2014 action/mystery novella. Miranda's working at the mall to get some
money together for Christmas presents for her friends while pining
over her not-quite-a-boyfriend-yet. Then things happen.
Well, it's very slight. Miranda meets various unpleasant people,
and one friendly person, but the plot happens to her much more than
she engages with it. Someone who knows more than I about the American
class system could probably have a good time picking out the ways in
which Ashe tries to make it clear that Miranda is a Normal Person
rather than a Snob, even though she's worked in the dreaded
international finance. (For example, she prefers this place, which is
the Cheap Mall in town, to the Other Mall where they have "a string
quartet playing Christmas carols". Classical music, the sure signifier
of snobbery in Americam popular culture.) And that's even before she
focuses on the one nice person she meets and tries to make his life
better at some risk and expense to herself.
But, well, that's about it. It's not a significant incident in
Miranda's life, and it has the feeling of something that'll never be
mentioned again in the novels.
Really this feels more like a trailer than like an independent story,
and it was first published in an anthology, presumably with the hope
of getting people to read the books.
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