Comments for Carolyn

Carolyn,

This is story is just plain cool—the characters are cool (Jack’s way of helping Fiona wash her hair isn’t just a sort of aid to her soul, it’s also just a cool and attentive action to take to help someone out), the concept is cool (a sort of murder mystery that involves ghosts), and the language (both description and dialogue) are cool.

I enjoy how Jack and Fiona banter—they know each other well, they’re intelligent, the accident/murder/ghosts give them a unique point of contact. I like that Fiona reveals that her family is “big on oaths” and that she and her brothers made a blood oath that whoever died first had to come back and haunt the others—and more than that, she’s waiting for them to come and they haven’t yet, and this is shattering for her. Awesome storytelling. There is so much power in this scene—especially in this beat on page 30—that I feel you might be able to make even more of it. After Fiona reveals this info about her frustration that her brothers haven’t returned to her as ghosts, she sobs with her head buried in Jack’s neck. This physical contact seems a little sudden—I almost want to have a greater sense of these two people coming closer, closer, closer together as Fiona builds up to the reveal—to see them coming together with some small actions (Fiona placing a hand on Jack’s or even holding his, or something). And maybe Jack even asks questions that a) show his curiosity and emotional involvement; b) function as the force pushing Fiona to reveal; c) make Fiona a little resistant or hesitant or trepidatious to reveal this family info about being big on ghosts and the info about the blood oath with her brothers. When she mentions the blood oath, I can imagine hearing Jack ask, “Blood oath?” Breaking up that block of dialogue with Jack asking questions and perhaps prodding a little might increase the tension and dramatic power by making the intimacy achieved by Fiona’s reveal even deeper. Does this make sense?

This may relate to your question about the emotional tone of the chapter feeling appropriate. I think the appropriate emotions are present, and now you can modulate them—turn them up or down depending on what benefits the story. Another bit of emotion I picked up on that I really like is Jack’s frustration that he can’t lift as much weight as he used to. The summer after my sophomore year, I trained a lot for basketball—I was playing great, jumping high, running fast. And then I broke my ankle and was in a cast a few weeks (3 or 6? Can’t remember.) When the cast came off, my calf muscles had atrophied, and I was crushed about how the injury had taken away so much of what I’d worked for. Jack’s an athlete, so maybe this frustration with his body could be made more of? Also, it’s compelling that his body’s physical strength has been reduced, resulting perhaps in added challenge to his character.

I haven’t seen Out of Africa (gasp if my ignorance deserves a gasp!) but the reference works for me. Jack says he’s getting the idea for what he’s doing at that moment from the movie Out of Africa, and Fiona says, “Seriously? You’re going to wash my hair?”

I like the idea of Jack querying Fiona about her comment about her family being all about ghosts. He might not reveal to her what he’s experiencing—at least not yet—but he may be seeking some kind of knowledge, some kind of verification that the ghosts he’s experiencing aren’t figments of his guilt or concussion.

I kind of like the Shakespearean stuff. I don’t think it’s too brainiac, and Jack writing a thesis on the ghosts in Hamlet and Macbeth may give him a chance to deal with the reality of ghosts with his intellect. Maybe he discovers that something Shakespeare did with ghosts is eerily close to what Jack himself is experiencing. Or maybe Shakespeare’s ghosts aren’t like what Jack’s experiencing and Jack feels a compulsion in his thesis to take a “that’s not how it is” stance that his teacher might find odd. Or maybe Jack even obsesses over this thesis. There are some fun possibilities to play with here.

Oh, and as far as pathologists—Andrea, Riley’s wife, might be a pathologist, actually. Riley, is Andrea a pathologist?

As I said above, you’re working with cool stuff here, Carolyn—go, go, go!

Have you read Stephen King’s ON WRITING? I was reading through it recently, and King said something wonderful about writing a story being like excavating a fossil—both are processes of discovery. I share that in case it’s enriching or helpful. Somehow I really liked it.

So, excavate, excavate, excavate!