That Look In Her Eyes by Jim Racanelli

I start reading with mild interest.  Most of us have probably read stories or seen movies in which the spirit of someone who has died calls a living loved one on the phone.  So when James receives a call from his dead father, I’m thinking it’s somewhat familiar territory, though handled nicely.  I grow more interested when James calls his sister but instead reaches his brother-in-law, Bobby, who seems to expect the call.  I fall in love with this story at the line, “You were driving home last March,” when I realize James, too, is a spirit calling a loved one.  The plot twist is delightful.  I feel excited anticipation about what is to come (hoping for yet another plot twist–could Bobby also be a ghost?) and really enjoy the absurdity when James tries to prove he can’t be a ghost by arguing, “a ghost can’t pick up the phone and call another ghost.  That doesn’t even make sense.”

The story also does a nice job of using text from the first part of the story to create subtext later in the story.  After James talks to his dead father, he worries about the possibility that his father might show up at the house.  Later, when James talks to Bobby, and James decides he should go over to Bobby’s house, Bobby does everything he can to deter James from going over.  We recognize the parallels to the first situation and are able to deduce what is in Bobby’s mind.  That works very nicely.

While I really enjoy all that, some areas of the story don’t work as well as they might.

The story doesn’t seem unified.  For me, the first part of the story, in which James talks to his dead father, shows us that the father is a relentless complainer and is still stuck in that behavior after death.  We also see that James is relentless–relentlessly angry, I think, though that could be shown more clearly–and has trouble taking responsibility and apologizing.  The theme seems to be that people are stuck with their personalities and behaviors and have a hard time escaping those.  This doesn’t quite seem to fit with James, who had such a heated argument with his father that his father had a heart attack and died.  Yet the James we see in the story seems able to stay fairly calm when on the phone with his father now.  James does not seem stuck in his behaviors.  When talking to Bobby, he doesn’t seem angry.  So I don’t get a consistent sense of his personality; another way of saying it is that he seems to have changed since his father was alive.

The climax centers around the placing of blame, as James remembers being in the car accident with his wife, Jo, and Jo giving him an accusatory look as she dies.  James doesn’t actually seem to be to blame.  A drunk driver T-boned their car.  Jo seems trapped in blaming James, unable to get past that moment and rescind the blame.  This is very believable territory for me.  Years ago, my husband made me aware that I tended to blame him for everything, and once I realized that I did, indeed, do that, I was horrified and I stopped.  Spouses and family members can definitely fall into the blame game, and that game can last a lifetime–or perhaps, even longer.  So that section rings very true to me, yet it doesn’t seem to strongly connect to the rest of the story.

Let’s look at some other parts of the story in which the issue of the placement of blame arises.  James knows he’s at least partially responsible for his father’s death, though this doesn’t seem to weigh on him and he never apologizes.  Since the father doesn’t know he’s dead, he doesn’t blame James.  So the issue is touched on but not really explored.

One more situation involving transgression and blame involves Fran, James’s sister, who blames herself for the deaths of James and Jo, and Bobby, who believes he is actually the one to blame for their deaths.  Since Fran and Bobby aren’t central to the story, these aren’t adding much.  And blaming oneself is different from blaming someone else.

I think you could adjust these elements of transgression and blame to focus them around a single theme and unify the story.  If Jo blames James, perhaps James blames his father.  In the story, James implies the father is to blame for the breakup of their family, though it doesn’t seem to bother him.  Maybe it does bother him.  Maybe his mother is unhappy and alone, or died unhappy and alone.  Or maybe James blames his father for making James into a stubborn, relentless person.  In this sort of situation, perhaps the person who is being blamed can’t find rest after death, knowing someone is condemning him, and the person placing the blame also can’t find rest, feeling unsatisfied.  The person feeling blamed makes the phone call, searching for forgiveness, though he may not realize it.  In that case, maybe Fran blames James, so James keeps trying to call Fran but gets Bobby instead.  And when James goes upstairs to wake Jo, perhaps he finds Jo calling the wife of the drunk driver, who blames Jo for her husband’s death.  Or perhaps Jo is calling James’s father, who blames her for stopping James from becoming a lawyer.

I think with some changes like this, the story’s exploration of the horrific web of blame that can swallow up a family can be more focused and unified, and can carry more emotion and power.

Another area I’d like to discuss is James’s reaction when Bobby tells him that he died in a car accident.  For me, James’s reaction rings false.  He doesn’t seem to react to many things Bobby says; the first-person perspective fades away from the story, leaving us primarily with dialogue.  When Bobby tells James that James was in an accident, James seems to ignore that information.  If he was tuning Bobby out, I might understand that, but later he reacts to what Bobby says, replying, “Sounds like it should have been in my eulogy.”  Why would James say this when he thinks he’s alive?  He certainly wouldn’t use that tense.  He might say, “Sounds like it should be in my eulogy,” though even that response wouldn’t make sense to me.  A page later, James suggests that Bobby was having a bad dream when he called.  That reaction comes far too late, if that’s how James is explaining this to himself.  Later still, James has a deep insight into Bobby’s feelings, thinking “it’s like he’s at the bottom of a deep pit,” etc.  James has seemed oblivious to much of what Bobby has said, and now he seems deeply involved in the conversation.  It feels like James’s reactions are being controlled by the author, not that this is how James would really react.  That section undermined the character for me.

Finally, the opening section, up until James calls Bobby, seems a bit talky, which is a common problem with first person.  I think you could cut that down about 10% and tighten the story.

I hope these comments are helpful.  I enjoy the story and the themes you explore.

Jeanne Cavelos, editor, author, director of The Odyssey Writing Workshops Charitable Trust

The action in this chapter moves along briskly. It’s clear what’s happening, and the line of the plot is straightforward, even with the flashback to the conversation with Sincerity. As a reader I have a solid picture of the protagonist—what he looks like, how he thinks, as well as who he is.

That’s all good work, and bodes well for the structure of the novel as a whole. It starts off with a literal bang and moves on from there.

What I would like to do for this Editor’s Choice is talk about the prose. I tend to advise authors not to worry about the word-by-word or the line-by-line while they’re still putting up the scaffolding of the plot. The important thing is to get the scenes blocked out and the characters moving within them.

How they do that is entirely up to the author’s individual process. Every writer has their own way of getting into the project. Some sketch sparingly and fill in later. Others throw it all in, try different ways of saying things, pile on the details as they come, then when it’s time to revise, go in with the pruning shears and cut away the undergrowth to show the structure of the story.

That’s what I see happening here. It’s a classic example of “kitchen-sink” drafting. There’s nothing wrong with it at all—as I like to say, “There is no wrong way to write a draft.” When it comes time for the line edits however, I have a few suggestions.

1. Overspecificity

One characteristic of kitchen-sink drafting is that the author puts everything in. They’re blocking out the scene in all aspects and from all angles. That means, for example, specifying what each hand is doing when a character moves. In his left hand he carried…, and in his right hand he carried… The question to ask in revision is, Does the reader need to know these exact details at this exact point? Is it impossible to understand what’s going on unless we know these particular facts? Are these facts relevant right here and now, or do they actually distract the reader from what’s happening? How much detail is just right, and how much is too much?

2. Word and phrase echoes

Another aspect of this type of process is a tendency to repeat the same words and phrases, as we can see in the excerpt above. Repetition is an effective rhetorical device, but it’s one of those things that needs a deft hand and sparing application. A little, in short, goes a long way.

In revision, see what happens when you trim down the repetitive phrases. Cut all but a few, and vary as many of the others as possible. Find different ways to say what needs to be said.

3. Wordiness

When writing draft, the goal is to get the words on the page. Sometimes that takes a bit of maneuvering, of talking around the subject until the meaning takes the shape the author is aiming for. Revision can tighten up the phrasing and make the meaning clearer. Here for example:

And most of all, he had Sincerity’s word that it was impossible for him to fail, no matter the trembling gun, no matter his aching back, no matter biting insects or sneeze-inducing pollen. Even if a mosquito were to take a whack at his neck at just the moment he fired, Sincerity would say that it’s all part of the plan. Baked in, like setting a watch 15 minutes ahead of an appointment he’d never be late for. She’d say there was no way he could ruin his moment to save the world. Every variable, calculated out to the nanosecond, was baked in good as a chocolate chip cookie.

There are some interesting images here, but these five sentences all say the same thing in five slightly different ways. Try condensing this passage into a single sentence. Think about the one or two details that are absolutely necessary here, that convey all the rest, and let those carry the narrative forward.

4. Transitions, flashbacks, and the passage of time

Movement within and between scenes can get challenging at times. When we’re telling each other stories, we often gravitate toward set phrases. And then, and so, or as we see in this chapter, that was when.

Here as elsewhere, variety is the spice of narrative, and the author’s job is to find different ways to say the same thing. It’s important to be clear that time is passing. And yet, somewhat paradoxically, sometimes the best way to do it is not to do it at all. Just move straight from one timeline to the next.

Flashbacks are a different kind of challenge. On the one hand, we need to make sure the reader is clear that the timeline has shifted. On the other, we don’t want to overstate the case.

Hence the use of the pluperfect to distinguish regular narrative past tense (she said) from the more distant past of the flashback (she had said). I tend to go minimalist here. Establish that this part of the scene is a flashback, but then shift to regular past tense. One “had” and then just go on with “said.” That does mean a clear transition back to the regular narrative, some phrase or construction that establishes the shift, but I think it’s less intrusive than a series of verbs marked off with “had.”

5. Viewpoint tagging

This happens a lot in draft. The author frequently reminds the reader (who at that point is basically themself) that THERE IS VIEWPOINT HERE, by the use of reminder words: thought, wondered, saw, and a favorite here, realized. There is often a fair amount of rhetorical questioning, too, as the author blocks the scene through the character’s internal monologue.

When it’s time to revise, it’s time to prune the excess, and think about whether and how often the reader will need to be reminded that they’re experiencing the story through the eyes and mind of a particular character. If the author does it right, they’ll only need to tag once or twice, then trust the reader to stay with the character until the scene or the viewpoint changes. It’s all about trust: the author trusting themself to tell the story clearly and effectively, then trusting the reader to follow where the author leads.

–Judith Tarr

The Meek Shall Inherit by Bill S.

–Leah Bobet, author of Above (2012) and An Inheritance Of Ashes (2015)

Chaos Is What You Make Of It by Tom Jackson

Sometime Through The Stars by Kate Ellis

–Judith Tarr

Helping You Be Your Best Self by Emily Scharff

The underlying idea, that a possessing entity can be a better Maya than Maya herself can be, is engaging and thought provoking.  The story does a good job at the start of showing Maya’s depressed nature, her dependence on Roger, and her motivation to “skip” parts of her life.  Her discovery that those important to her prefer the “possessed” Maya to the real one carries some good impact.  I think ending with Roger is the right way to end, since that relationship seems to be the most important one to Maya.  The message that the entity conveys at the end, “A happier you for a happier world,” conveys the situation Maya faces very clearly.

I’ll discuss the editorial feedback this revision is intended to address last.  First, I want to share my thoughts about the story.  If they aren’t useful for this story, perhaps they can help you with future pieces.

I think the story could be strengthened by increasing its unity, making all the elements work together.  Right now, the story seems to have several elements that don’t seem incorporated as well as they might be.  For example, Kevin seems very important in the opening scene, when we learn that he seemingly molested Maya, and she chooses to “skip” over her mother’s party because she doesn’t want to face him again.  Yet Kevin is barely mentioned in the story after that, as if he was just an excuse the author used to make Maya click on the app.  She later sees photos of the party, but there’s no mention of Kevin.

Because the problem of how she’ll deal with Kevin seems like the biggest problem in the opening, I’m most interested in finding out what happened with Kevin in the second scene, and I feel like something’s missing at the end when the situation with Kevin isn’t tied into the climax and conclusion.  I don’t think we actually need to meet Kevin in the story.  I think that dropping a hint or two into the story about what happened could be effective.  For example, when Maya is in school, I think you can raise the issue of Kevin more strongly.  I was fairly confused about her interaction with the teacher and why she got so upset.  What if the teacher hands back a test on which Maya did very poorly, and the teacher comments, “I thought you were getting tutoring three times a week.  Maybe your parents should ask for their money back.”  I think that could send Maya running from the room and could carry some pretty horrific implications, if she’s been seeing Kevin three times a week for a month.  The story might also describe a photo with Maya and Kevin in it, so we could get a hint of what the relationship is between Kevin and the possessed Maya.  Does she now dominate him?  As is, Maya mainly seems worried she’ll have to see him again, which is the same problem she had at the beginning.  That means this plotline is “stuck” in that situation and is not developing it.  Try to take it the next step.

It would also help to have two interactions with the mother rather than just one; that would help tie the mother into the story better.  If we could see her interacting with Maya in the first scene, we could get a sense of how the mother feels about Maya.  This could be brief, just the mother leaning into Maya’s bedroom during her texted conversation with Roger to say a line or two and then leave.  The mother might express her dissatisfaction that Maya isn’t wearing the lipstick the mother left for her, or something like that.

Another element that could be better incorporated into the story is what Maya thinks about her relationship with Roger.  At the end, she’s surprised at the feeling that Roger remained her friend out of pity and that she has been a burden to him.  So what does she think about their relationship at the beginning?   She thinks they’re friends, but I don’t get much more than that.  Does she think they both help each other, when in reality it’s always Roger helping her?  Does she think he really enjoys helping her?  The ending will have more impact if we know how different the reality is from her perception.  That’s not clear now.

The other area I think could be strengthened is Maya’s behavior.  For me, the believability of Maya’s character was undermined several times because I didn’t believe she would do what the story showed me.  The initial message she sees on her phone, “Want to skip through your day?” creates in my mind the image of a child skipping along.  It doesn’t make me think about skipping over unpleasant events.  So when Maya is immediately interested in the message, and immediately seems to read it as offering her the power to skip over events, I don’t believe that and don’t believe in her as a person.  It makes me feel as if the author knows what she means and is conveying that knowledge to the character, while the reader is left out.  If the message said something like, “Want to skip over parts of your day?” then I’d understand it as Maya does.  Or it could address the issue differently and tie better to the later messages; for example, “Are you unhappy?” or “Is your world an unhappy place?” or “Want to cope better with your life and be a happier you?”  A message like this could also add more unity to the entity’s messages through the story and to the decision that Maya must make in the story.

When she thinks, near the end of the first scene, that the advertised service would allow her to skip the party, that seems forced by the author, not something Maya would really think for two reasons.  First, because the ad doesn’t clearly claim that, as discussed above.  Second, because I don’t believe she would buy such a crazy claim, even if it was made clearly.  Maybe, if the claim is made clearly, she could think the service being offered is some sort of meditation or technique to cope with upsetting events.

I have a similar problem in the second scene, when she jumps from thinking she was in an accident to believing she was possessed.  To me, it seems like she’d have a step between these where she might question her sanity and might wonder whether she has Dissociative Identity Disorder.  She could check her texts in the second scene rather than the third scene, before the message from the entity.  I’m not sure why the entity deleted her texts with Roger.  It seems like she just told Roger that should stay apart.  And I think the entity would know that she’d talk to Roger and find out what the entity told him.  Anyway, it could be interesting for her to look for texts with Roger and not find any in the last month, but then see she’s been texting Kevin.  Or texting other people she doesn’t know.  Or texting a popular girl at school.  That would help me to accept that she believes she’s been possessed after the entity’s message.

Those are the main points I wanted to cover.  The revision request talked about making the ending more ambiguous.  While I can’t comment on the “more” part, because I haven’t read the previous version, I think the story’s end is ambiguous, and I feel generally satisfied by it.  The request also asked for more of an exploration of the entity’s motivation.  I think the messages from the entity could be strengthened some and made more unified, as discussed above, and I think that could more strongly suggest/imply the entity’s motivation.  I don’t need more than that.  Finally, the request asked for more time to resolve the friendship.  I discussed the Maya/Roger relationship above; I think you could strengthen the relationship arc by making some changes in those areas.

I enjoyed reading the story.  You succeed at accomplishing a lot in a short piece.  I hope my comments are helpful.

Jeanne Cavelos, editor, author, director of The Odyssey Writing Workshops Charitable Trust

Night Harrowing by Catherine Hansen

“Night Harrowing” caught my attention this month with the cadence of its prose, its visual imagination, and deeply poignant ending: that you can’t enter heaven without someone in your arms. However, there are a few aspects of the current draft which, as the author asked, I think might help move it from positive rejection letters to finding a home: thinking about specificity, concreteness, and what questions readers might be asking. So this month, I’d like to talk about how to bring out the most interesting version of a story: specific details, novelty, handling attention, and what the story itself reacts to.

There’s a strong sense of rhythm that kicks in right away in “Night Harrowing”, wry and tired and humble, and I was drawn to its single-mother protagonist and the small flares of beautiful language she sprinkles here and there: “breaking hard soil for new planting” and the gorgeous, grim idea of a “colossal, pitch-black voice”. However, the understructure beneath it isn’t, for me, firing on all cylinders, and I think there are a few reasons for that—all of which boil down to what “Night Harrowing” treats as interesting, and how it reacts to its own content.

“Night Harrowing” starts with a slightly apologetic relationship to its own sense of being interesting. While there are great uses out there for a framing story, or a scene that’s almost a teaser for the rest of the piece, there are definite downsides: they can rob impact from the piece in the first scene by telling readers there’s an interesting bit coming—the harrowing of hell—but not yet. Everything we put in a story shapes reader expectations, and “interesting but not yet” is no exception; everything I read filters through that lens of a harrowing is coming, and that will be interesting. Everything until that harrowing? Not yet—which is likely not the desired effect.

Once we do get into the main story, there’s a feeling of clinical distance from the protagonist that robs the urgency and vibrancy of “Night Harrowing”. The unnamed narrator has a tendency to speak in generalities and not specific details, and that generality leaches colour and life from what she’s telling us.

There’s a sense of the interesting that could be shored up just by bringing that sense of specifics back into the narrative: she was home with her three-year-old daughter—what is the child’s name? She’d surely think of her own child by their name. On a weekday, a national holiday—which one? That detail would give us time, place, seasonality: what country “Night Harrowing” takes place in, at what time of year; it would establish temperature without ever having to ask. Suddenly, we would have a sense of place.

Which long-postponed tasks is she dealing with? That detail would give us, without asking, something of the shape of this person’s life and what pressures she’s under. Which toys is her kid playing with? That detail would tell us something about the personality her child has, what money this family has or doesn’t, what year it is.

There’s a wealth of information that can be fitted into “Night Harrowing” without adding any words, just swapping generalities for specifics, and turning a setup that’s currently abstract into one that’s concrete and real: our protagonist not a single mother, but this single mother, this person with a real story and real life who, for a short time, can be cared about.

In principle, what’s happening there would be working with how human—and therefore, reader!—brains work: giving us novelty and connection. We’re wired to find novelty interesting, and empathize with other people; when there are enough specific details to flesh a character into a lived life, readers can empathize; when something new to us happens, we’re attracted to the novelty—and those things are tools in keeping readers invested in a story. In short, making it interesting.

That leads into the other major question I’d suggest looking into with “Night Harrowing”: the plot logic itself, and how the story handles novelty. As it stands in the current draft, it’s somewhat abrupt: the supernatural rushes upon the protagonist “suddenly”, she loses her body and experiences a major and earthshaking detachment—but nothing in how the story’s told changes. When she loses her ability to go back to her earthly body it’s just as sudden, just as unexplained—and she’s just as incurious about it. The form of the story and how little she asks about these occurrences give readers the cue to not pay attention to this startling change; that it is routine, not important to the story as a whole, that readers should move on.

That incuriousness—the ways “Night Harrowing” itself is telling readers that its most major narrative turns aren’t actually important, so don’t ask about them—puts a significant damper on its ability to draw readers closer through their sense of novelty. Readers can take strong cues about how to feel about a story from the story itself. When the story itself is downplaying its most change-driving events, the space where there’s room to evoke the most readerly emotion, it’s undermining its own ability to work.

There’s a lot to like in “Night Harrowing” but, at present—and acknowledging the author’s note that says it knows well what it wants to be—it’s communicating to this reader as still very much in the idea phase, not yet sunk roots. The author’s notes communicate an overall sense that “Night Harrowing” already knows what’s interesting about itself—that it’s a settled question. What I think might be missing here is communicating that cohesively: as it stands, there are a few different messages going out on that point—the ones we’ve gone through above—and I think, having decided already what’s interesting in this story, if that could be conveyed with more unity, that would be a strong start for a revision.

But I’d like to make a suggestion: before looking at all the intermediate work, details and plot logic and so on, all the things which would make each element more interesting—what if the story just started with the most interesting part? Is there a wider, deeper, more curious story that happens when “Night Harrowing” doesn’t have to start with a teaser for the interesting bit, because the interesting bit is front and centre, and there’s no need for an apology that readers have to wait for it?

I think that, for an SFF readership, there’s significantly more work to be done in here than expected, but that it’s worthwhile work, and wish you the best of luck with it.

–Leah Bobet, author of Above (2012) and An Inheritance Of Ashes (2015)

Beyond The Rings Of Imagination Chapters 15-18 by Heidi Wainer

–Judith Tarr

The Book of Margoleth, Chapter 1 by Meredith Asher

–Judith Tarr

In A Hurry by Michael Glaviano

The story generates a strong atmosphere around the old research tower, with the ancient elevator, flickering lights, and strange, chaotic lab.  The story has some very visual images, especially in the first half, so I almost experience this like a movie in my head.  The atmosphere makes me feel that strange, threatening things can happen in this place, which makes the ending believable.

The setting at the end, the staircase, reminds me some of the sub-basement in “The Rats in the Walls” by H. P. Lovecraft, with the implication that things get worse the deeper he goes.

I think the story has a strong idea and setting, but doesn’t yet have a plot or protagonist that maximizes the impact of the idea and setting.  Gordon is a hapless, distracted protagonist.  He does things without much thought, and that ends up dooming him.  While behaving thoughtlessly (or being in a hurry) can certainly lead to one’s doom, that doesn’t make a very strong plot in this case.  Gordon never seems to have a chance of success, because of who he is.  If he gave his immediate situation more thought and was a bit more on the ball, he might have a chance.  But that’s not who he is, so he doesn’t.  He’s basically a powerless victim in the story, which doesn’t make him a strong protagonist.  A protagonist needs to have some power/ability to affect events–he can have a lot of power or only a little, but he needs some.  I don’t see that Gordon has any.

That leaves me, at the end, feeling somewhat disturbed by the staircase, but it’s a distant, abstract feeling, because I’m not strongly connected to Gordon.  If Gordon were a horrible person and I had followed his horrible actions closely and formed a bond with him, then I could be happy at the end that he’s getting his comeuppance.  If Gordon were a good person and I had followed his struggles to do good closely and formed a bond with him, I could be upset and horrified that he’s trapped in such a situation at the end.  But because I’m watching Gordon from a distance, thinking how foolish he is not to listen to Philips and not to take more care in counting the floors, I don’t feel much of anything for him at the end.  Since this is a horror story, feeling nothing is not a good outcome.

He also, as far as he is aware, doesn’t have much at stake in the story until he realizes the nature of the staircase near the end.  That means he’s not really struggling strongly to achieve a goal and isn’t strongly engaged in what’s happening until near the end.  That means I don’t feel much engagement, suspense, or emotion.

I think a story with a protagonist who is too much in a hurry to notice what’s important might be more emotional and involving if the protagonist was very focused on achieving some goal (getting to an important meeting on time, for example) and was struggling against obstacles to achieve that goal so that we became very involved and rooting for him to make it to the meeting.  Then we would be caught up in the hurry also.  If the protagonist then drives through a yellow light and hits a pedestrian and kills that person, we would be devastated, because we were caught up in the same state of mind as the protagonist.  Those conditions aren’t being met in this story.  Gordon’s goal to get back to his office to work on a long-delayed project isn’t a very involving or urgent one; it’s not one we share; and his fate is more the product of the staircase than of his hurry.  We don’t know whether he would have been fine if he’d taken his time and counted the floors as directed, though I suspect not.  So I don’t think this plot fits well with the theme that being in a hurry can carry horrific consequences.

Looking at the other character, Philips seems pretty much the stereotypical eccentric scientist.  He doesn’t seem to do much in the story except provide us with a scientific reason for the staircase–that it’s an inter-dimensional portal of some kind.

One other character, the dean, is mentioned.

I think you could do much more with the characters to generate more emotion and involvement from readers and a more powerful plot.  For example, let’s say Philips and Gordon are both working on interdimensional connections, but doing so separately.  The dean is also a specialist in this area, but since his promotion, he’s stopped active research.  He still explores theory, though, and he’s developed a new theory of interdimensional connections.  Everyone in the research division knows he’s been working on this.  The story could open with Gordon in the dean’s office, fearing that he’s going to be fired because his research just led to a failed experiment, confirming that his last few years of work have been a total waste of time. He has tenure, so he doesn’t think he can get fired, but he could be demoted or moved out of the institute into a regular teaching job, a huge humiliation.  The dean has done this with researchers who haven’t produced–those researchers are transferred out and never heard from again.  Gordon’s goal is to not get transferred out of the institute.  The dean comments on the failure and asks Gordon to deliver a draft of the dean’s new theory to Philips immediately.  The dean says he was ready to share his breakthrough theory with Gordon if Gordon’s experiment had succeeded.  But since it didn’t, he’s sharing his theory with Philips. And if Gordon doesn’t show some progress soon, he might not have much of a future at the institute.

Gordon believes the dean wants to humiliate him, turning him into a delivery boy and having to face Philips in that capacity, as a failure.  The dean likes to play games.  Gordon takes the paper, which is sealed in an envelope.  He wonders if he could get into the envelope to read the theory before delivering it. His goal now is to learn the dean’s new theory.

The next scene could show Gordon going up in the elevator to see Philips and examining the envelope to see if it shows any signs of his tampering.  He opened the envelope and read the contents, but there was an unfamiliar symbol among the familiar ones, so he couldn’t understand it.  It seems almost like the separation from other dimensions vanishes if a certain condition is met.  But he doesn’t know what the certain condition is.

He gives the envelope to Philips, who seems like he might have noticed the tampering.  Gordon encourages him to open it and read it, hoping he’ll be able to engage Philips in conversation and learn about the unfamiliar symbol.  In the meantime, he’s trying to memorize the setup of Philips’s lab and figure out what kind of experiments he’s doing.

After Philips reads the theory, he seems to regard Gordon with new interest.  Gordon asks Philips out to coffee, but Philips says he’s too busy.  He asks Gordon if he’d like to participate in Philips’s research.  A research subject called in sick, and he doesn’t want to fall behind.  Gordon agrees, eager to learn about Philips’s experiments.

Philips shows Gordon moving images–like videos but not videos.  And they’re of Gordon doing things Gordon doesn’t remember doing.  In one, the dean is promoting Gordon to chief researcher.  In another, Gordon is selling computers at Best Buy.  As Gordon looks at each image, it radiates a weird light that gives him a strange feeling.  Gordon realizes he’s looking at himself in other dimensions.  Could he be a loser working at Best Buy in some dimension?  He tries to figure out how Philips has gotten these images.  One shows him opening the envelope, but the paper inside just says, “THIS IS A TEST.”  The images get weirder, with Gordon screaming, and in some he seems to be the tormentor and in some the tormented.  This leaves Gordon very unsettled.

Finally Gordon comes out and asks Philips to explain how he’s doing this, to tell him what the symbol means in the dean’s theory.  What is the factor that can make the separation between dimensions vanish?

Philips says it’s just your state of mind.  When you realize there is no difference between the dimensions, then the separation vanishes.

Gordon thinks this is Philips’s way of refusing to answer his question.  Philips is giving him a nonsense answer.  Gordon is furious and lets Philips know.  Philips asks if Gordon wants to hurt him.  Gordon says of course not.

Gordon heads for the elevator, and Philips tells him the call button doesn’t work; he’ll need to take the stairs.

In the staircase, Gordon thinks more about the images he saw.  He realizes that they were all him, that there is nothing inherently brilliant about him that would make him succeed in all dimensions.  He just got a lucky break with this position at the institute, and he may end up losing his position.  Some doors are locked, some open and show him dimensions in which he’s doing different things.  In some he’s a failure (in his estimation); in some he’s a success.  In some he is being tortured.  In some he is torturing.  He realizes that looking at the images has made the separation between dimensions vanish.  He rebels against the idea that there is no difference between the dimensions.  Of course there’s a difference.  He tries to convince himself of this–to believe he can be only the person he is now, not any of those others–to restore the separation between dimensions and be back in his own dimension.  He searches for the lobby door, to get back to his own dimension.  He goes down.  He hears the screams and curses and insane gibbering from below.  They are coming up the stairs.  He realizes he must choose a door.  He also realizes that the dean had sent him to Philips to be used in an experiment and discarded.  That’s probably what happened to the others who were “transferred” out of the institute.  He’s lost his precious position.  He finds the door to what looks like his dimension.  But now he knows what he faces there.  Failure.  He’s filled with shame and rage; maybe that’s what he is–a failure–in every dimension, whether he seems successful or not.  It’s not fair.  Why is Philips able to succeed while he is relegated to nothing?  The gibbering gets closer.  He goes down a flight, chooses the door where he is the torturer, and enters.

Anyway, that’s one possibility that would give Gordon strong goals he’s struggling to achieve, put more at stake, give him the power to affect what happens, take him through a character arc and epiphany, and require he make a difficult decision at the climax.  I think those things will make readers more engaged, increasing the intensity of the suspense and emotions they feel.

The story has some well-chosen details, and I really enjoy the images, such as the infinite staircase.  The atmosphere is very strong.  I hope my comments are helpful.

–Jeanne Cavelos, editor, author, director of The Odyssey Writing Workshops Charitable Trust