The Probability Pad

This is an amiable little tale, the plot moves briskly along and keeps you turning the pages. The writing style and the characters are unremarkable but adequate. It's the final part of a trilogy, each part of which was written by a different person, but they all have the same trio of main characters and all fit together so well that they could plausibly have had the same author.My main complaint about this one is that Waters has studied the preceding volumes (by his friends Anderson and Kurland) too well. Yes, the details have changed, but the outline of Book 3 is basically that of Book 1, with a dash of Book 2 in the middle.Chester Anderson set up the trilogy with [b:The Butterfly Kid 1137558 The Butterfly Kid (Greenwich Village Trilogy #1) Chester Anderson https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1297282485l/1137558.SY75.jpg 1124797]: an alien invasion of Earth is thwarted by himself and his friends from their base in Greenwich Village in the late 1960s. Nominally it's set in the future, but it's a future that tastes very much like the late 1960s. Michael Kurland retained this general idea in [b:The Unicorn Girl 757054 The Unicorn Girl Michael Kurland https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348126935l/757054.SX50.jpg 743167], but introduced some creative innovations, and had more fun with the characters and the dialogue. T. A. Waters recycled their ideas competently enough, but without adding anything basically new.I first read [b:The Unicorn Girl 757054 The Unicorn Girl Michael Kurland https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348126935l/757054.SX50.jpg 743167] some 10 years ago, and I still think it's the best of them. But at least I'm pleased that Books 1 and 3 are pleasantly readable and not complete duds.