A Shocking Accident is a shorty story in Open road. It was written by Graham Greene.
It tells about Jerome and his father’s death.
Jerome was called into his housemaster’s room on a Tuesday morning. Housemaster, Mr Wordsworth told him to sit. He told Jerome that his aunt had called. He had some bad news to tell. Mr Wordsworth said that Jerome’s father had been in a serious accident in Naples. It was a street accident, and his father had died in it.

Jerome thought, first, that his father was shot, but Wordsworth finally told what had happened. ”Your father was in a poorer quarters of the city of Naples. There, the pigs are kept on the balcony. Your father was walking down the street when in a block of flats fell from the fifth floor pig on top of him. ”

Jerome appreciated and adored his father. His father was a writer. Jerome thinks that his father’s death was a comic. When he told about the school’s friends, he realized how it affects others. His father death after, him began to treat unreasonable, such as pigs.

Jerome loved her father. He has in possession of the album, which was a picture-postcards, and it eased her pain when her aunt began chatting with strangers on his father’s death.
His aunt would start, ”it was a tragic accident.” And people feels for compassion.
Jerome realized suddenly that rambling speech can be real. Him all his father’s death was terrible. He did not understand how it could permit such a civilized country. Her aunt had replied that ”I expect that Italy can be considered civilized.
Abroad happening all sorts of things, and my brother was hard to travel. He always filtered the water, because it was cheaper than buying mineral water. He was a careful man, but who could expect that when he is on his way to the Hydrographic Museum, he would die on the way? No one.”

Jerome has practised to tell his father’s death, to a short extent. In his view, there were two ways.

”Someone once told me, that in Naples always feels at home when you go to the rivers in Naples and New York in the same way. Where was I? In Naples, of course! Naples is poor. No washing or bed linens.
Livestock, pigs and chickens kept on balconies. Animals were not allowed to exercise and they fattens faster. I have no idea how heavy pig can be, but in Naples, the buildings are in need of repair. Balcony on the fifth floor gave out and pig bounced off the third-floor balcony on the street. My father was on his way Hydrographic Museum and the pig fell on top of him. The height and angle of broke his neck.”

The other method Jerome rehearsed had the virtue of brevity:
”My father was killed by a pig.”
”Really? In India?”
”No, in Italy.”
”How interesting. I never realized there was pig-sticking in Italy. Was your father keen on polo?”

In course of time, Jerome was become the accountant and he got engaged with Sally, who was twenty-five years old and his father was a doctor.

Jerome was concerned. He was fond of picture-postcards. He felt a longing to protect their memories. They were going to get married, and Sally, of course, wanted to know everything that was Jerome. Jerome was forced to tell Sally, his father’s death, even though he was afraid to laugh. But Sally was not laugh, but showed his regret.

Short story was very interesting and it is focused on the content of Jerome’s father in an accident. The content of the short story was very well written, and it was used for the imagination. I think the end is slightly open, but it is nice. I liked the story too, and I think it fits all.

The last spin is a short story written by Evan hunter. The plot is consisted of two young men who are in a basement settling a conflict between their gangs by playing russian roulette.The short story is mainly formed of dialog between the two characters of the story, Tigo and Danny.

The story start with the boys in the basement facing each other around a table. In the beginning they are reluctant to show any real emotions to each other but as the chances of the next trigger pull being their last they start to bond. They realise that they are not so different from each other and that their gangs are fighting over nothing. The boys tell about their lives and they can relate to each other. When it is Danny’s time to roll the gun for the third time they make a plan to stop after it and if the gangs won’t accept it they would start their own. They make plans to meet the following sunday as Danny pulled the trigger the last time and died.

Due to the storys heavy consistancy of dialog the language what the boys speak plays a big role in setting the mood for the story. It is consisted of colloquial language such as guns being called pieces and various other words that either are still used nowadays or were used a long time ago in spoken language.

Danny asking Tigo to come with him to the lake was a signal that they had bonded in the short time they had known each other. It took him some time because they were supposed to be enemies. Asking Tigo to come meant effectively abandonning his gang.

It is clear that the short story is from a very different time than ours. The boys are driven to being a gang. It probably offered them a feeling of protection and a feeling of beeing a part of something in a time that things could be very rough.

In conclusion the short story is quite good. It has compelling dialog and the mood for it is set very well.

Alecia McKenzie’s short story Full Stop is a very impressive story about a cold relationship between mother and daughter. The short story consists of different letters which have been written by Grandma Scottie and her grandchild Carmen. The plot of the story is very simple, they write each others and tell about how their life’s going. In the story grandchild Carmen sends regularly letters and also money to her Grandma who uses the money for specific purposes. Carmen considers her Grandma as her biological mother because her own mother left her and her brother with their Grandma. The real mother is described as ”a snake in the grass” in the story so it tells a lot of their relationship.

Grandma’s character is a very religious person, which you can notice on the first Grandma’s letter. She always writes ”God bless” in the end of the letter. Grandma asks money that she doesn’t really need. In my opinion a good christian should live simply life and be satisfied with it. But however she is a good mother to Carmen because she takes care of her.

In the short story is mentioned Normy who is Carmen’s husband. Normy is called for ”hubby” by Grandma. Grandma and Carmen often writes about how Normy’s doing. For example Grandma often says: ”say hello to your hubby”. They also talks about some Richard who is Carmen’s brother. He doesn’t keep in touch with Grandma at all. He seems so busy and reluctant to write to his foster mother, Grandma Scottie. In the end of the story Richard finally writes to her how he’s doing but quite briefly I think.

Carmen has seen her biological mother only at once and her relationship with her seems to be quite complicated. Her mother wants to know her own daughter better but Carmen declines to contact with her. In the story Carmen’s mother tells the reason why she has left her children with Grandma. The reason of the event is a very different version from grandma’s. I believe that Grandma’s version is the right one cause the entire story has written in Grandma’s opinion so that version seems to be more reliable.

The story was quite interesting and easy to understand even if it had no punctuation in Grandma’s letters.

The story is mainly exchange of letters between woman named Carmen and her grandmother Scottie. Carmen lives in New York with her husband Normy, and her grandmother lives on some island. Grandma often asks Carmen to come visit her back home, but Carmen doesn’t have so much holidays that she could go. Carmen sends money to her Grandma almost every time she sends a letter to her but usually Grandma doesn’t use the money for the purpose it was intended to. For example Carmen sends her money to put burglar bars up to her windows but Grandma buys a new mattress instead because God will protect her from evil. The second time Carmen sends the money for burglar bars Grandma buys a dress for her neighbor’s funeral because she didn’t have anything else to wear. In the end of the short story Grandma finally agrees to put up the burglar bars maybe because there had been a robbery on her friend’s house or because she wants to please Carmen.

Grandma wants Carmen to contact with her mother but she refuses to do that because she doesn’t know what to say to her since Carmen has only seen her mother once. In Carmen’s opinion her Grandma is her mother because she raised her and her brother Richard. Their real mother lives in London but she comes to New York for a surgery and sees Carmen and acts like she is her long lost baby. Carmen’s mother tells that when she came to pick up Carmen and Richard their Grandma didn’t let them go but Grandma disclaims that. I think that when their mother came to pick them up Grandma was already so devoted for the kids that she couldn’t let them go. Maybe she as well thought that they were better whit her than with their real mother who was in her opinion “snake in the grass”. Grandma also says that “The Good Lord appointed me guardian—and look how fine you’ve turned out”.  I got the idea that Grandma was really stubborn and she is very religious and thinks that God will save him no matter what. She tells Carmen to pray for God and she often quotes the Bible. Grandma also asks Carmen to come and visit her and she appeals that she doesn’t live much longer on this earth before “He gathers her onto his bosom”.

Grandma asks often from Carmen that why hasn’t Richard sent a letter to her. And when he finally writes to Grandma he tells a lot of excuses why hasn’t he written and Grandma doesn’t believe those excuses. I think that Richard may have been busy and that’s why he hasn’t written to Grandma. Or maybe he just doesn’t want to read about church and God’s blessing etc.

Text was partly quite difficult to read because there were no commas or full stops on Grandma’s letters and that is probably the reason why the title of the short story is “Full stop”.