The outer story of "Goodbye Aquinna" is about Josiah, his father and the town of Aquinnah, which I interpreted to be a native American community on the New England coast. The father is a suspect character and the town is going through hard times. Josiah ends up killing the boys' father, is confronted by the local police and then leaves the town the next day. I was unsure what the inner story was, since we get the story told to us by the first person narrator. However, this narrator is just a spectator, nothing seems to happen to him or effect him very much.
I really enjoyed everything that had to do with the town of Aquinnah in this story. You did a great job of setting the scene for the town and creating a cast of minor characters who make very little impact individually, but as a collective, give a vivid picture as to what this town is and goes through. The passage about how everyone in the town knows everything about everyone else on page nine was my favorite part of the story, the little anecdotes and the whole atmosphere of the writing really was great.
I thought that the first person narrator was a bit of a problem. I think that you were going for a narrator who wasn't a particularly active character, which is fine, but I relt like I was getting the story through a character who was not really a character at all. He doesn't really do anyting or interpret anything, he is just a pair of eyes. This would be fine if the story was about Josiah, or the town, and the boy was just a pair of eyes that we were looking through. However, I thought that the story was somewhat about the boy, since the last scene we are left with is the boy considering the fact that his brother has left, without really reflecting on it.
I really liked this story and I think it could be great. I think that the story could go a couple of ways. I would like this story a lot if it was mostly about the town, centering on Josiah murdering their father in order to show us what this event does to the town. In this sense I think that the extremely passive narrator would be an excellent vehicle for exploring this. However, I also think that this story could be great if it focused on being about the narrator and how the trauma in the family is affecting him and the town. Right now I feel like it is somewhere in between and I would like to see it go in one direction or the other. Either way, I think you have a great start here.
The outer story is about how the narrator’s brother, Josiah kills his father and then leaves their Native American commune. The lives of other people living on the commune also seem to play a large part in the outer story, giving it greater dimension and complexity. The inner story seems to be about Josiah’s need to escape from the island and his father, who appears to be a complicated character – he tells these rich interesting stories to his sons and seems to have affection for them, but he is severely abusing and molesting their older sister Ruth, which shows that he has an evil twisted side. Although the story is through the narrator’s eyes, he plays a very small part in the story, serving as a kind of passive wing-man to Josiah.
I thought the way you structured this story was interesting, cutting it up into short titled segments that kind of dabbled about in time. Although this could have been distracting, I thought it added interest and allowed for quick snap shots of the town of Aquinnah and its inhabitants that together made the story very rich. The town itself and these short stories are very vivid, and you do a great job of providing the readers with interesting details. I also like the narrator’s voice, which is young but trustworthy and wise. He seems to understand what’s going on although he never really says it.
A few issues I had: While I really liked the way you divided the story up into little segments that build on each other and together are very rich, I wasn’t sure about the way you title them—repeating titles and putting “, etc.” after many of them. The repeating titles, in particular are very confusing. Are you creating continuations of the same scene with each similarly-titled piece, or are we just bringing up the same issue. It’s confusing and doesn’t add to the story. I feel like each piece needs a new title, and one that’s more poignant than “The Day it Happened” or “Home, etc.”. There’s more to these portions of story than the titles let on. Also, I felt like the speaker was too passive and plays too small a part in the story. I like his voice, but he seems to be entirely an onlooker and not at all a participant. I’m sure these things have an incredibly strong impact on him – his dad is abusing his sister; his brother killed his dad! These are not small issues, and yet he seems unaffected. Also, your characters, while interesting on the surface, don’t have very much depth. Josiah is the most fleshed out character, but other than that the reader doesn’t get to know anybody else very well. Even Ruth, who is so damaged and grotesquely interesting has no personality. The narrator seems to hardly know his father in the distant way he describes him…and the father is such a central character to the story that we need much more than this. I also want to see more into Josiah’s motive for murder. Also, while I absolutely love the way you paint this oppressed town and its quirky characters, I thought that this needed to tie into the story with Josiah and the narrator or else it feels distracting. The two could very easily weave together, if you simply showed the aftermath of the murder and how it affects the town as well as the narrator. As it is, the town doesn’t seem to mind much, except for the fact that it’s bad for business. But as a reader, I don’t believe this – I want to see them care but suppress it like they always do. Or at least their attempt at trying to stay quiet. Maybe the murder unleashes something in the town…causes a change.
This is a great first draft, and I’m really excited to see what you do with it.
Nick: The outer story is about the narrator’s older brother killing their father on a reservation in Aquinnah because (maybe among other reasons) their father abused their sister. The inner story seems to be about Josiah’s desperation to escape the island. Josiah is ready to abandon his home and all of the tradition and heritage attached to it, while the narrator seems reluctant. He obviously admires his older brother, but he clings to these things. The focus of the story seems to be on the murder, as the repeated reference to “the day it happened,” yet I feel like more development is done on the inner story. Ruth is abruptly introduced, then we jump to the boys on the basketball court teasing Josiah and the narrator, then we jump once again to Josiah killing his father. It definitely catches me off guard.
I love the idea of an island providing protection, but also feeling trapped within it. I think one of your strongest scenes is when the boys leave the island to go into Boston. There seems to be this great generational gap between the father who can’t “deal with the mainland” and the boys who are eager to explore. I think this is further highlighted with the traditions and story telling of the Native-American culture. Josiah breaks out of the small community even psychologically, refusing to believe his father’s stories.
I feel like you’re trying to fit a lot into this story. This may be why you were drawn to using titles to break up the sections, but I’m not sure this helps, in fact I feel like it fragments it even further. You’ve got the rich culture of growing up on the reservation, the conflict between the reservation and the rich New England renters, Josiah’s desire to leave the island, the father’s abuse of the daughter, and finally, the murder of the father. Honestly, I didn’t feel like Ruth was even necessary. I would believe that the brother could run away without such a dramatic catalyst as murdering his father. I think by eliminating these more sensationalist parts of the plot, you could focus more on character and place development. You’ve created fascinating characters and have placed them in such a rich environment. I feel like you hardly exploit your situation.
Sometimes, I get confused as to the narrator’s voice. He sounds young, but he often makes observations that seem out of his perspective (“The guy that bought it fixed it up, and last year sold it for $1.2 million to a family from New York City” or “Natalie’s methamphetamine addiction.”) The story is told in the past, but I’m not sure how much later this is supposed to be written. The narrator says “Moshup was our God” suggesting he no longer believes in this, yet he writes that Gay Head became Aquinnah only a few years ago. I feel like this narrator is still very embedded in his community, and I would love to see that reflected more in his language. For example, I would think he would refer to Oak Bluffs, etc. as “up island” rather than “the other side of the island.” I guess I’m also biased, since I’ve spent so much time on the vineyard, but it comes back to a question of authenticity. I want to believe in this voice as much as I believed in your first piece’s narrator.
You’ve set up a great deal of potential in this draft, I feel like you could take it anywhere. -Michelle
On the surface, “Goodbye, Aquinnah” is about the narrator watching the events that lead up to his father’s murder (committed by his older brother, Josiah). On the level of the inner story, it is about the narrator’s own growing disillusionment, not only with his father but with the whole Wampanoag community of Aquinnah, with his home.
I thought your choice of narrator for the story was very interesting—not the murderer, but the murderer’s younger brother. I think this point of view has a lot of potential: first, it takes away from the melodrama that would probably result from telling the story from Josiah’s point of view; second, it adds another layer to the story, the psychological effects of the murder and its surrounding events on the narrator. You’ve set up a really cool premise: here we have a narrator that is young enough not to question the religion that’s been ingrained in him, young enough to still be playing games with the lighthouse, young enough to still ask for bedtime stories, but at the same time has to be old enough for a minimum understanding of the events so that he can present them to the reader, whether or not he interprets them correctly. I think this premise can be developed further by asking yourself how long ago after the murder is the narrator telling the story. Is he telling it immediately after—when everything is still a hodgepodge of memories, of vague feelings that this is why it happened—or, as it seems to me, is he telling it when he is much older—when he can look back and clearly identify these turning points in the relationship between Poppa and Josiah, when he can recognize his own naivete and now be critical of his hometown. Currently, one of the things I was confused about was just how old this narrator was. He’s young enough to ask for bedtime stories but he’s old enough to make statements like, “So we carried with us the burdens of our truths.” If the narrator is telling the story from a far enough perspective, this isn’t a problem: you can show both the youthful innocence and the critical older eye, with things like, “Back then, I always asked for bedtime stories” and so forth. However, if the narrator is telling it soon after the murder, then I think you could play up his innocence more and not have him moralize about home so much; this, instead, could come from talks with Josiah or something. Either scenario answers the question I wondered about as I read “Goodbye, Aquinnah”: Why is the narrator telling the story? Also, on the note of the narrator, I find myself wondering why he wasn’t more freaked out that his brother killed his father. He asks Josiah, “You killed him, didn’t you?” and then allows Josiah to sidetrack him with a question about religion.
I think you have a very entertaining story here and some beautiful moments of writing—your descriptions of the physical town as well as its dark underbelly, your sense of detail (“his round stomach would come spilling out” and “After Josiah ate his, he got diarrhea”), and your dialogue (“My boys,” he said sheepishly) are all wonderful. I like the inventiveness of your structure also, but I have to admit I was a little confused as to its significance in the larger theme of the story. Why sections? What effect were you reaching for? I also liked how the story moved beyond the scope of the family and also addressed the problems of Aquinnah in general, particularly that feeling that the Wampanoag Indians must stick together at all costs, even if that means punishing no one. Thank you very much for sharing, “Goodbye, Aquinnah,” and good luck with your revisions.
The external story in “Goodbye, Aquinnah” is about a boy who lives on a Native American reservation in Cape Cod, and his brother kills his father. To me, the internal story is about a guy who experiences a tense family life, and watches the relationship between his brother and father deteriorate.
This story has some fantastic imagery. I love descriptions like “arms tangled in the wooden railing” (3) and “His baggy white t-shirt flopped around in the wind; sometimes it would fly up, and his round stomach would come spilling out” (4), and “the waves licked the shore, sucking back rocks and bits of clay” (3). – so vivid. The setting of the island is clearly important and shapes the narrator’s life, so it’s great how you pay attention to details like how the water hits the rocks, how foggy the sky is, and how the clay in the cliffs looks. These details build a real, tangible place for the story to take place in.
Another interesting aspect of this story is how information is woven throughout in a mysterious way, instead of linearly or clumped together. Important aspects of the story unfold as we read, and more and more is revealed to us. For example, we aren’t sure who Josiah killed until later, with hints of the tension in his relationship with his father, and then finally the description of his dead body. We don’t know what the deal is with Ruth until the basketball game. At first I was slightly frustrated that I didn’t know some important details, but by the end, I was satisfied with how they came on in layers.
Something I was left wondering about was why this story was told through this voice. I felt like the more compelling story was Josiah’s. Although it was interesting to hear about the events from a semi-objective voice, I felt like the narrator didn’t add that much to the story himself, and hearing it from Josiah may have been more compelling. Otherwise, I’d like to know how the narrator plays a role in this world, hear more how he’s been affected by the death of his father, hear more about his interpretation of the Josiah-father relationship, hear his opinions about his sister, etc.
Another thing that could be developed in this story is the Native American factor. I think it sets a very interesting dynamic to the story, and I admire this original choice. I sometimes get confused however, which characters who live in the area are white and which are not, and I wonder about the dynamic between them. It seems like it is a source of tension, like when Sophie urinates on the competitor’s porch (“which was owned by a white couple”), and when the tour buses roll through, yet it isn’t fully clarified. Also, I wonder why the god Moshup is mentioned, and what that impacts in the story.
Overall, I thought this was a really interesting piece, and told a sad but captivating story. Great work!
This story is about two boys who grow up on an Indian reservation. Their mother is gone and there father is a pretty awful guy. He forces them to crawl into holes and he molests their sister. One day Josiah loses it and kills dad, then he runs away. The inner story of this seems to be the story of the community. It is this diseased, inbred and dying thing that appears palatable to the tourists but holds secrets that finally burst out in the father’s murder. I found that all the breaks with bold headings were really distracting. Each time I came to one I was forcibly pulled out of the story and reinserted somewhere else. I think that the breaks can stay but the headings must go. The where’s and the when’s need to happen more organically within the story instead of being written there in bold. The first scene was really confusing to me. I am left with this feeling that Josiah is some kind of psycho, but the rest of the story is getting me to empathize with him. I thought that this story could happen a little later in the narrative. Maybe showing Josiah and his brother talk as brothers before I see Josiah already on trial, already accused as a criminal. I wanted the scene with Moshup to work more for the story. Right now, I’m not sure why exactly Josiah brings it up. Does he feel guilty? Or is he just messing with his little brother, or is he not sure he believes himself anymore and wants to see if anyone does? I thought that this could be accomplished by showing more of Josiah and his brother’s actions while they are having this talk. Like the way Josiah throws rocks into the ocean, this is awesome and I thought that things like this could be happening throughout the conversation. The bunker scene was great. It really painted the picture of the dad as this monster that the story needed. He is willing to endanger his own kid’s life for something shiny in a hole. I wanted this to be more traumatic for Josiah, though. I thought that this scene could be expanded and drawn out a little more. I want Josiah to really be terrified for his life, his brother, too. Are they thinking about him drowning in that old bunker and how they’ll have to wait for low tide to pull his body out? What about dad? How lazy is he? What is he doing while Josiah is down there? Is Josiah screaming and crying, also how does this manifest itself later when he gets out? Does he do anything else besides just not talking to dad for a week? I wanted the town’s secrets to be more and darker. I didn’t think that peeing on the porch was severe enough thing to do. This section set up this feeling of small town scariness like Deliverance, or The Lottery and I think that this could be exploited to build up to the murder even more.
Interesting and entertaining, I would like to see it darker and maybe learn more about the murder, though. Thanks.
I think the outer story here is about Josiah, his past with his family, and how he eventually comes to murder his father. I think the inner story was about how the narrator of the story is attempting to come to terms with the death of his father at the hands of brother, through relating a number of pointed incidents between the two. The narrator ultimately wants to understand why this horrific thing happened, while I think Josiah just wants to get away from the island and his father’s oppression.
I really liked the setting in this piece. It was unusual and evocative. I loved the imagery of the seacliffs and the ocean. The lighthouse that alternately emits red and white light was quite memorable. In general, I think the details and description of Aquinnah are great, as was the description of the town’s inhabits, and their tendency to sweep dirty secrets under the rug. I would have liked to see more of this; this is a really interesting world. I also thought the snatches we got of the narrator’s culture and beliefs were intriguing, and I think perhaps we could get more of this as well. I think the tension between Josiah’s rejection of Moshup this culture and the father’s conservatism (“I can’t deal with the mainland,”) alone could provide of conflict for this story. I also really liked the glimpse we got of Boston, which provided an interesting contrast to the somewhat suffocating nature of the island. I also really liked the relationship of the islanders to the tourists, which felt quite real and said a lot about both groups.
There’s a lot going on between Josiah and his father, and although I didn’t feel like the murder was ultimately unbelievable or implausible, I’m not sure the murder is even necessary to the plot. The conflict between Josiah and his father, and with the island culture in general, is great and complicated and fascinating, and I think adding a murder on top of it takes a little away from that. Indeed, I felt like the Ruth aspect, which ultimately seems to be the major impetus for the murder, could be another story on its own. It’s memorable and really creepy, but she just pops up on page 7 unannounced, and then drops out only to be mentioned again on 11. As it is, she felt like a plot device, something to justify the murder, given that Josiah’s relationship with his father was otherwise quite tense but not near murderous levels, so to speak. I think dropping this part of the story would let you focus on Josiah’s conflict in a more natural way. The best parts of the story were, I felt, those that dealt with the island culture, Josiah’s rejection of it, and his father’s willingness to go along with things as they had always been. The story can end with Josiah’s decision to run away, which I think is still a pretty major event and a reasonable resolution to the story.
I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the narrator. In some ways this story reminded of “The Eve of the Spirit Festival,” with the narrator acting as a more passive character, commenting on the actions of the more dynamic older sibling and the father. I don’t think there’s any need for the narrator to become a major player in this story, but I would have liked to get a somewhat better sense of who he is and what he thinks about his world. He doesn’t necessarily need to play a big part in the plot, but I wanted to see more of his thoughts and feelings. Indeed, my sense was that he was telling this story in order to figure out for himself why his brother committed murder. However, that’s mostly speculation on my part and not necessarily borne out in the story.
I think this is a great world with some fascinating characters! Michael Booe
Hi Nick, I read the outer story as being about the narrator's life on his home island, especially focusing on the days surrounding when his older brother Josiah murdered their (abusive, mean) father. The inner story seemed to be about Josiah's anger towards his own history and upbringing- his disbelief in the God of his people, his father's abusive ways, the isolation of the island- and how it all comes to a head and he has to release it somewhere. Judging from this and your last story, I'd say you do a really great job of relaying the flavor (I don't know if that's the best word) of a community. Through little details like the boys at the cliff hurling rocks into the ocean and bigger ones like their alienating trip to metropolitan Boston, you're able to give a good sense of the narrator's place and understanding of his own culture and community. I also think the more major themes concerning Josiah and the events surrounding the father's death were really powerful, with motivations clearly drawn and understandable. My main issue with the story is concerning the use of the first person narrator- he seems emotionally distant (and strangely nonresponsive) to the events unfolding, and that I think weakens the emotional impact of his brother killing their father. I think it would be best to have the story as close to the events unfolding as possible, either through a third-erson narrator that can better show Josiah's frustrations or a first-person narrator who is much more emotionally involved with what is going on- he really doesn't seem to have much of an opinion of what's going on, nor does he attempt to interpret Josiah's actions, and I think the story could benefit from both. I also found the structure of the story to be a bit confusing- the way it jumps around seems unnatural for a first-person narrator especially, and I would often get lost between scene changes- especially when it was a "ctd." segment, I would have to look back to see what was gonig on in the story before and that pulled me further away from the story. There is a really strong use of the environment and community of the story here, and it was in moments like the description of selling "authentic" Indian necklaces that I thought the story was at its best. I just think that strong personal connection the narrator has with his community could be applied to the events taking place, and this could be a really great story. Great job- I think you've got something really good started here! -Matty
I understood your outer story to be about the narrator’s brother, Josiah, killing their father. I understood your inner story to be about Josiah’s growing sense of disgust and hatred towards the father, which culminates in his act of murder and his subsequent escape from the island.
This is an inventive and well-written story, and I like the structure you use. I think the short scenes and passages lend themselves well to this story, and I like the deceptively simple subtitles that you often use multiple times. I think it’s bold to make this story so non-linear, and I applaud you for pulling it off. I am also very impressed by how specifically and realistically you painted this Native American island community, from its gossip to its traditions to the challenges it faces. The conflict between tradition and business is wonderfully understated, and the world you describe really feels like a small island community. You do such a good job describing the trip to Boston that I really find myself believing that the characters’ previous experiences are limited to this little island that you create for us.
While it seems to me that this is Josiah’s story (the younger brother narrator scarcely reacts to or comments on anything), I don’t feel that I understand Josiah well enough or see enough of a change in him to make him a compelling protagonist. With the exception of the Boston memory, Josiah’s attitude towards the father seems to be angry and suspicious throughout the story. The pivotal moment for the readers occurs when we are given the final piece of information – that the father abused Ruth – and not when we see a change in the protagonist. It’s fine to wait to reveal this information, but I want to see more of Josiah’s turmoil. Did he love his father at one point? When did he realize about Ruth? Does he confide in the narrator? Is it an easy decision to run away, or is it a hard decision? I also think you can make better use of your narrator. If he’s telling the story, I want to know how he feels about what’s going on. What confuses him? What surprises him? What does he expect? It has to be significant that Josiah’s younger brother is telling the story, and right now I’m not sure that I think it is.
I think you’ve got the foundation for a really terrific story here, and I look forward to seeing where you go with it.
I understood your outer story to be about the narrator’s brother, Josiah, killing their father. I understood your inner story to be about Josiah’s growing sense of disgust and hatred towards the father, which culminates in his act of murder and his subsequent escape from the island.
This is an inventive and well-written story, and I like the structure you use. I think the short scenes and passages lend themselves well to this story, and I like the deceptively simple subtitles that you often use multiple times. I think it’s bold to make this story so non-linear, and I applaud you for pulling it off. I am also very impressed by how specifically and realistically you painted this Native American island community, from its gossip to its traditions to the challenges it faces. The conflict between tradition and business is wonderfully understated, and the world you describe really feels like a small island community. You do such a good job describing the trip to Boston that I really find myself believing that the characters’ previous experiences are limited to this little island that you create for us.
While it seems to me that this is Josiah’s story (the younger brother narrator scarcely reacts to or comments on anything), I don’t feel that I understand Josiah well enough or see enough of a change in him to make him a compelling protagonist. With the exception of the Boston memory, Josiah’s attitude towards the father seems to be angry and suspicious throughout the story. The pivotal moment for the readers occurs when we are given the final piece of information – that the father abused Ruth – and not when we see a change in the protagonist. It’s fine to wait to reveal this information, but I want to see more of Josiah’s turmoil. Did he love his father at one point? When did he realize about Ruth? Does he confide in the narrator? Is it an easy decision to run away, or is it a hard decision? I also think you can make better use of your narrator. If he’s telling the story, I want to know how he feels about what’s going on. What confuses him? What surprises him? What does he expect? It has to be significant that Josiah’s younger brother is telling the story, and right now I’m not sure that I think it is.
I think you’ve got the foundation for a really terrific story here, and I look forward to seeing where you go with it.
Dear Nick, I read the outer story of Goodbye, Aquinnah to be about a father who is killed by his son, leaving behind him, another son, and a retarded daughter who live on an Indian reservation on an island off the coast of Boston. I read your inner story to be about the changing relationship between Poppa and Josiah—Josiah becomes increasingly independent and skeptical of his father’s intentions. I think that Josiah wants some space; I’m not sure what Poppa or the narrator want. I really like the world that you create. The reservation felt very real—I like the use of Native words and the anecdotes of who’s doing what with whom on page nine. The descriptions, of the lighthouse and the cliffs and the Victorian homes all bring the island to life. I did want to see more of the white-native tensions you imply (with rising home prices and the peeing on the chowder stand)—what is the dynamic on the island in this respect, and how is it exacerbating the tribe’s condition or changing its dynamics? There are some great phrases. I especially liked the phrase “sucking back rocks and bits of clay (page 3),” which reminded me of Matthew Arnold’s Dover Beach. I also liked the phrasing “pellets of rain.” You have some really interesting situations as well—the eroding cliffs and the bunker scene were two of my favorites. These, the language, and the view of the reservation kept me reading and really drove the story. I had a number of questions about plot. First, it took me a couple readings to understand what happened to Poppa. When the answer comes, it feels too vague to be the climax of the. Perhaps you could move the discovery of Poppa’s body to the beginning of the piece. Along with that, I wanted to understand how characters are impacted by the death. In the narrator’s case, I wanted to know how he feels. I want to also better understand Josiah’s emotional state when he leaves. Part of the way to do this, I think, is to show more of them as characters. Similarly, I wanted to better understand who the Vanderhoops were, what exactly the relationship between Ruth and Poppa is, and how old the brothers are. I read you inner story to be about relationships: between the brothers, between them and Poppa, between Poppa and Ruth, between the family and the tribe, and between the tribe and mainstream society. Making some of these relationships more detailed for the reader, especially that of the immediate family, would be really helpful for my understanding of the murder, Great draft, James
Nick, The outer story of your piece is a brother’s departure from his family and his sheltered life at the Indian Reservation. The inner story is a younger brother dealing with and understanding his family, especially in the wake of his older brother’s departure and his father’s death. I think you have some wonderful set-up in this story. I can completely see the sandy bunker, the father picking up “small pieces of sea glass with his stubby fingers” (4). I loved the tension after Poppa inadvertently almost drowned his son, and the unspoken truths about the townspeople. Also, the moment where the two boys see a city for the first time is especially captivating and well-written. You have created some wonderful moments here that are poignant and full of meaning. I get a good sense of the unique environment that these boys are growing up in, and how the Reservation informs so much of their identity. I think that most of this story is set-up, however, and that there is not as much of a plot arc. We see the younger brother learning about his father, and his mysterious sister Ruth. We see Josiah as unhappy and upset at Indian life and values and his need to escape. Yet I am not sure of what actually happens. Does Josiah kill his father? That seems particularly gruesome and out of character for a disgruntled adolescent who is yearning for a taste of the real world. Why isn’t the narrator more upset that his brother could have possibly killed his own father? And how does he come to this conclusion? Overall, I wanted to get to know the narrator better. We watch him observe a lot of situations, but I never feel like I have a good hold on his personality. How old is he? His father still tells him the same story at night, yet he knows about the neighbors’ adultery and meth addictions. Is he in middle school? High school? Did the Reservation make him grow up fast? And how old is Josiah? You have set up a great tension between these two brothers—Josiah doesn’t believe in the Indian religion why the younger brother still does, Josiah seems to know something about Ruth that the narrator is only beginning to realize. I wanted to explore this tension, which ultimately seems like the crux of the piece, in more detail. You give us the end at the beginning, and you make the reader figure out the puzzle. I think this drives the story a lot, and definitely made me eager to find out what happens. I wonder if you need the very delineated and titled sections of the story. Is it the narrator trying to organize and make sense of his father’s murder? Is it a journal entry? Why then, is it told out of order? I also wonder if you told us what the mystery was at the beginning, if we would still be eager to find out the details, but we would not be built up for the worst of worst (which almost happens. I guess there can almost be worse, although this is close.) Maybe play around with how much you reveal to the reader—enough to clue us in, but not enough to give everything away. The story ends dramatically with Josiah leaving, but how does the narrator react to this? He says that he knows he will never return, how is he so sure? Is he relieved that his murderer-brother is gone? Is he worried what he will do now that he is alone with his sister? There are so many questions left undone, the story doesn’t feel complete to me, yet. Best of luck with revisions, Katie
12 comments:
Nick,
The outer story of "Goodbye Aquinna" is about Josiah, his father and the town of Aquinnah, which I interpreted to be a native American community on the New England coast. The father is a suspect character and the town is going through hard times. Josiah ends up killing the boys' father, is confronted by the local police and then leaves the town the next day. I was unsure what the inner story was, since we get the story told to us by the first person narrator. However, this narrator is just a spectator, nothing seems to happen to him or effect him very much.
I really enjoyed everything that had to do with the town of Aquinnah in this story. You did a great job of setting the scene for the town and creating a cast of minor characters who make very little impact individually, but as a collective, give a vivid picture as to what this town is and goes through. The passage about how everyone in the town knows everything about everyone else on page nine was my favorite part of the story, the little anecdotes and the whole atmosphere of the writing really was great.
I thought that the first person narrator was a bit of a problem. I think that you were going for a narrator who wasn't a particularly active character, which is fine, but I relt like I was getting the story through a character who was not really a character at all. He doesn't really do anyting or interpret anything, he is just a pair of eyes. This would be fine if the story was about Josiah, or the town, and the boy was just a pair of eyes that we were looking through. However, I thought that the story was somewhat about the boy, since the last scene we are left with is the boy considering the fact that his brother has left, without really reflecting on it.
I really liked this story and I think it could be great. I think that the story could go a couple of ways. I would like this story a lot if it was mostly about the town, centering on Josiah murdering their father in order to show us what this event does to the town. In this sense I think that the extremely passive narrator would be an excellent vehicle for exploring this. However, I also think that this story could be great if it focused on being about the narrator and how the trauma in the family is affecting him and the town. Right now I feel like it is somewhere in between and I would like to see it go in one direction or the other. Either way, I think you have a great start here.
Nick:
The outer story is about how the narrator’s brother, Josiah kills his father and then leaves their Native American commune. The lives of other people living on the commune also seem to play a large part in the outer story, giving it greater dimension and complexity. The inner story seems to be about Josiah’s need to escape from the island and his father, who appears to be a complicated character – he tells these rich interesting stories to his sons and seems to have affection for them, but he is severely abusing and molesting their older sister Ruth, which shows that he has an evil twisted side. Although the story is through the narrator’s eyes, he plays a very small part in the story, serving as a kind of passive wing-man to Josiah.
I thought the way you structured this story was interesting, cutting it up into short titled segments that kind of dabbled about in time. Although this could have been distracting, I thought it added interest and allowed for quick snap shots of the town of Aquinnah and its inhabitants that together made the story very rich. The town itself and these short stories are very vivid, and you do a great job of providing the readers with interesting details. I also like the narrator’s voice, which is young but trustworthy and wise. He seems to understand what’s going on although he never really says it.
A few issues I had: While I really liked the way you divided the story up into little segments that build on each other and together are very rich, I wasn’t sure about the way you title them—repeating titles and putting “, etc.” after many of them. The repeating titles, in particular are very confusing. Are you creating continuations of the same scene with each similarly-titled piece, or are we just bringing up the same issue. It’s confusing and doesn’t add to the story. I feel like each piece needs a new title, and one that’s more poignant than “The Day it Happened” or “Home, etc.”. There’s more to these portions of story than the titles let on. Also, I felt like the speaker was too passive and plays too small a part in the story. I like his voice, but he seems to be entirely an onlooker and not at all a participant. I’m sure these things have an incredibly strong impact on him – his dad is abusing his sister; his brother killed his dad! These are not small issues, and yet he seems unaffected. Also, your characters, while interesting on the surface, don’t have very much depth. Josiah is the most fleshed out character, but other than that the reader doesn’t get to know anybody else very well. Even Ruth, who is so damaged and grotesquely interesting has no personality. The narrator seems to hardly know his father in the distant way he describes him…and the father is such a central character to the story that we need much more than this. I also want to see more into Josiah’s motive for murder. Also, while I absolutely love the way you paint this oppressed town and its quirky characters, I thought that this needed to tie into the story with Josiah and the narrator or else it feels distracting. The two could very easily weave together, if you simply showed the aftermath of the murder and how it affects the town as well as the narrator. As it is, the town doesn’t seem to mind much, except for the fact that it’s bad for business. But as a reader, I don’t believe this – I want to see them care but suppress it like they always do. Or at least their attempt at trying to stay quiet. Maybe the murder unleashes something in the town…causes a change.
This is a great first draft, and I’m really excited to see what you do with it.
-Brodie
Nick:
The outer story is about the narrator’s older brother killing their father on a reservation in Aquinnah because (maybe among other reasons) their father abused their sister. The inner story seems to be about Josiah’s desperation to escape the island. Josiah is ready to abandon his home and all of the tradition and heritage attached to it, while the narrator seems reluctant. He obviously admires his older brother, but he clings to these things. The focus of the story seems to be on the murder, as the repeated reference to “the day it happened,” yet I feel like more development is done on the inner story. Ruth is abruptly introduced, then we jump to the boys on the basketball court teasing Josiah and the narrator, then we jump once again to Josiah killing his father. It definitely catches me off guard.
I love the idea of an island providing protection, but also feeling trapped within it. I think one of your strongest scenes is when the boys leave the island to go into Boston. There seems to be this great generational gap between the father who can’t “deal with the mainland” and the boys who are eager to explore. I think this is further highlighted with the traditions and story telling of the Native-American culture. Josiah breaks out of the small community even psychologically, refusing to believe his father’s stories.
I feel like you’re trying to fit a lot into this story. This may be why you were drawn to using titles to break up the sections, but I’m not sure this helps, in fact I feel like it fragments it even further. You’ve got the rich culture of growing up on the reservation, the conflict between the reservation and the rich New England renters, Josiah’s desire to leave the island, the father’s abuse of the daughter, and finally, the murder of the father. Honestly, I didn’t feel like Ruth was even necessary. I would believe that the brother could run away without such a dramatic catalyst as murdering his father. I think by eliminating these more sensationalist parts of the plot, you could focus more on character and place development. You’ve created fascinating characters and have placed them in such a rich environment. I feel like you hardly exploit your situation.
Sometimes, I get confused as to the narrator’s voice. He sounds young, but he often makes observations that seem out of his perspective (“The guy that bought it fixed it up, and last year sold it for $1.2 million to a family from New York City” or “Natalie’s methamphetamine addiction.”) The story is told in the past, but I’m not sure how much later this is supposed to be written. The narrator says “Moshup was our God” suggesting he no longer believes in this, yet he writes that Gay Head became Aquinnah only a few years ago. I feel like this narrator is still very embedded in his community, and I would love to see that reflected more in his language. For example, I would think he would refer to Oak Bluffs, etc. as “up island” rather than “the other side of the island.” I guess I’m also biased, since I’ve spent so much time on the vineyard, but it comes back to a question of authenticity. I want to believe in this voice as much as I believed in your first piece’s narrator.
You’ve set up a great deal of potential in this draft, I feel like you could take it anywhere.
-Michelle
Dear Nick,
On the surface, “Goodbye, Aquinnah” is about the narrator watching the events that lead up to his father’s murder (committed by his older brother, Josiah). On the level of the inner story, it is about the narrator’s own growing disillusionment, not only with his father but with the whole Wampanoag community of Aquinnah, with his home.
I thought your choice of narrator for the story was very interesting—not the murderer, but the murderer’s younger brother. I think this point of view has a lot of potential: first, it takes away from the melodrama that would probably result from telling the story from Josiah’s point of view; second, it adds another layer to the story, the psychological effects of the murder and its surrounding events on the narrator. You’ve set up a really cool premise: here we have a narrator that is young enough not to question the religion that’s been ingrained in him, young enough to still be playing games with the lighthouse, young enough to still ask for bedtime stories, but at the same time has to be old enough for a minimum understanding of the events so that he can present them to the reader, whether or not he interprets them correctly. I think this premise can be developed further by asking yourself how long ago after the murder is the narrator telling the story. Is he telling it immediately after—when everything is still a hodgepodge of memories, of vague feelings that this is why it happened—or, as it seems to me, is he telling it when he is much older—when he can look back and clearly identify these turning points in the relationship between Poppa and Josiah, when he can recognize his own naivete and now be critical of his hometown. Currently, one of the things I was confused about was just how old this narrator was. He’s young enough to ask for bedtime stories but he’s old enough to make statements like, “So we carried with us the burdens of our truths.” If the narrator is telling the story from a far enough perspective, this isn’t a problem: you can show both the youthful innocence and the critical older eye, with things like, “Back then, I always asked for bedtime stories” and so forth. However, if the narrator is telling it soon after the murder, then I think you could play up his innocence more and not have him moralize about home so much; this, instead, could come from talks with Josiah or something. Either scenario answers the question I wondered about as I read “Goodbye, Aquinnah”: Why is the narrator telling the story? Also, on the note of the narrator, I find myself wondering why he wasn’t more freaked out that his brother killed his father. He asks Josiah, “You killed him, didn’t you?” and then allows Josiah to sidetrack him with a question about religion.
I think you have a very entertaining story here and some beautiful moments of writing—your descriptions of the physical town as well as its dark underbelly, your sense of detail (“his round stomach would come spilling out” and “After Josiah ate his, he got diarrhea”), and your dialogue (“My boys,” he said sheepishly) are all wonderful. I like the inventiveness of your structure also, but I have to admit I was a little confused as to its significance in the larger theme of the story. Why sections? What effect were you reaching for? I also liked how the story moved beyond the scope of the family and also addressed the problems of Aquinnah in general, particularly that feeling that the Wampanoag Indians must stick together at all costs, even if that means punishing no one. Thank you very much for sharing, “Goodbye, Aquinnah,” and good luck with your revisions.
Jessamyn
Dear Nick,
The external story in “Goodbye, Aquinnah” is about a boy who lives on a Native American reservation in Cape Cod, and his brother kills his father. To me, the internal story is about a guy who experiences a tense family life, and watches the relationship between his brother and father deteriorate.
This story has some fantastic imagery. I love descriptions like “arms tangled in the wooden railing” (3) and “His baggy white t-shirt flopped around in the wind; sometimes it would fly up, and his round stomach would come spilling out” (4), and “the waves licked the shore, sucking back rocks and bits of clay” (3). – so vivid. The setting of the island is clearly important and shapes the narrator’s life, so it’s great how you pay attention to details like how the water hits the rocks, how foggy the sky is, and how the clay in the cliffs looks. These details build a real, tangible place for the story to take place in.
Another interesting aspect of this story is how information is woven throughout in a mysterious way, instead of linearly or clumped together. Important aspects of the story unfold as we read, and more and more is revealed to us. For example, we aren’t sure who Josiah killed until later, with hints of the tension in his relationship with his father, and then finally the description of his dead body. We don’t know what the deal is with Ruth until the basketball game. At first I was slightly frustrated that I didn’t know some important details, but by the end, I was satisfied with how they came on in layers.
Something I was left wondering about was why this story was told through this voice. I felt like the more compelling story was Josiah’s. Although it was interesting to hear about the events from a semi-objective voice, I felt like the narrator didn’t add that much to the story himself, and hearing it from Josiah may have been more compelling. Otherwise, I’d like to know how the narrator plays a role in this world, hear more how he’s been affected by the death of his father, hear more about his interpretation of the Josiah-father relationship, hear his opinions about his sister, etc.
Another thing that could be developed in this story is the Native American factor. I think it sets a very interesting dynamic to the story, and I admire this original choice. I sometimes get confused however, which characters who live in the area are white and which are not, and I wonder about the dynamic between them. It seems like it is a source of tension, like when Sophie urinates on the competitor’s porch (“which was owned by a white couple”), and when the tour buses roll through, yet it isn’t fully clarified. Also, I wonder why the god Moshup is mentioned, and what that impacts in the story.
Overall, I thought this was a really interesting piece, and told a sad but captivating story. Great work!
-Annie Jonas
Nick,
This story is about two boys who grow up on an Indian reservation. Their mother is gone and there father is a pretty awful guy. He forces them to crawl into holes and he molests their sister. One day Josiah loses it and kills dad, then he runs away. The inner story of this seems to be the story of the community. It is this diseased, inbred and dying thing that appears palatable to the tourists but holds secrets that finally burst out in the father’s murder.
I found that all the breaks with bold headings were really distracting. Each time I came to one I was forcibly pulled out of the story and reinserted somewhere else. I think that the breaks can stay but the headings must go. The where’s and the when’s need to happen more organically within the story instead of being written there in bold.
The first scene was really confusing to me. I am left with this feeling that Josiah is some kind of psycho, but the rest of the story is getting me to empathize with him. I thought that this story could happen a little later in the narrative. Maybe showing Josiah and his brother talk as brothers before I see Josiah already on trial, already accused as a criminal.
I wanted the scene with Moshup to work more for the story. Right now, I’m not sure why exactly Josiah brings it up. Does he feel guilty? Or is he just messing with his little brother, or is he not sure he believes himself anymore and wants to see if anyone does? I thought that this could be accomplished by showing more of Josiah and his brother’s actions while they are having this talk. Like the way Josiah throws rocks into the ocean, this is awesome and I thought that things like this could be happening throughout the conversation.
The bunker scene was great. It really painted the picture of the dad as this monster that the story needed. He is willing to endanger his own kid’s life for something shiny in a hole. I wanted this to be more traumatic for Josiah, though. I thought that this scene could be expanded and drawn out a little more. I want Josiah to really be terrified for his life, his brother, too. Are they thinking about him drowning in that old bunker and how they’ll have to wait for low tide to pull his body out? What about dad? How lazy is he? What is he doing while Josiah is down there? Is Josiah screaming and crying, also how does this manifest itself later when he gets out? Does he do anything else besides just not talking to dad for a week?
I wanted the town’s secrets to be more and darker. I didn’t think that peeing on the porch was severe enough thing to do. This section set up this feeling of small town scariness like Deliverance, or The Lottery and I think that this could be exploited to build up to the murder even more.
Interesting and entertaining, I would like to see it darker and maybe learn more about the murder, though. Thanks.
Mike
I think the outer story here is about Josiah, his past with his family, and how he eventually comes to murder his father. I think the inner story was about how the narrator of the story is attempting to come to terms with the death of his father at the hands of brother, through relating a number of pointed incidents between the two. The narrator ultimately wants to understand why this horrific thing happened, while I think Josiah just wants to get away from the island and his father’s oppression.
I really liked the setting in this piece. It was unusual and evocative. I loved the imagery of the seacliffs and the ocean. The lighthouse that alternately emits red and white light was quite memorable. In general, I think the details and description of Aquinnah are great, as was the description of the town’s inhabits, and their tendency to sweep dirty secrets under the rug. I would have liked to see more of this; this is a really interesting world. I also thought the snatches we got of the narrator’s culture and beliefs were intriguing, and I think perhaps we could get more of this as well. I think the tension between Josiah’s rejection of Moshup this culture and the father’s conservatism (“I can’t deal with the mainland,”) alone could provide of conflict for this story. I also really liked the glimpse we got of Boston, which provided an interesting contrast to the somewhat suffocating nature of the island. I also really liked the relationship of the islanders to the tourists, which felt quite real and said a lot about both groups.
There’s a lot going on between Josiah and his father, and although I didn’t feel like the murder was ultimately unbelievable or implausible, I’m not sure the murder is even necessary to the plot. The conflict between Josiah and his father, and with the island culture in general, is great and complicated and fascinating, and I think adding a murder on top of it takes a little away from that. Indeed, I felt like the Ruth aspect, which ultimately seems to be the major impetus for the murder, could be another story on its own. It’s memorable and really creepy, but she just pops up on page 7 unannounced, and then drops out only to be mentioned again on 11. As it is, she felt like a plot device, something to justify the murder, given that Josiah’s relationship with his father was otherwise quite tense but not near murderous levels, so to speak. I think dropping this part of the story would let you focus on Josiah’s conflict in a more natural way. The best parts of the story were, I felt, those that dealt with the island culture, Josiah’s rejection of it, and his father’s willingness to go along with things as they had always been. The story can end with Josiah’s decision to run away, which I think is still a pretty major event and a reasonable resolution to the story.
I wasn’t quite sure what to make of the narrator. In some ways this story reminded of “The Eve of the Spirit Festival,” with the narrator acting as a more passive character, commenting on the actions of the more dynamic older sibling and the father. I don’t think there’s any need for the narrator to become a major player in this story, but I would have liked to get a somewhat better sense of who he is and what he thinks about his world. He doesn’t necessarily need to play a big part in the plot, but I wanted to see more of his thoughts and feelings. Indeed, my sense was that he was telling this story in order to figure out for himself why his brother committed murder. However, that’s mostly speculation on my part and not necessarily borne out in the story.
I think this is a great world with some fascinating characters!
Michael Booe
Hi Nick,
I read the outer story as being about the narrator's life on his home island, especially focusing on the days surrounding when his older brother Josiah murdered their (abusive, mean) father. The inner story seemed to be about Josiah's anger towards his own history and upbringing- his disbelief in the God of his people, his father's abusive ways, the isolation of the island- and how it all comes to a head and he has to release it somewhere.
Judging from this and your last story, I'd say you do a really great job of relaying the flavor (I don't know if that's the best word) of a community. Through little details like the boys at the cliff hurling rocks into the ocean and bigger ones like their alienating trip to metropolitan Boston, you're able to give a good sense of the narrator's place and understanding of his own culture and community. I also think the more major themes concerning Josiah and the events surrounding the father's death were really powerful, with motivations clearly drawn and understandable.
My main issue with the story is concerning the use of the first person narrator- he seems emotionally distant (and strangely nonresponsive) to the events unfolding, and that I think weakens the emotional impact of his brother killing their father. I think it would be best to have the story as close to the events unfolding as possible, either through a third-erson narrator that can better show Josiah's frustrations or a first-person narrator who is much more emotionally involved with what is going on- he really doesn't seem to have much of an opinion of what's going on, nor does he attempt to interpret Josiah's actions, and I think the story could benefit from both. I also found the structure of the story to be a bit confusing- the way it jumps around seems unnatural for a first-person narrator especially, and I would often get lost between scene changes- especially when it was a "ctd." segment, I would have to look back to see what was gonig on in the story before and that pulled me further away from the story.
There is a really strong use of the environment and community of the story here, and it was in moments like the description of selling "authentic" Indian necklaces that I thought the story was at its best. I just think that strong personal connection the narrator has with his community could be applied to the events taking place, and this could be a really great story. Great job- I think you've got something really good started here!
-Matty
Dear Nick,
I understood your outer story to be about the narrator’s brother, Josiah, killing their father. I understood your inner story to be about Josiah’s growing sense of disgust and hatred towards the father, which culminates in his act of murder and his subsequent escape from the island.
This is an inventive and well-written story, and I like the structure you use. I think the short scenes and passages lend themselves well to this story, and I like the deceptively simple subtitles that you often use multiple times. I think it’s bold to make this story so non-linear, and I applaud you for pulling it off. I am also very impressed by how specifically and realistically you painted this Native American island community, from its gossip to its traditions to the challenges it faces. The conflict between tradition and business is wonderfully understated, and the world you describe really feels like a small island community. You do such a good job describing the trip to Boston that I really find myself believing that the characters’ previous experiences are limited to this little island that you create for us.
While it seems to me that this is Josiah’s story (the younger brother narrator scarcely reacts to or comments on anything), I don’t feel that I understand Josiah well enough or see enough of a change in him to make him a compelling protagonist. With the exception of the Boston memory, Josiah’s attitude towards the father seems to be angry and suspicious throughout the story. The pivotal moment for the readers occurs when we are given the final piece of information – that the father abused Ruth – and not when we see a change in the protagonist. It’s fine to wait to reveal this information, but I want to see more of Josiah’s turmoil. Did he love his father at one point? When did he realize about Ruth? Does he confide in the narrator? Is it an easy decision to run away, or is it a hard decision? I also think you can make better use of your narrator. If he’s telling the story, I want to know how he feels about what’s going on. What confuses him? What surprises him? What does he expect? It has to be significant that Josiah’s younger brother is telling the story, and right now I’m not sure that I think it is.
I think you’ve got the foundation for a really terrific story here, and I look forward to seeing where you go with it.
Zach
Dear Nick,
I understood your outer story to be about the narrator’s brother, Josiah, killing their father. I understood your inner story to be about Josiah’s growing sense of disgust and hatred towards the father, which culminates in his act of murder and his subsequent escape from the island.
This is an inventive and well-written story, and I like the structure you use. I think the short scenes and passages lend themselves well to this story, and I like the deceptively simple subtitles that you often use multiple times. I think it’s bold to make this story so non-linear, and I applaud you for pulling it off. I am also very impressed by how specifically and realistically you painted this Native American island community, from its gossip to its traditions to the challenges it faces. The conflict between tradition and business is wonderfully understated, and the world you describe really feels like a small island community. You do such a good job describing the trip to Boston that I really find myself believing that the characters’ previous experiences are limited to this little island that you create for us.
While it seems to me that this is Josiah’s story (the younger brother narrator scarcely reacts to or comments on anything), I don’t feel that I understand Josiah well enough or see enough of a change in him to make him a compelling protagonist. With the exception of the Boston memory, Josiah’s attitude towards the father seems to be angry and suspicious throughout the story. The pivotal moment for the readers occurs when we are given the final piece of information – that the father abused Ruth – and not when we see a change in the protagonist. It’s fine to wait to reveal this information, but I want to see more of Josiah’s turmoil. Did he love his father at one point? When did he realize about Ruth? Does he confide in the narrator? Is it an easy decision to run away, or is it a hard decision? I also think you can make better use of your narrator. If he’s telling the story, I want to know how he feels about what’s going on. What confuses him? What surprises him? What does he expect? It has to be significant that Josiah’s younger brother is telling the story, and right now I’m not sure that I think it is.
I think you’ve got the foundation for a really terrific story here, and I look forward to seeing where you go with it.
Zach
Dear Nick,
I read the outer story of Goodbye, Aquinnah to be about a father who is killed by his son, leaving behind him, another son, and a retarded daughter who live on an Indian reservation on an island off the coast of Boston. I read your inner story to be about the changing relationship between Poppa and Josiah—Josiah becomes increasingly independent and skeptical of his father’s intentions. I think that Josiah wants some space; I’m not sure what Poppa or the narrator want.
I really like the world that you create. The reservation felt very real—I like the use of Native words and the anecdotes of who’s doing what with whom on page nine. The descriptions, of the lighthouse and the cliffs and the Victorian homes all bring the island to life. I did want to see more of the white-native tensions you imply (with rising home prices and the peeing on the chowder stand)—what is the dynamic on the island in this respect, and how is it exacerbating the tribe’s condition or changing its dynamics?
There are some great phrases. I especially liked the phrase “sucking back rocks and bits of clay (page 3),” which reminded me of Matthew Arnold’s Dover Beach. I also liked the phrasing “pellets of rain.”
You have some really interesting situations as well—the eroding cliffs and the bunker scene were two of my favorites. These, the language, and the view of the reservation kept me reading and really drove the story.
I had a number of questions about plot. First, it took me a couple readings to understand what happened to Poppa. When the answer comes, it feels too vague to be the climax of the. Perhaps you could move the discovery of Poppa’s body to the beginning of the piece.
Along with that, I wanted to understand how characters are impacted by the death. In the narrator’s case, I wanted to know how he feels. I want to also better understand Josiah’s emotional state when he leaves. Part of the way to do this, I think, is to show more of them as characters. Similarly, I wanted to better understand who the Vanderhoops were, what exactly the relationship between Ruth and Poppa is, and how old the brothers are.
I read you inner story to be about relationships: between the brothers, between them and Poppa, between Poppa and Ruth, between the family and the tribe, and between the tribe and mainstream society. Making some of these relationships more detailed for the reader, especially that of the immediate family, would be really helpful for my understanding of the murder,
Great draft,
James
Nick,
The outer story of your piece is a brother’s departure from his family and his sheltered life at the Indian Reservation. The inner story is a younger brother dealing with and understanding his family, especially in the wake of his older brother’s departure and his father’s death.
I think you have some wonderful set-up in this story. I can completely see the sandy bunker, the father picking up “small pieces of sea glass with his stubby fingers” (4). I loved the tension after Poppa inadvertently almost drowned his son, and the unspoken truths about the townspeople. Also, the moment where the two boys see a city for the first time is especially captivating and well-written. You have created some wonderful moments here that are poignant and full of meaning. I get a good sense of the unique environment that these boys are growing up in, and how the Reservation informs so much of their identity.
I think that most of this story is set-up, however, and that there is not as much of a plot arc. We see the younger brother learning about his father, and his mysterious sister Ruth. We see Josiah as unhappy and upset at Indian life and values and his need to escape. Yet I am not sure of what actually happens. Does Josiah kill his father? That seems particularly gruesome and out of character for a disgruntled adolescent who is yearning for a taste of the real world. Why isn’t the narrator more upset that his brother could have possibly killed his own father? And how does he come to this conclusion?
Overall, I wanted to get to know the narrator better. We watch him observe a lot of situations, but I never feel like I have a good hold on his personality. How old is he? His father still tells him the same story at night, yet he knows about the neighbors’ adultery and meth addictions. Is he in middle school? High school? Did the Reservation make him grow up fast? And how old is Josiah? You have set up a great tension between these two brothers—Josiah doesn’t believe in the Indian religion why the younger brother still does, Josiah seems to know something about Ruth that the narrator is only beginning to realize. I wanted to explore this tension, which ultimately seems like the crux of the piece, in more detail.
You give us the end at the beginning, and you make the reader figure out the puzzle. I think this drives the story a lot, and definitely made me eager to find out what happens. I wonder if you need the very delineated and titled sections of the story. Is it the narrator trying to organize and make sense of his father’s murder? Is it a journal entry? Why then, is it told out of order? I also wonder if you told us what the mystery was at the beginning, if we would still be eager to find out the details, but we would not be built up for the worst of worst (which almost happens. I guess there can almost be worse, although this is close.) Maybe play around with how much you reveal to the reader—enough to clue us in, but not enough to give everything away.
The story ends dramatically with Josiah leaving, but how does the narrator react to this? He says that he knows he will never return, how is he so sure? Is he relieved that his murderer-brother is gone? Is he worried what he will do now that he is alone with his sister? There are so many questions left undone, the story doesn’t feel complete to me, yet.
Best of luck with revisions,
Katie
Post a Comment