Please respond: a short fiction piece

[Dane S]

Agreed. You should get that sentence perfect, then rewrite the whole story around it if necessary.

[katyseagull]

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I think the story loses some of its effect if I make it any more blatent than "She signed to him." This is quite a dilemma for me, as I feel that I am changing the meaning behind the story by forcing it out so openly.


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I see your point. Perhaps something along these lines:

"He rolled his eyes and smirked to himself. As he did this, Emily gurgled “dada” loud enough for the rest of the room to hear.

Jackson smiled, lost in his thoughts. He was soon distracted by the sight of his wife's animated face. Confused, he glanced at her hands. She quickly signed to him “She just said her first word! Dada!”

[Rushmore]

There have been a lot of useful suggestions in this thread thus far, so rather than rehash the "Chinese food," "John Deere," and deafness issues, I'd like to point out something new:

Until the very final words of the first paragraph, we cannot be sure of the setting. It is impossible to know if they got delivery food (and are at home), or if they are at the restaurant. Actually, the fact that they have permitted their infant child to play on the floor might imply that they are at home. It is not until "...entire room to hear" that we are certain they are in a restaurant.

Just add a phrase to the first sentence, i.e. "Thanking the waiter as he paid the check..." or something to this effect.

There can be no ambiguity, as most folks don't have waiters in their homes.

[Rushmore]

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One line that has been bothering me:

"As he did this, Emily suddenly garbled out “dada” loud enough for the entire room to hear."

After this line, we learn Jackson is deaf and hence make the conclusion that despite Emily being so loud the "entire room" could hear, in fact Jackson did not hear. I'm not sure how I feel about this. Despite third party narration, we assume in a generality as such that everyone in the room heard the cry.

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Remember in The Silence of the Lambs, at the end, when the cops are ringing the doorbell of Buffalo Bill's house, and they keep showing the actual bell ringing each time the button gets pushed, jump cutting to the killer's reaction to the fact of the bell? It turns out that was NOT Buffalo Bill's house, and his reaction was to the fact that Jodie Foster was ringing the bell. Of course, we have no way to know that at the time.

It is a cute and clever device, but, ultimately, it is a cheap trick. We are left to backtrack through what has just happened, and to say to ourselves, "Oh, I see."

There is something disingenuous about this. There is something about this that lessens the artistic achievement of the piece.

Although there's a bit of apples/oranges at work here, there is a similarity, both from an unintentional perspective (the quoted portion--(pre-deaf) Jackson's POV would infer that he CAN hear what the entire room hears), and from the clever surprise perspective, which, to be honest, always strikes me a someone just trying to be clever.

Think of Tyler Durden's query on the plane:

"How's that workin out for you?"

"What?"

"Being clever."

"Great."

"Well stick with it then."

Or words similar to these.

In any event, try some Raymond Carver. Nothing "clever" there.

[writername]

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It is not until "...entire room to hear" that we are certain they are in a restaurant.

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I'm fairly certain they are in a home setting. I won't ask Solo to confirm this because it is a matter of perception, but the image of the baby playing on the carpet with the toy almost certainly implies they are at home, and the expression "entire room to hear" is just that, an expression, and doesn't have to imply a crowded restaurant.

[SoloAJ]

I'll be responding again tomorr with what turns out to be the final submission copy.

I don't think the ambiguity of setting matters to the theme of the story. That said, writername is correct in what I was personally thinking writing it.

Rushmore,

I don't think I was trying to be overly clever. I wasn't trying to pull a huge veil over their heads to mislead them entirely. I just simply said that the room would hear it, so naturally, the reader assumes Jackson did too. Then I hint at the contrary two sentences later. It isn't like I set the reader up and then 200 pages later say "it was all a dream" or something too crazy.

I just wanted a small bit of something to add substance to it (which I really think it does add). But obviously a piece of literature likely won't please everyone, and certainly not something constrained to 200 words.

[SoloAJ]

F#$&*$*(@&@)@()*T@*^T)J*Y,

They moved the deadline to May 18. This means I will inevitably write something else now (to have higher odds of getting published) and agonize over that for a couple weeks like I have this one. Haha. Splendid!

[rothko]

um, no you're not. ducy?

[SoloAJ]

I do not...

Rules are you can submit as many as you want, but only one can get published. I didn't mean that I would write something in PLACE of this one, if that is what you meant. If not, uhhh, what did you mean, I do not cy. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[rothko]

multiple entries allowed, then? if so, nothing to see here. move along, please.