E-Mail : A Love Story

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

While the cybersex and cyberromance depicted in this debut novel isn't nearly as cutting-edge as the author and publisher suggest-real-time online ``chat'' having supplanted E-mail as the cyberlover's medium of choice-it does allow debut author Fletcher to spin a fanciful, if strained, variant on the traditional epistolary novel. Katherine Simmons, 44, bored with her routine life as mother of teenage twins and taken-for-granted wife of a successful businessman, signs on one morning to the Adult Topics Bulletin Board of LuxNet. It's not long before she responds to an invitation to a ``party'' at Buck's Basement, an online bulletin board run by Buck Brazzmore, a chatty 40-year-old Texas oilman. Within a few weeks, Katherine and Buck have exchanged secrets and photographs and have announced to their fellow bulletin boarders that they are hosting a beach party to celebrate being ``on a slow cruise on the sea of love.'' But when Buck goes to Israel on business, Katie starts hitting the hot E-mail with John Kelly, a Marin County cardiologist. Before long, she's juggling computer sex fantasies with John, offers of phone sex from Buck and a surprising revival of real-life sex with her husband. While Fletcher, a ``special contributor''on the Prodigy Network, seems to think love on the Internet an intriguing and often positive new adventure, many readers may find her vision of computerized passion a disturbing ode to what is, at best, a poor substitute for the real McCoy. (Jan.)

Booknews

A text for beginning students in medical imaging, especially in radiologic technology, emphasizing communication and the imaging professional's role in patient care. Chapters on areas such as age- related considerations; infection control; medical ethics; emergency medicine; and patient care in critical situations feature illustrated procedures of patient care and vignettes, plus key terms, objectives, chapter summaries, and study questions. Color photos depict both male and female imaging professionals. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

George Needham

It's vaguely unsettling to see an epistolary novel, a quintessentially eighteenth-century literary technique, composed entirely of e-mail messages, but Fletcher manages to complete this postmodern exercise with panache. The story begins when Katherine Simmons, a fortysomething homemaker, signs onto the adult bulletin board section of her online service while she is in bed with the flu. She quickly makes several new friends, eventually indulges in some light sexual banter, and gradually finds herself drawn into two cybersex relationships that seem more satisfying than her troubled marriage. She spends hours each day on the system, avoiding the hard issues of a straying spouse and twin sons who are about to leave for college. The most interesting character Katherine meets online is the Chaplain, who is sponsored by the online service to provide counseling to those who are unable to cope with the cyberuniverse. Although the novel tries to expose the steamy underside of the online world, most of what appears here is considerably tamer than the private chat rooms on most commercial services. The story even has an optimistic, upbeat ending.