I met a beautiful woman whose interests lay in the design of destiny, miracles, and apparently me when Jeanette needlessly dangled mystical intrigues from her novel-in-progress to secure my help formatting it for the screen: As an average-looking man whose naivete had been savaged while working for television news in places like San Salvador and Beirut, I reasoned that a romance between us was no less absurd an idea than the premises she already seemed to embrace, and I decided to pursue her affections while assisting her. Portentously, learning her plot was like sucking gelatin through a...