The setup is great - a story that keeps coming back to mind years later. It's told as a crystal clear memory that stands out from the foggy mind, with all of the details you need to understand what was happening and why. Good characterization on Freddie, if a bit cliche (but hey, some people really are like that) which is fine for a minor character in a very short story like this one. It's all the reader really needs to know about him, and he comes through in the end to fulfill his purpose to the narrative.
I felt like there was a sort of dreamlike quality to this memoir, that you are inviting the reader to do some sort of dream interpretation or therapy. Themes of injustice despite one's best efforts and suffering in silence stand out the most, and I think these kinds of early life experiences can become emblematic to us as we go through life. We keep coming back to that feeling, and the feeling is associated with a story. Fairness and injustice are universal themes that everyone can relate to, but you made it very personal and gave it a sense of time and place.
Excellent work crafting the narrative. If I were the author, I'd clean up the spelling and grammar a bit and send it off to a short story competition.
Great visual storytelling here. I felt like I could see everything that was going on in this scene.
That said, however, some of the word choices and perspective of the narrative don't sound like the story as told by Lupa, whose own personal reaction to all of these events is left out of this account entirely. She's either an exceedingly stoic character or writing as a historian more than in a letter to a friend. When I was reading about the charred remains in the street and her being pinned under a beam, watching her home town burn, etc. I felt there was a lot that was being glossed over here, and it felt a bit unnatural as a personal letter. What is it like to go through all of that? The narrative would benefit a great deal from a less "informative" viewpoint.
I was also disappointed when you said you'd spare the details on the view of destruction she witnessed. And in truth, a character who'd lived through such traumas would be able to speak of little else for a while. I'd like to hear some of that shock in her voice. Or if she is supposed to be stoic, some reference to emotions that she can't allow herself to feel.
On the flip side, I do like the way your story starts out already in the middle of the action. The compelling conflict is also a big plus, and even though the narrator is detached from the story, as a reader I still hoped she was OK.
Lovely poem. The first line put me right in the scene. I like how you developed that in the next passage. I did get a little lost in the middle though, halfway into the second stanza. I found it difficult to relate the passing bus or carriage to the idea of scrambling down a list, which is fairly abstract - but it connected somehow to trembling amongst the busywork, which felt modern in contrast to the lines above.
The existential question posed at the end was perhaps a bit jarring, mainly because I wasn't clear on what 'failure of execution' referred to. It forced me to re-read the poem, looking for a clue, and I think I got the takeaway that the narrator had averted suicide - or "failed" in a sense, maybe to execute a suicide plan.
If that's what you intended, then it was beautifully done. Subtle and visual, with emotional overtones that were striking and visceral.
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