Anexis Matos

I read this book as the December 2022 Envision’s College Success Program book club selection. If you are a college student who is blind or visually impaired, this may be a great resource for you. To learn more about the program, check out their web site below.

Synopsis

Molly is very happy with her work as a maid. Although she struggles interpreting situations, she does everything possible to follow the rules and complete her tasks to the best of her ability. Everything is great in the hotel until she finds their most infamous guest, Charles Black dead in his bed. Her life is further upended when her propensity for order and neatness makes her the lead suspect in his murder.

Book Information

Genre: This is classified as a mystery. However, it does not read as one, so, personally, I classify it as fiction.
Category: Adult
Explicit sex: No
Explicit violence: No
Content warnings I noticed: Discussions of latinx immigrants being mistreated
This is a standalone.

Review

The prose is good. Accessible and easy to read.

This story reads like a very clean first draft without developmental edits. It’s clunky in the way the story is told. It lacks context in certain areas. Things simply happen.

I don’t know how to describe the pacing. It’s a pacing I like in most stories. It’s slow and it builds up to everything so well. It’s one of the reasons I don’t love stories with a fast pace. However, I don’t like it in this book.

While plot and characters dictate events, it can be argued that pacing does, too. More specifically, pacing dictates when everything happens. How things are written to fit into the big picture. This story is very scripted. I know this formula. I’ve seen it play out a few times. It’s predictable, but it can work. I’ve seen it done better.

The formula is situation occurs equals all is solved with friendship. In essence, friendship solves everything, no matter how impossible. Everything works out as long as you have good friends. It tells a story where the story consumer feels good in the end. Where you can root for amazing characters.

A great story that follows this formula is Yu-Gi-Oh!. Yugi Muto has a regular life until he defeats Seto Kaiba, the world’s duelist champion. He gains the attention of Maximillion Pegasus, the creator of the Duel Monsters game. Pegasus defeats Yugi in a 15 minute duel, taking his grandfather’s soul and forcing him to enter the Duelist Kingdom tournament. His friends accompany him, one as a competitor and the others as stowaways. Throughout the series, Yugi’s friends constantly cheer him on and, while he struggles, everything works out because they’re there.

While cheesy and predictable, it works as a feel-good story. It hits all the emotions. By the end of Yu-Gi-Oh!, I was so happy. I was a little sad, but I was happy.

I can’t say the same for this story. By the end, I felt cheated. I didn’t feel good. I was irritated. The formula that has never disappointed me… disappointed me.

This formula also offers lessons on good friendships and more. Essentially, it’s a morning cartoon. I’m the adult child that enjoys this stuff.

The Maid is written like a morning cartoon. However, it’s somehow made palatable for adults who may think cartoons are just for children. I’ll talk more about this later. Making this formula palatable for adults doesn’t work because, from what I’ve seen, it’s not targeted toward them. Also, at least in this book, it mises a few essential elements.

The themes of love and friendship feel hollow. This is mainly the case because most of the relationships feel forced. The only one that doesn’t is between Molly, Charlotte, and Mr. Preston. In this formula, relationships are natural, especially friendships. Because they come across so naturally, it’s easier to root for them. While I was rooting for Molly, when I reached the epilogue, it felt pointless.

This story made me think of the idea that cartoons are only for children. It’s a conversation I’m not going to have in this post. What I will say is that it’s stupid. While certain cartoons are targeted toward children, a lot of them can be enjoyed by adults. One of them is Avatar: The Last Airbender. The argument is pointless.

The characters are flat. They follow specific archetypes which is not bad. I think it’s great to follow one, but give characters more than the archetype. Give them more dimensions. Like tropes and cliches, archetypes are tools. They’re frameworks to base your story on. There are no good characters to root for here because they have no dimensions.

As a character, Molly is inconsistent. I don’t mind inconsistencies, but, with this formula, characters, while predictable, are consistent. Molly’s ideas of right and wrong can’t be pinned down because she constantly changes her standards. I don’t believe this can be attributed to her difficulty interpreting situations. There are moments where she clearly understands what’s happening and she decides to do what she considers right at the time, even though it’s wrong. If she was a morally gray character, I’d understand, but she’s not. She’s presented as someone who has standards for right and wrong, but, when things become difficult, she’s capable of doing the wrong thing and claim that it was the right thing.

If you want a good picture of her, think of Torhu from Fruits Basket. She can be very naive and sometimes misinterprets situations, but, in her heart, Torhu wants the best for everyone. However, she’s very consistent in her beliefs and, no matter what, always does what she considers correct. There’s never any doubt with her. Torhu is a better representation of this character archetype, especially in the reboot of the anime. She also learns as the story develops, something Molly doesn’t do.

I attribute Molly’s character inconsistencies to bad writing. It feels like the author didn’t have a clear idea of who their character was and smashed a bunch of things together. I don’t think this was lack of planning. I’m a discovery writer and, most of the time, I don’t plan my stories. It feels like the author didn’t tighten up the little things during editing. As I mentioned earlier, this story reads like a very clean first draft without any developmental edits.

There’s a romantic plotline here, but it’s not believable. It’s predictable, but not believable.

This book had so much potential. It followed such a great formula that always delivers a feel-good story. As someone who enjoys this, I want to talk about what I think could have been done differently.

The first thing that should have been done is establish a group of friends. From the beginning, Molly should have a network. Maybe she and her grandmother spent more time with Mr. Preston. Make him a bigger part of her life. He should spend more time with her from the beginning. Charlotte’s introduction can happen the same way, but she and Mr. Preston need their relationship to be more solid. This way, Molly doesn’t hesitate to ask for help, thus introducing Charlotte more smoothly.

Juan Manuel should also be a bigger part of her life. They should spend a lot more time together in order to make their friendship and possible subsequent romance believable. Maybe they see each other out of work once a week. She, of course, wouldn’t know what he’s doing at the hotel. She would get involved in his illegal work by accident, thinking she’s helping and not realizing he’s being threatened.

Let’s get rid of the romantic plotline. It’s truly not necessary. Let’s focus instead on beautiful, blossoming friendships instead. While it’s not necessary, the romantic can still be added, but, if it is, there needs to be a core friendship to make it more believable.

I feel like this story would have been better for a younger audience, but it can still work for adults. Just make it adult. Don’t make a formula usually targeted for younger audiences palatable for adults. That’s insulting.

Make Molly more consistent. She always does the right thing, no matter the situation. She can do something that can appear wrong here and there, but not so often. For example, in Fruits Basket, Torhu moved by herself into a tent in someone else’s property in order not to inconvenience her grandfather. It all worked out because, at heart, Torhu is a good person. While she’s technically trespassing, it made sense. Molly pawning a dead man’s ring does not because she knows it’s wrong, but still does it.

Now that these elements are fixed, a better story can be told. One that feels authentic. One that has feel-good vibes without disappointing consumers.

Conclusion

Overall, this was a very disappointing story. It had so much potential, but it didn’t deliver. It’s one of those stories I would have loved to give five stars, but, unfortunately, that didn’t happen. I rated it two stars.