Hey AJ, If I can find it, I’ll send it! Thanks for your interest, Cynthia

Hi Ola, thanks for reading and leaving a comment. The chart will be on its way to you shortly. Enjoy!

Sharon, thanks for reading. The chart is on its way to you!

Thank you for your thoughtful analysis.

Sarah, thanks so much for coming back to this post after you were able to reread the story. About the white space, or space breaks as I suppose they are technically called, of course I don’t know, but my guess is they are the author’s decision as part of the story. Interesting question, though.

You are spot on with how Munro makes horror plausible by grounding it in the real world.

I agree that Lloyd’s letters seemed unnecessarily long. I don’t think anything would have been lost by shortening them to a paragraph.

Yes, I appreciated Linda’s observation about the breathing space. And I liked the ending too–I love hope.

It was interesting to see how you broke it down for analysis. I read the story as being from Doree’s perspective, but I can see your point about the secondary characters. Are you sure the white space was Munroe’s decision? I’d have guessed it was the editor’s. I agreed with your analysis of the word “use.”

I look for different things as I read with more focus on the story, pace and characters as opposed to the physicality of the words on the page and usage. I was impressed by how Munroe established tension early (you flagged this too.) The best part of Munroe is how she builds character through little details like Mrs. Sands’s shirts. She makes horror seem plausible by grounding it in the real world.

Not all of the story worked for me. The letter section was too long and broke the narrative flow, but then again I’m never too crazy about stories told via letters, especially in contemporary fiction. Lloyd never felt real to me. It was a cop out to blame his behavior on insanity. A little more back story about him would have helped, ie was he abused or abandoned as a child? Also, it would have been more believable had he been physically abusive either to his wife, kids or patients before he snapped.

I did like the ending – unusually upbeat for Munroe to leave us with so much hope.

Great comment from Linda about breathing space. I’m sure that was intentional. Munroe has a wicked sense of humor.

Fun discussion!

Oui, beaucoup de travail, Mireille. But I enjoyed every minute of it. Thanks for reading!