[Tuesday Reading Room] How We Avenged The Blums by Nathan Englander

This story comes from Englander’s short story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank: Stories.

The title of the collection made me a bit nervous, I’ll confess. I’m not Jewish and I wasn’t – until last year – American, and I wasn’t sure where Englander was going with that Anne Frank reference.

I needn’t have worried. All the rave reviews were well earned.

The stories are universal in appeal, dealing with everything from growing up in a small town, feeling different (and who hasn’t?), to navigating the waters of relationships, to the world of the elderly at a summer retreat (don’t call it a ‘camp’!), from the very human costs of founding of an Israeli settlement, to the experience of an all-American boy visiting a peep show (and the ghosts of his past).

“How We Avenged The Blums” is the third story in the collection and feels like any one of the ‘it was tough to be the nerd in middle school’ stories you might read written by anyone bookish from any background. The boys in this story are different because they are Jewish and attend the Yeshiva school rather than the public school. When one of their classmates is attacked by bullies, the boys set about planning their revenge. They are almost comically unqualified for the job…until the fortuitous arrival of Boris, a Russian Jew, veteran of both the Russian and Israeli armies. The boys persuade Boris to help train them and spend weeks preparing for a showdown with the bullies.

The story is immersive, dropping the reader into the world of a 1980s suburban Jewish community of boys on the edge of adulthood, of adults preoccupied with the community’s problems in the wider world, of expectations and cultural references that you don’t have to have known  to nevertheless ‘grok’.

The writing is utterly engrossing. Englander spoons out cultural details and historical references in perfect portions while driving the story with strong characters. He evokes the panic and hopelessness of the bullied middle-schoolers without ever preaching. And then ends the story perfectly: maintaining the boys’ perspective, allowing the reader to filter it and figure out how the story should affect them.

This is a great example, for writers, of how to lead a reader right up to the point of what you want to say, but not to ram it down their throats — and not to leave them feeling disappointed either. This story definitely ends. It just doesn’t end with the author standing up on a soap box and saying, “now, in case you missed my point…”

I recommend the whole collection.

Have you read this story? What did you think?

How do you feel about stories that evoke a very specific time/place/community? Do you like to learn about others? Do you feel disconnected from it? Do you ever write this way?

Leave a comment and let’s talk!

[Write on Wednesday] Why Would You Say That?!

Communication

It happens all the time:

  • You say one thing, your boss hears another.
  • Your kid’s teacher tells him to finish an assignment by Friday, he tell you Monday.
  • He says he’s busy, she hears “I don’t love you anymore”.

Miscommunication is part of life. It can lead to hilarity or it can be tragic. Crises can be averted, or opportunities can be missed. A story based on miscommunication can be frustrating or poignant.

The Prompt

Write a story where two characters misunderstand each other.

Tip

  • Try to make the miscommunication something that couldn’t easily be solved if the characters simply ‘fess up and talk like adults. Keep them apart, have someone interfere, find another way to make the miscommunication believable.
  • Make sure your story travels from start to end: don’t just write a scene, make someone or something change between the first word and the last.

The Rules:

1. You should use the prompt in your story (however tenuous the connection).

2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.

3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.

4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!

Optional Extras:

Share this challenge on Twitter or Facebook

Some tweets/updates you might use:

Don’t miss my short story: miscommunication  #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ym

This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is all about miscommunication #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ym

Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ym

See my story – and write your own, today: Why Would You Say That?  #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ym

[Write On Wednesday] Changing Seasons

Sprinkler

I don’t know about you, but where I live, the season has definitely changed.

A month or so ago, the weather was changeable, spring-like and hanging on to the old season. Now we are fully into the next season: hot, humid, and surrounded by school-free kids running wild through the backyards.

The Prompt

Set a story on a day when your character notices the season has changed.

Include details in your story that let the reader know how this new season expresses itself in your character’s setting. (And, if you’re writing something futuristic, on a space station, it can be the turning of a new season without any reference to weather at all. Humans have a way of dividing up time and marking it off on the calendar.)

Use the change of season to echo some significant change in your character. Be as subtle or obvious as you please.

Tips

• Make sure your story travels from start to end: don’t just write a scene, make someone or something change between the first word and the last.

The Rules:

1. You should use the prompt in your story (however tenuous the connection).

2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.

3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.

4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!

Optional Extras:

Share this challenge on Twitter or Facebook

Some tweets/updates you might use:

Don’t miss my short story: Changing Seasons  #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-yh

This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is all about change #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-yh

Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-yh

See my story – and write your own, today: Changing Seasons at #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-yh

[Write On Wednesday] Passages

Just a number

Today is my birthday!

It’s a big one too: one of those round numbers that everyone finds so significant. The big four-oh.

When I saw it coming I decided to emulate a friend of mine and and throw myself a party. Another friend is running away to a secluded beach when her time comes next month.

 

We humans love to mark our lives with milestones like this: New Year, birthday, anniversaries, this-time-last-year-s. The milestones can be happy or sad, full of surprise or deeply disappointing.

The Prompt

Write a story in which a character reaches, anticipates or reminisces about a milestone. 

How does she react? Is it as meaningful as everyone said it would be? Does he run towards it or shy away from it? Does it change anything?

 

Go!

 

The Rules:

1. You should use the prompt in your story (however tenuous the connection).

2. You must write the story in one 24 hr period – the faster the better.

3. Post the story in the comments — if you’re brave enough.

4. Find something nice to say about someone else’s story and leave a comment. Everybody needs a little support!

Optional Extras:

Share this challenge on Twitter or Facebook

Some tweets/updates you might use:

Don’t miss my short story about milestones!  #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ya

This week’s #WriteOnWed short story prompt is all about milestones! #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ya

Come and write with us! #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ya

See my story – and write your own, today: Passages at #WriteOnWed #storyaday http://wp.me/p1PnSG-ya

[Prompt] Picaresque

I first came across the term “picaresque” when I was about 13 and assigned “Catcher In the Rye” to read for school.

It meant, I learned, a story about a journey: literal or figurative, or ideally both.

Today I’m traveling to New York for Book Expo America 2012 and while I’m taking a literal journey, your assignment is to

Write A Story In Which Your Hero Takes A Literal And Figurative Journey

Go!

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Last Day of StoryADay May 2012!

Today is the last day of StoryADay May 2012!!

Even if you haven’t written a single story yet this month why not write and finish a story today? Writing and finishing one story in a single day is quite an achievement. You’ll be proud, I promise.

To those who have been writing every day: wow! You are awesome and every other writer on the planet envies you.  Well done!

Things You Have Done This Month

Q: Can you improve as a writer by writing a lot?
CLUE: There’s a reason this challenge is in a month named “May”…

STORYFEST REMINDER

Don’t forget to submit or nominate stories for StoryFest by June 5 (and yes, there will be another reminder). Then start planning to tell the world to visit StoryADay.org on June 8-10 for StoryFest!

(Seriously. This is your party. I don’t have email addresses for all the people you’d like to invite. You’ll have to do it!)

WHAT NEXT?

I’ll still be writing away, bring you interviews with writers, the Tuesday Reading Room, the Write On Wednesday writing prompt and regular Kick-In-The-Pants articles on Thursdays, with the newsletter serving as a regular digest of articles.

Take a moment today (or maybe tomorrow) to recap. Write an End of StoryADay report for yourself detailing any or all of the following:

  •    how you felt at the start,
  •    what you did,
  •    what you failed to do,
  •    how you kept going,
  •    what you learned,
  •    what you’re proud of
  •    how you plan to use the lessons learned this month to keep moving on your journey to literary superstardom (no wait, fulfillment. I meant to say ‘fulfillment’).

If you do write a recap and would like to share it, please post a link to it in the comments or simply send me a link in an email. I’d love to read about your experience.

Then get back to writing, polishing and submitting your short stories.

Further Reading

  • For help on developing the craft of writing, I suggest checking out DIYMFA.com.
  • For accountability and camaraderie in the year-round world of writing and submitting short stories, I refer you to Write1Sub1.

(Both of these sites have been started by former StoryADay writers since their first StADa experiences. I’m so proud!)

COME BACK EACH WEEK AND WRITE ON WEDNESDAY

Every Wednesday throughout the year I post a Write On Wednesday prompt. (If you are subscribed to the Daily Prompt email list you’ll receive these Wednesday prompts in your inbox).

The ‘rules’ for the Write on Wednesday prompt are: write a rough and ready story to the prompt within  24 hours, post it IN THE COMMENTS and comment on someone else’s. You don’t have to write it on Wednesday, but you’ll probably get the most feedback if you do.

Don’t miss out. Subscribe now!

AND FINALLY

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who has talked about StoryADay, taken part, read stories, left comments, sent me an email, or written in secret. It is an absolute honor to have been your ringmaster again this year and I will be bereft … until we do it all again next time!!