“The Track of the Assassins” by Jim Shepard
Hey, now you can read along, too!
A thing that I like to do, even when I shouldn’t, is find patterns in narratives. So now that I’ve read two stories by the same author in the same collection, I am going to think about how these stories are similar and what larger idea Shepard is sharing.
This is bad. I should let each story be its own thing. I shouldn’t be drawing conclusions from two examples. I should let Shepard speak, instead of interrupting and being like, “So here’s what I think is going on.” But here’s what I think is going on!
- Pursuing something. My inability to articulate what the “something” is is either intentional on Shepard’s part or attributable to my inability to read Shepard’s stories well.
- Pursuing something in the extreme Outdoors (extreme height in the last story, extreme discomfort in this story, extreme isolation in both stories).
- Pursuing something in the extreme Outdoors while leaving someone important behind. But why? Reader, you tell me.
