Like you, as I read this I kept asking “what is this trying to be?” I found the story to have interesting elements—Sal and Annie’s relationship and how it developed and Charlie’s death—but I felt that it was a bit unfocused. It seemed as though all of these things were supposed to come together, but I’m not sure if they ever fully did. I think part of it is due to the narrator not ever fully realizing what is happening. This can work well, don’t get me wrong, but I think that for a story that is so reflective and personal, it would have made more sense for Annie to synthesize things more than she did. As a someone who was a teenage girl not too long ago, I found that Annie did not feel like a teenage girl. At the beginning of the story, I had thought she was male. This could just be me being nit-picky.
Despite my critiques, I did thoroughly enjoy reading this. I found Sal to be incredibly interesting, and it was no wonder why someone like Annie would be drawn to him. Much of why I kept thinking of what the story was trying to say was because I was so engaged, and I think that speaks to its strengths.
A heat moment for me is the bridge. The bridge connects and shows the isolation of their lives, relationship. I like how you speak of the past docks and their long ago history. Even the most substantial aspects of our lives become tokens of an unknown past.
Like you, as I read this I kept asking “what is this trying to be?” I found the story to have interesting elements—Sal and Annie’s relationship and how it developed and Charlie’s death—but I felt that it was a bit unfocused. It seemed as though all of these things were supposed to come together, but I’m not sure if they ever fully did. I think part of it is due to the narrator not ever fully realizing what is happening. This can work well, don’t get me wrong, but I think that for a story that is so reflective and personal, it would have made more sense for Annie to synthesize things more than she did. As a someone who was a teenage girl not too long ago, I found that Annie did not feel like a teenage girl. At the beginning of the story, I had thought she was male. This could just be me being nit-picky.
Despite my critiques, I did thoroughly enjoy reading this. I found Sal to be incredibly interesting, and it was no wonder why someone like Annie would be drawn to him. Much of why I kept thinking of what the story was trying to say was because I was so engaged, and I think that speaks to its strengths.
A heat moment for me is the bridge. The bridge connects and shows the isolation of their lives, relationship. I like how you speak of the past docks and their long ago history. Even the most substantial aspects of our lives become tokens of an unknown past.