All Comments on 'Life on Another Planet Ch. 06-09'

One..critique i have that you missed is that Jesse never questioned Eve about being a doctor, there were damn few female doctors in 1961 let alone one being a psychologist. I'm enjoying the story so far and i like the fact that you've chosen to take your time establishing the characters properly instead of rushing, i'm looking forward to seeing a lot of questions i have being answered.

Tazzy

This, along with the previous chapters, have been very well thought out, written, and presented. Again, nicely done. Keep it going,

I don’t know how you can be such a prolific writer but thank you for all your stories. I just finished Yakima & Silver Arrow and am thoroughly enjoying Life on Another Planet. Over the years, I’ve read every one of your stories and all earned 5-Stars. Life on Another Planet is no exception.

Since I retired you’ve provided a lot of pleasurable reading.

Again, THANK YOU

Normally I wouldn't nitpick about this, but it actually plays a fairly major role in the story, and the author makes a point of mentioning it in the previous chapters: Eve has pretty badly violated her profession's ethics by mentioning anything personal at all about Jesse to Kirsten -- such as that his teachers thought he should go into writing, and was thus encouraged to develop his vocabulary -- since everything she has learned about his background has been in the context of her being Jesse's doctor/psychiatrist. Even more egregious is her mentioning anything at all about his likely attraction to Kirsten. Likewise, some of the stuff she's mentioned to Jesse about Kirsten is questionable, given that she's also Kirsten's doctor/psychiatrist. Playing matchmaker with two of her patients is highly dubious ethics, IMO. (Though I'm not a medical professional of any kind, so I'm not certain about this, just very skeptical.)

If the author had considered this issue a bit more carefully, Eve could instead have independently encouraged Jesse and Kirsten to 'open themselves up to social interactions' or some such thing, letting them introduce these personal details to each other, and the story could have proceeded just as well without any apparent conflict of professional ethics. In the end, as a reader, I'm willing to 'overlook' this kind of detail, but as I was reading it in the moment, it did break my 'suspension of disbelief', enough that I thought it worth mentioning, anyway. 😊

The issue of doctor/patient confidentiality raised by previous commenter EugeneSelfish, did not even occur to me as I read.

Now that he has raised the question, it is still totally a non-issue with me. Sometimes manmade rules need to be bent to help man.

Besides, Eve's relationship with Jesse is not only doctor/patient, but also foster mother/sponsor. And with Kirsten (and family) the added relationshipship is friend.

Even the most well-intentioned politician, when making rules, cannot envision every contingency. So, while Dr. Eve technically broke laws to get Jesse a birth certificate and needed legal paperwork, she was nevertheless right in doing so. No politician could have envisioned the circumstances she encountered.

It is possible to be technically correct, but practically wrong.

Dr. Eve was technically incorrect, but in practicality was correct.

A tip of the hat to those (especially if in a government position) who deem people more important than rules.

Note. This is very different than despicably bending/breaking rules for one's own selfish advantage/gain.

Paul in Oklahoma

Eve didn't violate doctor-patient confidentiality. She and Jesse talked about his cover story, (his parents being dead and memory issues), so there was tacit permission, if not direct permission. As far as mentioning his ambitions re: writing, or his teachers encouraging him to write, that is not exactly medical info, nor did it come from her hypno session with him.

There is nothing wrong with her matchmaking, either, vis a vis ethics or confidentiality. She tells nothing to Jesse about Kirsten's issues with men, she simply suggests he invite her to Whistler. Don't conflate her internal dialogue with actual dialogue.

The only thing I've seen which didn't ring true was Jesse having sex with his previous girlfriend. While high school kids WERE having sex in '61, it was not very common. I framed houses with a brother-in-law, for a number of years, who would have been Jesse's age. We talked a lot about the differences between his high school days, and mine, as I was ten years younger than him, graduating in '71.

I was glad to see Eve did some checking on his parents, etc, but the obvious thing for her to do would be to track down a '61 yearbook from his high school, especially since he was from Vancouver. She could have went to the damn high school and looked one over; that was a pretty obvious oversight.

She'd have an easy time doing it, since she's a doc, and keeping it confidential. Also, she seems to have become way too casual with the idea he somehow time traveled 50 years. Her character should be WAAAY more curious about it.

As this story continues it has become an interesting tale. I notice that in the beginning he was going as Michael his middle name and when he awoke in the hospital he was using his first name Jesse. Well written and the character development is really good. 5 stars