Critique #120 — David Milloway
Kevin Andrew Murphy March 7th, 2007
Little Henry didn’t understand why the other children teased him. He wasn’t terribly tall for his age or noticeably short. He didn’t have big ears or an odd shaped mole or any of the hundreds of things that usually mark a child as different and thus the object of childish scorn. He was just as normal, just as run-of-the-mill as any young boy could hope to be.
Except that he was made of bees.
It wasn’t much, I admit; one could hardly notice it. But it was enough, and it marked him from the moment he swarmed onto the school bus each morning until he swarmed off each afternoon.
“Oh no, it’s bee boy!”
“Buzz buzz buzz!”
“Probably wets his bed with honey!”
Every day he suffered such rapier wit. He put up with bad jokes and worse puns and insults I won’t bare to repeat because mothers might send me nasty letters. All this Little Henry endured, and he did so without so much as a flutter of his thousands of wings.
Unless Henry is particularly dense, he understands why they tease him…especially since you mention in detail that they make fun of his bee-y-ness. I’d suggest dropping this sentence.
The fact he’s made up of bees and none of the other children are doesn’t sound normal and, again, I think Henry knows this. I’d suggest dropping that and simply saying, “He was just as run-of-the-mill…” instead. The punch line is then funny instead of exasperating.
I thought Little Henry was the POV character, so who is this “I”? If Henery is the POV, then drop the “I admit,” and the sentences still rings funny. Otherwise, I’m wondering what nit-whit thinks it’s not much when it very obviously is noticeable and ‘a lot’ to the other children.
The quoted insults might seem bad to a child, but I seriously doubt that mothers would write nasty letters about them. Again, I’m annoyed with “I”, which I’m assuming is the author, and am wishing he’d butt out and let Henry tell the story. Not everyone would agree with me at this point.
You just talked about him buzzing and swarming places. Buzzing is caused by the wings being fluttered. Therefore, I don’t buy that ‘his thousand wings’ didn’t flutter throughout the insults, though I might buy that they weren’t in response to the insults. Still, it the insults were so very bad, I’m not convinced by a kid who doesn’t react to them.
The idea of a kid made up of bees is interesting and I’d read on just for that, but I’d want the boy to seem real despite his the bees instead of superhumanly stoic as well as made up of bees. Especially since such a point is made that he is otherwise normal.
I like the concept and I like the narrative voice, but like Debbie you lose me when you introduce the “he didn’t understand why/it wasn’t much” conceits. Little Henry apparently does understand that kids tease each other for “any of hundreds of” reasons, but not this? You have two characters here, Little Henry and the narrator. I would suggest you have one of them understand Little Henry’s plight and one not, and mind which POV you’re in at all times.
I may be wrong but I think it’s “won’t bear to repeat.”
The conceit is interesting. Overall I agree with Matt about the narrative voice. I even rather like that there is a narrator because I think this story does need to be told from the outside, but be clear about who understands what and how it reflects on the progress of the story.
I agree with Debbie - those insults are nothing to write to school about. Make sure that you know what Henry’s relationship is to the other kids at school, how long he has known them, how his situation at school intersects with the rest of the story, and why it matters to the narrator.
I’m from the “don’t explain yourself, let the writing do it” school of workshop critiquing, so I’ll refrain from comment except to say thanks. I really appreciate the critiques so far.
I will ask for clarification from kateelliott. Do you believe I should be trying to answer all those questions in those first 13 lines or just make sure they’re answered somewhere in the story?
I also like the author’s voice in it, and also don’t like how Henry seems kind of thick. I like the sarcasm (”rapier wit”) and the humor. The last little bit is weird, though…
“He put up with bad jokes and worse puns and insults I won’t bare to repeat because mothers might send me nasty letters.”
I won’t dare repeat, perhaps? And this is a weird concept, anyway. Some other people commented on it.
“All this Little Henry endured, and he did so without so much as a flutter of his thousands of wings.”
Again, weird concept, someone else said.
But yeah, I’m definitely gonna keep reading this one.
David, make sure YOU know it. Part of your job as a writer is to decide what needs to be on the page. But certainly whatever you decide needs to be on the page doesn’t all need to be crammed into the first 13 lines.
It’s interesting, though, as I find that the more I know (as the writer working on one of my own stories), the clearer my exposition is. That is, my set up is more opaque and disjointed if I am a little confused about what I’m doing - and I may spend reams of text explaining to little purpose - but if I know exactly what I’m doing in my own head, then a single line may suffice to set up a situation that I will fully explicate or unfold later.
David,
What Kate, Debbie and pretty much everyone else has said: bear and not bare, have Little Henry be less dense, and also think a bit about the insults: this is a child made of stinging insects. Even if he were sent to school with regular kids (which requires more suspension of disbelief than a boy made of bees, frankly), the fact that no one is afraid of him puts this somewhere between Magical Realism and the type of funky magical realism you only see in kids picture books, the type where kids grow antlers and then go to school anyway.
Of course, it could be one of those “At least he wasn’t made of limburger like Susie” type of things.
I’d probably turn the page, but mostly to figure out where this was going.