounded. Cycling was all the rage.

Still, for a Black woman to claim full rights to this growing sport was extraordinary. Yet, Kittie Knox did just that: competing with men (and often beating them); and claiming a place as a premier cyclist despite her race and gender. These three plays celebrate her moment.

The Kittie Knox Plays are three related pieces, which really feels like one play in three acts. Each segment is 20 to 30 minutes long. The actors are on bicycles, and the audience moves between each act. Action begins in Gay Head on Martha’s Vineyard in 1893, which Kittie and friends explore on two-wheels. Things start off a bit slow, as there is a lot of exposition in the first act, but the action speeds up in 1895, when Kittie travels to Asbury Park, NJ to claim her place at a national convention where many other cyclists are none-too-happy for her presence. Back in Boston, in 1896, the final act takes place at a cycling ball where Kittie’s fame and abilities eclipse the fact that she’s colored—and arrives without an escort. This is the best part of the piece because director Michelle Aguillon does a wonderful job integrating the bicycles into the dancing. It’s terrific!

The ball is a triumph for Kittie, but dark clouds loom as the Supreme Court’s Plessy v. Ferguson decision is soon to enshrine separate but equal as our national disgrace, even as the emergence of the automobile will sideline bicycle travel to the gutter for the next century.

The Kittie Knox Plays are a delightful way to enjoy the out-of-doors and engage in a bit of non-traditional history. The plays will be presented the next two weekends. Three performances on September 20 at the Eustis Estate in Milton, and the final three at Herter Park in Boston. Admission is free but reservations are required. Ride your bike to either spot and enjoy!

Last week’s post described how I came to create a fellowship named after my grandmother, and the wonderful effect, after forty years gone, it’s been to have her name and spirit evoked as a regular part of my life.

Louise Eustace, my grandmother, had a profound impact on me and others, with her patience, warmth, and genuine love for humanity. Qualities that I believe best enable returning citizens—and the rest of us—to flourish.

In this post I am proud to introduce the 2025 Louise Eustace Fellows:

Justice Ainooson earned a Bachelor’s degree in Media, Literature and Culture through the Emerson Prison Initiative. He lives with extended family in the Boston area until he and his fiancé find a place of their own. Justice has a part-time gig as a product research analyst while he develops his financial services firm.

Hamza Berrios currently works as a circle keeper for Transformational Prison Project and legislative liaison for UTEC Lowell. He recently moved out of Brook House to his own place in Cambridge. Hamza graduated from Boston University and will start a graduate program at Harvard Divinity School this fall.

Aaron Morin recently moved to his own apartment in The Fenway and works as a Youth Coordinator at UTEC Lowell. Aaron is working towards a BA in Business from Boston College and is keen to capitalize on his years as a dog trainer within the prison system to open his own dog walking/grooming business. Meanwhile, he’ll be developing a parallel, non-profit business through BC’s Project Entrepreneur Program this fall that will employ returning citizens to train service dogs for victims of gun and community violence.

After several monthly dinners with these men, and other informal interactions, I am so honored to get to know them. Although I’m sure the money they receive is useful in their daily life, their connection when we come together is also important. For more than fifteen years these guys were each other’s family. They provided the mutual support necessary to successfully navigate prison, redirect their purpose, finish high school, attend college, and eventually earn parole into the community. In the name of community safety, the parole system requires parolees to remain apart. Because I got special permission for them to ‘associate’ as part of the fellowship, they have an invaluable opportunity to continue their mutual support.

When we get together, it’s my privilege to see these guys unwind, share stories of where they’ve been, where they’re at, and where they want to go. They literally build each other up. For my part, I get an unvarnished view of our carceral system from men who’ve successfully navigated it, and the immense satisfaction in having a hand in seeing these guys thrive.

I’ve always been a fan of the notion that we keep the spirit of those we love alive when we keep them fresh in your memory.

Geography can be a trigger. Since I’ve lived in the same place for going on fifty years, the spirit of so many friends loiter in the streets and parks I traverse every day. Habit as well. Every time I feel like having an aimless chat, I think of my mom, my go-to person for passing time on the phone. Of course, the calendar is a predictable reminder. Mine is littered with birthdates, death dates, and memorable events in between that I’ve flagged with the intent of resurrecting memory.

Still, some people drift so far beyond our scope that they don’t rise in our mind as often as we’d like. We kind of forget how important they were to us; how important their spirit still can be.

I embarked on a new project this year, a different slant on my concern for folks in the carceral system. My endeavor brought the unexpected delight of reviving the spirit of my beloved grandmother. Since this Sunday, September 7, is Grandparent’s Day, it seems a good time to share how this came about.

I didn’t have a large grandparent pool. Never met my father’s folks, who were estranged for reasons never explained. My mother’s dad died when I was nine, so he’s little more than a genial shadow.

After he died, my grandmother, Louise Eustace, moved to a retirement village only ten miles away; an easy trek for a boy on his bike ever eager for escape. Through my adolescence, college years, and early adulthood, my grandmother’s apartment was my sanctuary. Though she would never claim favorites, I felt special status sitting on her jalousied porch, overlooking the picturesque artificial lake, sipping a root beer float, listening to stories of Grandma’s girlhood. Or her long and happy marriage. Or tales of her son the priest, her daughter the nun, her son died in World War II, and her youngest, the beauty who married a rascally man. Sometimes we’d simply sit in the quietude while she mouthed the rosary while fingering her beads, or softly breathed some jewel from the American songbook.

My grandmother wasn’t a hero or an activist or an influencer, or even particularly assertive. She was simply the most contented person I’ve ever known. She bore the burdens of life stoically, and always praised the goodness that fell upon her. I cannot recall her making a single complaint. Given my penchant to be an angry young man, my grandmother proved a saving grace. When she died, at peace, asleep, in her own bed, I inhaled as much of her spirit as my lungs could hold.

But nearly forty years gone, her spirit in me had dwindled. Until..

This was the idea. Give a monthly stipend for a year or two to returning citizens (the currently preferred term for people just out of prison) to help them get on their feet. No strings attached. Finding a job, a place to live, setting up house can be much more difficult for returning citizens than the rest of us because: though they’ve paid their ‘debt to society,’ society too often holds a grudge.

I shopped the idea to some fellow advocates in carceral circles, and eventually met Larry Gennari who runs Project Entrepreneur at Boston College, a kind of Shark Tank for felons. “No, no. You’ve got this all wrong.” Larry doesn’t mince words. “Sure, returning citizens need money, but they also need support, and they need responsibilities.” Larry spun my idea into a fellowship, with an application process and signed contracts that clarify what fellows are expected to do, and what I will do in return. “Give it a name. That adds caché, prestige.”

A few mornings later I woke to the perfect title. “Louise Eustace Fellowship.” What my grandmother offered me: the wisdom of calm patience in the face of impetuous youth, is exactly what so many men coming out of prison need. (Really, it’s what all of us need.)

Within a few months of gestating, I had a dozen applications from returning citizens; all of whom had committed violent crimes in their youth, used their prison time to redirect their lives, and are hellbent on successfully reintegrating into society. I selected three, and since May we’ve developed a bond of financial and mutual support that aligns with my expectations.

What’s transpired beyond my expectations is how much more alive my grandmother is in my life. Every time I describe the fellowship, whenever we reference our guiding principle of calm, unwavering support, my grandmother comes alive for me, fresh as ever. And that is wonderful.

Greetings All –

Dave and I escaped the heat up to Nova Scotia. A glorious place.

Hope you all have a lovely summer. More Awkward Posing come fall.

I realize it is commonplace, maybe even expected, to decry how much everything costs. Inflation is a necessary byproduct of an economic system predicated on the wonders of compound interest. But just as often I am amazed—nay, astounded—by just how cheap stuff is.

The day it hit 102 degrees in Boston, our ice maker stopped working. Of course, we were having folks over for a birthday celebration. And of course, we ran completely out of ice. (Though not until the end of the party—thank the summer party gods.)

A residential ice maker is a completely expendable frill. The amount of ice two people need can easily be accommodated with a few ice cube trays. Even if we had to purchase a bag of ice for the occasional 100+-degree party, we’d use far less energy than running the ice maker 24/7. Yet, having an ice maker is one of my favorite indulgences. Makes me feel like I live in a permanent hotel.

The next day, when it was merely ninety, we realized the fridge’s water filter needed to be replaced. After we changed that out, ice should start spitting at us again. Only it didn’t. The ice bin remained empty, forlorn. Perhaps the problem was worse, in which case we’d have to wait for our appliance repairman; an excellent chap though prone to long lead times.

Maybe I could just buy a few old school ice cube trays. We hadn’t had those in years, but how much could they cost?

I go to Target.com. $3 for two trays. Okay, I’ll get four. I select the quantity, the color and click, ‘pick up in two hours.’ The computer tabulates my bill. I expect $6 plus a contribution to the governor. But no, I get a $5 coupon, plus my customary 5% off for using my Red Card, and my total bill is…$1.43.

Next morning I go to Target and the cheery customer service rep hands me four very serviceable ice cube trays. On the walk home I decipher the economics.

Somewhere in the Middle East, or Russia, or Alaska, or Venezuela, some oil is pumped out of the ground it. It gets tankered to China, flowed through some pipelines, or into a truck, and delivered to a factory. In the factory, the oil is mixed with various emulsifiers, solidifiers, and dyes, souped into a slurry that’s injected into molds. Once cooled, two trays are stacked as a pair, adhesived together to form a single unit, loaded on a freight container, railed back to port, put on another tanker, and shipped to the good old US of A. Most likely Los Angeles or Long Beach, our nation’s premier container ports. Containers in Long Beach are craned directly from ship to rail car, and sent East. Most likely my ice cube trays go to Target’s East Coast Distribution Center in Bergen, NJ.

Once my trays reach the Garden State, things get dicey because, up until now, I’m pretty sure no human hands have touched these useful objects. They’ve travelled over 10,000 miles, but still have 220 to go. At the Bergan warehouse, they are differentiated from the thousands of other items loaded into a trailer headed to my Watertown store. There’s a good chance at least some parts of that transfer require people, though you’d be a fool to bet they are white people.

Once my trays arrive in Watertown, there are definitely people involved. The guys offloading the truck, stocking the shelf, collecting the items for my two-hour pick-up, and then smiling at me when they hand over the goods.

All of that effort makes $1.43 seem like a very good price, but don’t forget there’s a whole other component to this transaction: the web side. Someone had to photograph my ice cube trays, write up the description, note what aisle they occupy in my store and include them in the computer inventory when made ready for sale. Another part of the web noted when the store staff retrieved my trays and modified quantities available for the next ice querier. The web also calculated my price: I guess I need to thank those folks who, for reasons unknown to me, decided that $6.43 was entirely too much to pay for four ice cubes trays, and so they gave me a $5 coupon.

Thank you, Thank you, Oh ye Gods of Capitalism.

By the way, shortly after I returned with my quartet of well-travelled ice cubes trays, the ice maker kicked in of its own accord. I guess it had just needed a rest. So now I have motel ice once again, and ready backup trays, should I ever have the need. They will survive in my basement for decades, well beyond my own expiration date.

Stay cool!

A female science fiction writer from Japan? Being no kind of science fiction fan, I figured I’d pass on Elif Batuman’s profile of author Sayaka Murata (The New Yorker April 7, 2025). But as a faithful New Yorker reader, I give every article a chance to grab my attention. Three paragraphs in, I was hooked.

Sayaka Murata is a unique person by any standard. Quirky at the very least. Likely bizarre. Certainly diagnosable in our label-infatuated era. A Woman on the Spectrum. Ms. Murata is one of Japan’s most celebrated authors, yet continues to work part-time in a convenience store, as she’s done since college, as does the heroine of her most famous novel, Convenience Store Woman.

How can a convenience store be a setting for science fiction? The genre is premised on creating alternative worlds, while convenience stores are firmly rooted in this one. Actually, they’re so much a part of our world as to be almost invisible. Convenience stores are ubiquitous. Neither landmark nor eyesore, we drive by them without seeing them. Until we need gas or a soda or a chili dog, in which case we avail ourselves of their service. But we don’t engage with them. We don’t credit notable experiences to them. They are functional components of lives that we live in other places, at other times. Convenience stores are so of-the-moment that our moments in them don’t even register.

According to Ms. Batuman, Sayaka Murata’s writing is science fiction because she creates other worlds out of the one we actually inhabit. How? By subverting the assumed priorities of our society. By questioning the things that we do not question. Children. Career. Love. Honor. What are humans like who do not (pretend to) esteem these things?

Keiko knows from an early age that she’s odd. Vignettes of her youth, sprinkled through the narrative, illustrate a child without empathy—at least not as conventionally defined. When she and classmates come upon a struggling bird, that dies, she does not understand why they go through a ritual burial. Why not eat the bird? Her father likes quail! Time and again she is told that she’s strange, but the root cause of her problem eludes her. Her world is internally consistent to her, so she does not understand the faults others cannot overlook.

Thus, Convenience Store Woman is a much more frightening science fiction than the conventional kind. The alternative world is embedded in our own, and the alien is the daughter, the sister, the coworker among us, chortling a corporately scripted greeting with far too much enthusiasm than entering a convenience store deserves.

When Kieko, as a college student, first takes a part-tome job in a convenience store, her family and acquaintances (it would be a stretch to report she has any real friends) applaud her initiative. Eighteen years later, long-ago graduated, still single, still working part-time in the convenience store, she is considered an utter failure. Keiko lives for the convenience store. The rhythm of the register, the ebb and flow of daily customers, the critical importance of every display, every special, every sales goal met and exceeded. Fellow workers are her teammates; she molds herself however necessary for ultimate convenience success. Life beyond her always-open sanctuary…falls flat.

Since this is a novel, change must occur. A true loser enters her world. A convenience store failure, who cannot muster the necessary enthusiasm to greet and clean and stock and submit himself to the dreary customers. Shiraha falls through life’s cracks, and eventually winds up sharing Kieko’s tiny apartment, hiding from the world.

The specifics of their cohabitation, quirky and humorous to the reader, are exciting to the outer world. Keiko’s finally has a man! She’s moving on! She’ll get married! She can leave the convenience store, get a real job, raise a family!

I will offer no spoiler. You’ll have to read Convenience Store Woman yourself to find out what happens. What I will say is that, this simple, 2-3 hour read, is one of the most provocative books I’ve read. But I will offer this: how often in science fiction does the human world supersede the alien one? Never. Which begs the question of which world is more real. The ever bright, predictable, neatly packaged convenience store. Or the detritus beyond