Judging Comment: They
say that good short stories are all about character. Yes, what happens
in the story is important – but it is only important because the
readers care about the character to whom these things happen. And Fran
Tracey’s story meets this requirement for a focus on character as
she tells us about Sally. For a start, Fran tells us about the progress
of the delayed train and the reactions of its passengers, and she punctuates
this narrative with back-story about Sally and the problems she is facing.
As the story goes on, Kieran is introduced to provide a someone to whom
Sally can talk as she unfolds her story. By this time we really care about
Sally and wonder how she is going to resolve her difficulties, then along
comes the moment of crisis: the train crash.
People react to shock in different ways, and Sally reacts by pouring out
her worries into the sympathetic ear of Kieran. Their lives, as Fran’s
closing line has it, would never be the same again. We hope they spent
their lives together.
Fran Tracey met the competition brief by telling the story of a journey.
But the journey became subsidiary to her character study.
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