Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Response to "Off" by Aimee Bender

This is the story of a girl who is at a party and trying to meet her night's quota of guys to kiss. She seems to be distressed about something and it seems to be causing her to act this way, but we never find out what might be bothering her.
      The narrative is in first person, so all we get is what the main character gives us. This precludes us from ever getting an objective look at the situation, but we do still get a lot of information about the character. We see her true character in her voice, her actions and reactions, and even in her subjective viewpoint.
      What I really appreciate about this story is that it is very engaging and entertaining without being about something exceptional. Sometimes it's hard to find stories to write, but this just goes to show that everything is a story if you write it right.
      I think what kept me so engaged in this story was the mystery of the main character's motives. We never find out what is driving her to complete this list, why it was this night, what happened. Yet we get glimpses, we see how she responds to her situation, we hear how she sounds as she narrates. Figuring out the character, to me, was the most entertaining part of this story.

1 comment:

  1. You're right about the events seeming unexceptional--no murders, no babies in dumpsters, no cheating spouses--and yet it works because of an interesting voice. You *could* have been a bit more specific with details from the story, analyzing what made the character interesting or how Bender gave you information about her through what she tells us (and why that info. was important). I didn't do a word count on this but it seems a bit short of the requirement.

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