The short story "Protista" by Dambudzo Marechara incorporates a fable like fantasy that I would love to explore if I get the chance. The thing I love about this short stories book is that the reader does not know what genre of literature they are reading until they have actually done the reading. The first passage of any of these short stories could probably pass off as biographical or realistic fiction, but once you dive further into the story, the fantasy world shows itself. Going into the reading of one of the sections, all that you know is the region that it came from, nothing about the validity. This causes the reader to be even more enveloped in a story which very well could be fictional, as they may think that it could be a first hand account. Although this is evident in multiple stories throughout this compilation, it really struck me in Protista. This short work of fiction begins with speak of a drought, winds, and a man that is sentenced to this desolate place. Seems realistic enough, right? Then this man/narrator talks about a circle that his love drew on the wall when she left, claiming a sort of magical telling quality in it, throwing you for a loop. When you brush past that, the story seems to become more realistic again. Then suddenly the man wakes up and he is a tree. It is this sort of surprise twist that I would like to try out eventually.
I loved "The Coffee-Cart Girl" because it is very different from most of the stories we have read thus far. It does not reveal much about the location, making it more easily applicable to the reader, allowing the reader to place the "Metropolitan Steel Windows Ltd." wherever they want in the world. If the reader can place the setting somewhere they have been, seen, or experienced allows for a much more vivid picture in their mind. This relatable quality of the story intrigued me.
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