What a brave and beautiful story, really. The image of high-schoolers stomping on a stuffed animal until it's torn to pieces is terribly harrowing. The short speech Ariel delivers is very powerful, but I feel like if you take the time to flesh out the abuse even more and to build up the emotional turmoil, it will be even more meaningful. Also, I feel like you're doing more "telling" rather than "showing." Instead of saying flat out "Many kids in my school were racist against Mexicans," show what they did that made it clear that it was her heritage that separated her from everybody else. Or rather than saying, "It pained me to see this," explain how you would wince at the sight or focused your eyes on the cafeteria floor instead or for some reason, you couldn't look away. (P.S "most brave" should b "bravest," unless that was a stylistic choice.) It's really a very beautiful story though. The last line--"we were all swept away in the after glow" is absolutely wonderful, haunting almost.
December 5th, 2010 at 01:58am