Thursday 23 January 2014

Until She Comes Home by Lori Roy

A Couple of Days Before

Malina Herze stares down on her dining-room table, her lovely dining-room table, and clutches a red-handled hammer to her chest.

This opening line is full of anticipation, which pulls the reader through the opening narrative, creating suspense. These types of sentences are hard to write because they depend on the rest of the scene just as much as the rest of the scene depends on them.

With the repeating of her lovely dining-room table, some tone and character are established. However, it's the hammer clutched to her chest that stands out and gives the scene it's tension and color.

As the paragraphs roll along an unpleasant image of Mr. Herze emerges - that of a jerk husband who doesn't appreciate his wife and who is a little over-domineering. It's an archetypal character that's commonplace in literature, one that is usually joined for entertaining contrast effect with the timid and submissive archetypal wife, a -by now- cliché of sweet nuptial antagonism.

First thing said:

"And who the hell you think you be?"

Verdict: Pass

Sincerely,
Theodore Moracht

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