Tea with the Black Dragon

This book has been on my TBR list for a long time, ever since it was in a Humble Book Bundle. I really enjoyed it. I don't know if I can categorize it, but there's an unusual romance plot, as well as some elements of crime fiction and some of light fantasy. I would almost call it urban fantasy, except it's nothing like anything else I've read in that genre. There's a strong theme of Eastern spirituality, but I don't know enough about that topic to understand it very well. Hopefully I'll understand it better when I read it again, and I'm sure that I will.

The romance is between a 50-year-old woman and a man who seems to be about the same age. I've never read a romance featuring a woman older than her early 40s, so I was really happy about that. I also liked the portrayal of the complex mother/daughter relationship between Martha and Liz. We never actually see them together, but their love for each other drives the whole plot. Liz believes that her mother deserves adulation from everyone she meets, and the author succeeded in creating a character who lives up to that high esteem, while still making Martha human and imperfect.

This book feels relevant to current discussions about the barriers women face in the tech industry, although it definitely isn't about that topic. It's amazing that this was first published in the early 80s, because it doesn't feel dated at all. I also like that the main villain is not mustache-twirlingly-evil, but bad in a relatively ordinary kind of way. This line is pretty insightful, and I think it applies pretty well to the people in tech who are often in the news these days:

He never obeys the rules if he thinks he can get away with it.