Friday, May 2, 2008

* Edward Falco's "Winter Storms" (short story, non-genre)

This is a dark political story about US occupation of Iraq. A US journalist who won't toe the official line of US Army is, in a way, handed over to jihadis. She saves herself by compromising the US spy who did her in, inadvertently also getting 3 little children killed. Now she's both nursing a guilt about killed children, & is fearful US authorities will consider her act treason.

That's about the first half of the story. Second half just drags on pointlessly, adding word count but not anything else to the story.

Fact sheet.

First published: Playboy, May 2007.
Rating: B

Note: Why is this post so short?

2 comments:

Ed Falco said...

Glad you found the plot of the story interesting. I was more interested, though, in the relationship between the father and the daughter, both of whom are victims, in different ways, of the seemingly endless violence arising out of Middle East conflicts. The father retreated from life, hiding from danger and trying to protect his daughter. The daughter, rebelling against the father, throws herself into danger's path whenever she can. Now she too has suffered a tragedy, and the point of the story, for me at least, is that she is not defeated by it, as her father was defeated. We don't know what will happen to her once she drives away. Certainly she's in great danger. But she has not quit, she has not retreated. For me, that's the point.

Tinkoo said...

Thanks for clarifying, Ed.

I did notice this part, but it seems to be so common in fiction...