Edited to get rid of the wall of text…
@Hannah_Minger
This is true, but my point was that, had the MC known the truth, she might have taken one of the team with her to the hospital instead of going alone. At the very least, had she known what was going on, she might’ve suspected something weird with Murphy and called them from the hospital. Had they caught Murphy then, the MC never would’ve been taken. A lot of ‘ifs’ going on there, but it would’ve decreased the possibility, at least. The MC was in the dark for too long. Way too long.
On a personal level, I sympathize with her having to be gone for work a lot and not being around for the MC growing up. My dad traveled a lot when I was a kid. And, when I say a lot, I mean he was gone three out of four weeks of the month. Sometimes, more. There were times he’d come home, stay long enough to get his clothes washed and pack another bag, and then he’d be leaving again. It sucked. My mom worked on and off, so I was alone a lot (my brother was older and out of the house). But it didn’t bother me. Others, in the same situation, were bothered. It depends on personalities, I think, and also how the relationships go with the parents when they are around.
Anyway, despite sympathizing with her for that, I think Rebecca has made a lot of other mistakes, particularly in the way she treats the MC. You put it well here:
She’s way too hover-y. Dezh is 26, soon to be 27–she doesn’t need her mommy taking care of her or hiring bodyguards for her, especially when she never had that growing up. Rebecca’s shows of affection don’t mesh with her, I think. Dezh likes physical contact (it’s why Mason draws her in), and words mean nothing to her without action to back it up. Rebecca isn’t a physical type person and when she tries it, it rubs Dezh the wrong way. So it’s just an ugly situation (Nyx doesn’t really like touching people much at all, so Rebecca’s methods are fine with her, lol).
I can’t do that. It’s funny–I write a lot and have been for years (finally actually finished a book with a friend and we’re doing edits). When inspiration hits with characters, I walk around the house playing it out, dialog and all. My family is mostly used to it now. They come in and I may snap their heads off for no reason and they’re like, “Working out a scene with Gwynne?” Me: “Yes!” I end up with a bunch of random tertiary characters because my mains won’t do what I need them to do. They can be such assholes.
@Mewsly
Well, I disagree here. I get the timing (I think that was more of a author thing than a story-dictated thing, since Sera didn’t want our first contact with UB post-Murphy to be offscreen), but it still sucks. And “easing” the MC into the team isn’t going to work if Rebecca encourages the team to leave the MC out of everything as often as possible. The MC is either part of the team or they aren’t. When you get a new job in a place, it doesn’t matter if the team there has worked together for two months or twenty years–you’re part of the team now, too, and everyone has to figure out how to make it work. If it was an ‘easing in’ thing, no one would ever hire new people.
And the real problem is that Rebecca doesn’t like the MC being part of the team, and makes that abundantly clear to the MC. Given that the team is a bunch of vampires, with the ability to sense reluctance and doubt, as well as other feelings, it only stands to reason that they sense that from her when she’s talking about the MC’s involvement. She makes it seem, when the MC first meets her at the warehouse, that the team is doing their thing without the MC and don’t need her at all, except to meet every now and then. In fact, she makes that creepy comment about the team “watching” her all the time. Um? What??? She’s clearly pushing that attitude on the team, as well, which is unfair to the MC.
A is bad enough as it is (I’m leaving M out right now, because you can actually start gaining M’s respect already, at least to some extent), so for Rebecca–who the entire team respects and admires–to exude the attitude that the MC is incompetent and worthless against anything supernatural (or otherwise, really), is uncalled for, unprofessional, and extremely demeaning to the MC, especially in circumstances where the MC helped take Murphy down.
Personally, I think Rebecca has some stuff she needs to work through herself–guilt over not being there much for her kid growing up, the fact that her kid has a dangerous job whether or not the supernatural is involved, and the fact that she needs to back off and let her kid work with UB and find their place there.
She can’t make up for what happened when the MC was growing up, but she can show some professionalism and respect to an adult who is doing whatever they can to prove themselves. Undermining the MC with the team is shitty, whether or not it’s intentional or comes from good intentions. Rebecca needs to think about how she’d feel in that situation. Putting the MC in bubble wrap isn’t helpful (unless it’s Charlotte, I suppose!), but helping to guide the MC–with training, information, encouragement to really be a part of the team, and support in the form of confidence in the MC’s abilities (both when they’re alone and when speaking to UB)–is helpful. I just don’t think that’s who Rebecca is, unfortunately, at least not where the MC is concerned. And she needs to work on it if she wants to have a good relationship with some MCs.