Response to "A Flicker in the Night"

I felt like this short-short was well accomplished, accomplishing all that I imagine it's intent was. I thought that it's tie in to the television theme was well done without seeming out of place but really seemed not only well woven into the story, but quite sweet as well. After we had the revelation in class about the short short stories not following the same protocol as the standard short stories, I find myself evaluating this one very well by my new criteria. It was a very nice little story about how a girl has memories of her youth and how much she had a fondness for her mother's perfume and when she would put her off to sleep. I imagine that Shelby probably read the class blog post about how certain words about smell incite reactions from the reader, and I figured that this story was partially experimental, trying to use these in her story. I thought that it was done pretty well, keeping it simple and I think it was used effectively. The story was told in what I thought to be a very sweet way and it had a soft tone that led to an almost dreamlike feeling for the reader, especially towards the end when the lines are separated with gaps that gave me the feeling of falling in and out of sleep a little bit. Even though I now know that there is no turn required at the end, I still felt like this one had a little bit of one, but not that it was all up in your face. I just seemed to say in an interesting way that all is not as it once was, which gives it the ever so slightest bit of tension. I thought it was nice and well done, without getting too complicated.

Response to "From Me For You"

I feel like this story is another piece of compelling literature that Patrick seems to often achieve. It was an interesting read, and managed to have a lot of tension throughout a majority of the story. Because of this fact, though, I worry that perhaps it is not as effective in having a moment of the story that seems like a climax or a specific point of emphasis. I thought that it did quite well to paint a vivid image of an environment and people, giving it a lot of character and coloring the story well with detail. However, I feel like there is some left unsaid. For some reason, I feel like the circumstances of the events are simply somewhat odd or off, and it just confused me as to why the family would have insisted on doing things normally. I think that the story would benefit from making Albert a more visualized person. By that, I mean that I would like to see more detail about what he looks like so that his death really impacts the reader. Perhaps I was simply in a heartless mood, but for some reason I still feel cold to his death. The only other thing that threw me off was near the very end, when for some reason Isaiah threw up and seemed to be blaming himself for something. I missed what, but that might be my fault. Anyways, very well put together with good tension, but the ending has me puzzled.

Response to "Jensen Day"

It was hard to know what to make of the story. It was about a man who is a lawyer and the story of a singular day in his life. He wakes up next to a girl and goes off to work, where he is met by a boss and has a few obscure, and seemingly full of contempt, interactions and remarks. The story was incredibly short, and I was thinking that perhaps it was because it was meant to show exactly how meaningless and boring and thoughtless Jensen's days really are, and it would be proving this in its brevity. But the thing is I do not know if that is exactly what it is going for, because that is certainly not said and there is little to point his overall mood in that direction. I find a large amount of the story to be rather confusing as well. The ending, specifically, confounded the hell out of me. I am not quite sure at the end what happened to him. In this class it has been nearly nailed into our brains to have some sort of overall change in the character in the story, or there needs to be some change that makes it story-worth, and I do not know what that is in this story. I did feel like the piece was successful in the dialogue, which was realistic and seemed to fit well.

Response to "Swiss Cheese"

I suppose I will start by saying that this, more than any other story I have read for the class, was very difficult to put down. It was very compelling and I thought that the storyline itself was an incredibly compelling one. It moved along without any bumps and it seemed real, more than anything else. I enjoyed that Brett (odd name choice, by the way) had a very distinct personality but what I liked far more than that even was how Jack Goodwin had his own very distinct, and very very compelling personality of his own. The relationship between the two is what wrapped it up for being a really good story to me. It also did a nice job of tying in other aspects of the story throughout, like the 'cows down the chute' thing or the bananas. I did feel like maybe the banana was used a bit too much, as it became one of the predominant images in the mind of the reader to too high of a degree in my opinion. I also felt like the setting could have been portrayed a little bit better to give the reader a more concrete sense of place. For instance, I had a really odd image in my head of the room where jack was being held. There were a couple of minor things that I marked on the paper where I felt like it could use come cleaning up, and there was only one minor plot hole that I noticed and that too was marked. I thoroughly enjoyed this read though. I only pray that this doesnt overly inflate any egos.

Response to "Blood"

"Blood" my Molly was twisted and interesting, and just the type of intrigue that I would expect from her writing. To begin with, it was told from a very interesting point of view that instantly made the reader lock in, so they can hear the tale of a crazy girl. I also really enjoyed the way the memories were told, especially the ones involving the father. The story is apparently about a girl named Scarlet (and for once I feel like her name was introduced at an appropriate time) and she is in some sort of mental hospital. She describes the other "crazies" who are patients and their differing levels of severity, and also describes her mother and father. The mother is somewhat neurotic and a germ freak and the father seems very laid back. She then goes on to tell about the reason for her getting put in the hospital and the current talk with the psychiatrist. I find her reasoning for her cutting tendencies to be odd and interesting but still chilling because of the nature of the subject. I feel like the whole piece fits that nature well. I feel like the piece moved along well and I enjoyed the way the story was told from a time and memory standpoint. It did seem like it could get polished up a bit more though, and although there was a good and definite voice (of course) I wasnt sold on everything she said, such as the times when she says "think ____". Still a very good story.

Response to "Support Group"

I thoroughly enjoyed reading "Support Group". It was a unique story that was told purely with dialogue and only by one person. This can be difficult, obviously, and to be perfectly honest I am not sure what the best way to do this on paper would be, as far as writing conventions or grammar are concerned. That aside, I thought that the story was good in that it really captured a lot of attention from the reader and it never let up. It seemed like a genuine voice and I was able to see a depressing individual admitting his perverted nature to a group of silent onlookers. It was very awkward and made my skin crawl a little bit, but in a very good way that built tension and gave the reader the typical feeling of 'not being able to look away from a car crash'. The story was also laughable, and I am pretty sure that this was Paul's intention when he put it together. It was the awkward laugh that makes you feel weird for laughing at, like the scene where he tells about messing his pants in front of his friends. It clearly is also a somewhat taboo subject and that alone propells it to having significance, but it does not tackle the subject half-heartedly. The only gripe that I have is for the ending. I felt like the end was trying to wrap it up and finish, and I don't know what would have been better but it seemed sudden. At the very least, my suggestion would be to put a little bit more between the last paragraph and the one before that makes a sort of time lapse between him saying he would be there for everyone else and him jetting out of there. It just happens so quickly it seems rushed and ill formed.

Response to "The Marriage of Ruth and Isaac"

I liked the story by Emily, largely because of the perspective. It was a well told story that was told from the point of view of the mother of a girl who is about to get married. What I like about this is that the mother has a more or less reproachful thought about the whole idea of losing her baby daughter to the life of a man, and I feel like it would be far more stereotypical to go the other route and make it the father who has this idea. The story starts with the mother telling about the memory she has of her daughter (Ruth) when she was a very young girl in her first wedding, and paints a good picture of how she was once a very dependent and shy girl who needed her daddy. It goes on to tell more memories about how the mother felt she should have been more supportive of the daughter throughout different events in Ruth's life in her relationship with Isaac, such as the meeting of the parents or learning of the engagement. I would have liked to see more about how Ruth reacted to the Mother's take on all of these events though, and I think it would tell a lot about the state of their relationship. It seems unclear to me now if the mother is overly loving and is merely protective and doesn't want to lose her daughter or if they have a relationship that is flawed. It was a bit short and I was not convinced that it had to be. I thought a good bit more could have been put on paper. I also felt like the last two paragraphs lost the easymoving voice from before and fall apart simply to try to end it.