Atd : page 542---starts on page 524.Big Ass Spoiler

[kelber at mindspring.com]

>From: Seb Thirlway <supa_kart_hooter at yahoo.co.uk>

>
>Nice, and appropriate quote.  You're widening out the question (dizzyingly!).  By "real life" I
>just meant whatever interests compete in characters' minds against the Mission to Find Out the
>Secret Of Everything.  Something like an imagined Jessica/Beaver reproach against Roger - that
>Roger's stuck in some obsession of the War and the Counterforce, while they in contrast are
>getting on with their lives.
>This opposition is explicit in AtD, in that all the Webbs get on with all kinds of other things
>which distract them from their supposed Mission to avenge their father.  And IMHO just on 1st
>reading TRP sides much more with "Real Life" in AtD than he did in GR; though this tendency is
>obvious in both VL (Zoyd doesn't get back together with Frenesi or actually defeat Brock, because
>that's just "what happens sometimes") and M&D.  In GR the Mission-"phantasy" also goes down
>against Real Life, but goes down kicking and screaming, leaving a bleak crater.

But the Traverse boys are reminded of their mission at every turn -- by shamans, dreams and Webb's ghost.  Justice matters somewhere, even if it doesn't work out in real life too often.

Laura