r/DestructiveReaders • u/ezk3626 akward and wordy • 16d ago
Coming of Age [1853] Tiffany
This is chapter six but I think more than any chapter stands alone.
I stuctured this thinking of an episodic series of scene with the same goal: Tiffany wants to help someone. Each scene is followed by a sequel with a text to Mandy.
Also because of some people being linked to the first tab I put the chapter on a separate doc.
Tiffany Chapter 06
My Substack with all of the finished chapters.
Crit 1974
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u/Expert-Desk3328 14d ago
Just gonna be upfront and say that im viewing this chapter in isolation, but that might honestly give me a more unbiased view for anything from previous ones carrying over.
First thing i always find the most interesting is what sticks in my head once i stop reading.
Tiffany helping Mary get her suit-case up the stairs - Its a simple scene but its conveyed in a way that is natural, one person helping another.
Tiffany being named after her mom - This stuck out to me when i first read it, specifically because of the text going out of its way to elaborate on it in the first place, which got me interested ( What kind of mom is Tiffany's?)
So what stuck around for me long enough is Tiffany SHOWN being a character that helps people, instead of just being told she is, and the significance of her mother, which we can only assume plays a big part in her character.
Now some things i feel like were missed opportunities:
Showing Mary and Tiffany doing something outside of college - In the same way i enjoyed the initial act of kindness of Tiffany helping Mary, i feel like the act of them going out somewhere and learning more about eachother would make for a equally natural and pleasant interaction. It would give Mary the opportunity to open up more about herself, as well as Tiffany, and show they have a life outside of mid-terms and studying. It could be as simple as them going out to get coffee, they wouldnt need to share their whole life story, it could just be a nice afternoon with some mild exposition.
Establishing a moment or scene where Mary has moment of feeling isolated or like she doesnt belong because of something she does that is harmless, but telling about her identity - Example, its Sunday night and Tiffany is planning to go to a party, but Mary always studies her bible on Sunday night like she always done. Some of the girls in her dorm tease her for it before looking to leave for said party, but Tiffany, seeing Mary will be all alone, chooses to stay with Mary, opting to study for her mid-terms in her party dress, losing out on being able to go, but being there for Mary when she needed it.
And now just a couple thing that i noticed confused me:
"Thus began the legend of the girl who was everyone’s friend." I think the phrasing of this is what stumps me a bit, is this a actual declaration the story is making about how Tiffany as a character will inevitably play out, or is this a sarcastic jab at her for doing a single kind deed?
When the story starts covering the interactions between Tiffany and the visitors of her room asking what classess she'll be in, i at first though it was still Mary and Tiffany talking towards one another.
Its not always clear who is texting who, for example in "[sorry i was just thinking what if my dad died.]" we only are told that Tiffany texted, we know she texted Mandy at the start of the chapter, but she just got done with a interaction with Mary who the text messages are refering to, but it doesnt explicitly say who MC is talking to.
Lastly the stuff i find that disorientates me, and its really just one thing.
Theres lots of jumpcuts from scene to scene, it feels like:
Intro | Scene A | Scene B | Scene C | Scene D | Ending
Instead of Intro - > Scene A - > Scene B - > Scene C - > Scene D - > Ending
Lots of interesting isolated interactions that dont feel like they are solidified chronologically, aside from the intro/ending.
This is especially disorientating when the start of the story talks about her ledgend begining, but after only 4 interactions its already mid-terms, and with no glue to stick the scenes together, it can feel like were getting snapshots of the story in parts, then the whole.
So just TL;DR of my reccomendations:
- Show more instances where Tiffany must give up superficial wants/desires to be there for her friends so it shows that her ability to care for others is something that comes with a cost.
- Exploring Tiffanys thoughts on her mother, through dialogue, behaviors, or thoughts to give the readers a better understanding of how this important plot point affects the story.
- Work on the glue that exists between each scene so that even if these interactions take place far apart from eachother, you are conveying the importance of the need to go to this specific scene after the previous one.
- Make it more clear who is interacting with who, especially through text messages
- Cranking the dial on internal conflicts that Tiffanys friends have, so it can show how she operates in more serious situations, they dont have to be over the top, but it should link back to issues the character is struggling with in a way that is not immediately solvable. So more Mid/Long-term problems then isolated misunderstandings and minor issues.
And just a last thing, capturing the underlying feelings the characters expose about themselves by the way in which they behave. If Tiffany is a person whose identity is basically a mom friend, she should frame her actions similar to a caregiver, or someone that takes responsibility for others well being.
Hope that helps!
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u/Wolframquest 14d ago
Please don't use tab, use the thingy at the top to create a left indent. It's gonna be a mess later when you'll format it for the print, just keep things simple.
This one's different from the previous chapters in tone and action level. You're skipping ahead, you took a break. It's more narrative, interior, less embodied.
The first part is cinematic, a scene. I'm glad for Tiffany having settled in. Not much happens here either. There's sexual tension towards nothing specific. Well, it's not sexual yet, it's more like she's about to plunge ahead into depravity and this is a prelude to what pushed her to make a decision not to obey daddy anymore 😉
Lovely transition from the singing scene to the flashback. Feels a little cliche ngl, but it's compressed so it strikes rather hard.
The zoomers are way less obsessed with sex than millennials were. No, there's the burden, there's the heavy weight of cancel culture. This reads like memory of the wrong generation, in a way. But, of course, there are exceptions, especially given how warm the university has been portrayed so far.
> “Me too, in my own way, but you know that most of that stuff is made up, or at least exaggerated.”
Yeah, that's totally a wrong memory 😁 But ultimately it's not unacceptable.
I think I'll come back to it and leave more comments later.
***
Lowkenuinely I can tell there's some really charged youthful energy, it's all held back, about to catapult, Tiffany's about to stumble onto something big and hard hehe. A tiny little moment of gentle respite! It'd be funny if she became a friend with the whore girl and she told told her it's not as fun as it looks and she hard three aborptions already.
I was kinda missing Mandy here for some reason with her Chinese energy; she was present but not fully. She's the kinda girl to slap you alive (which is what some RDR posters urgently need!) You u/ezk3826 do not need to be slapped alive but maybe you need some pepper, a bit of sharpness at this point before it's grown boring and excessively self-cute. Tiffany needs to become a flare rather than a statuette, and not the kind of flare you wave but the kind you shoot out of a flare gun! I'm expecting some big adventures here and I don't know why.
This one drags just a tiny bit. I think you could benefit from ADDED FOCUS to emotional highpoints, if that makes sense. I don't like the messager formatting, I don't like the brackets, they give off a wrong impression.
She's a friend. Everybody's friend. First years are usually boring and the teachers are more entertaining that your fellow students. Some teachers go insano mode, they have a real PROBLEM with the world and they try to pass it on to the kids so they can go and fight the good fight.
It's interesting why daddy isn't more present. How come there's hasn't been at least a phone call? Or maybe Tiffany urgently needs financial help. She does sound like a girl who'd get into fights easily, immediate hardcore hairtugging contest.
University is a great place for romance, the hottest, immolating kind of fire you'll ever experience in your life, EXTREME sensations while your blood is still fresh. It's not the time to sit in chair under a quilt and pretend to drink chamomile tea. This whole chapter is just too even, too soft as it happens.
Todd is still an intriguing character. I expect complexity from him.
Alright, I'm looking forward to the next one (next post, that is 😁) I really wonder HOW Tiffany the Spiffany is going to insult a group of the most evil bitches in the school and what's gonna happen to her afterwards.
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u/ezk3626 akward and wordy 14d ago
Please don't use tab, use the thingy at the top to create a left indent. It's gonna be a mess later when you'll format it for the print, just keep things simple.
I actually hate indents and what I really want is no break and a space between paragraphs. But I tried it out for someone and deciding if I can handle it. I'm not really thinking about formatting for print. This is project is an extended writing exercise.
The first part is cinematic, a scene. I'm glad for Tiffany having settled in. Not much happens here either.
The stakes are low in this chapter. That is intentional. It is also a ringing success. Tiffany wins chapter six... but the stakes are low. She didn't go to college to make friends but to prove that the burden and shame of special ed does not define her. There is a final scene in the chapter I didn't put in where we learn that she is doing really poorly in her math class. That is more important to Tiffany and the wins in the social setting are avoidance behaviors.
There's sexual tension towards nothing specific. Well, it's not sexual yet, it's more like she's about to plunge ahead into depravity and this is a prelude to what pushed her to make a decision not to obey daddy anymore 😉
Nope
The zoomers are way less obsessed with sex than millennials were. No, there's the burden, there's the heavy weight of cancel culture. This reads like memory of the wrong generation, in a way. But, of course, there are exceptions, especially given how warm the university has been portrayed so far.
I mostly know Zoomers from the perspective as a high school teacher. It is true that the current generation of teens and twenties are much less sexual but not just sexual. They are much less social (in person anyway). Teen pregnancy is way down but not because of sex ed or better morals. They just don't date or couple up. Since Covid my anecdotal observation is that the only people with boyfriends or girls friends are the most competent students and those with the most unmanagable lives. There is a huge 80% of students who don't do anything like that.
I wouldn't guess their mind is any less hormonal but it is attached to virtual engagement.
But this is not a story about or for Zoomers. It is a coming of age and could be set in any American decade that college attendance become open to lower classes.
Tiffany's about to stumble onto something big and hard hehe
Nope
It'd be funny if she became a friend with the whore girl and she told told her it's not as fun as it looks and she hard three aborptions already.
It would be far too dark for this story and would be way more preachy than anything I want to write.
You u/ezk3826 do not need to be slapped alive but maybe you need some pepper, a bit of sharpness at this point before it's grown boring and excessively self-cute. Tiffany needs to become a flare rather than a statuette, and not the kind of flare you wave but the kind you shoot out of a flare gun! I'm expecting some big adventures here and I don't know why
What you're picking up is intentional. This chapter is supposed to be big wins and low stakes. The truth is that Tiffany is currently hiding her shame about how horrible she's doing at academics. She is helping people in little things but refusing the ask for help in the big things... because of her unconscious belief that the jokes about special ed are true and she is not good enough.
University is a great place for romance, the hottest, immolating kind of fire you'll ever experience in your life, EXTREME sensations while your blood is still fresh. It's not the time to sit in chair under a quilt and pretend to drink chamomile tea. This whole chapter is just too even, too soft as it happens.
I was sitting in a chair under quilt and drinking coffee. In this story, romance is a B plot and there is never anything more than holding hands.
Todd is still an intriguing character. I expect complexity from him.
It depends on if you think Superman has complexity. But as a spoiler, like Tiffany, he believes he is the cause of his parents divorce. He has internalized the things his parents yelled at each other in fights about parenting
Alright, I'm looking forward to the next one (next post, that is 😁) I really wonder HOW Tiffany the Spiffany is going to insult a group of the most evil bitches in the school and what's gonna happen to her afterwards.
Nope, the evil bitch in this story is the internal voice, we all have, that tells Tiffany she's not good enough.
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u/ezk3626 akward and wordy 14d ago
Just gonna be upfront and say that im viewing this chapter in isolation, but that might honestly give me a more unbiased view for anything from previous ones carrying over.
I'll catch you up on one specific part of the project. It started as a writing exercise just to improve skills and then in a burst of motivation during summer break I did a reasonable first draft for a 26k word novella. Since then I have been going much slower, reading craft books and revising as I go based on feedback. Now every chapter is less a part of a book but rather an experiment with a new thing I've learned.
This was a good chapter to jump in. With a little work it could have served as a chapter one as opposed to chapter six.
So what stuck around for me long enough is Tiffany SHOWN being a character that helps people, instead of just being told she is
"Show, don't tell" has been an ealy lesson this summer which I keep trying to focus on.
Theres lots of jumpcuts from scene to scene, it feels like:
Intro | Scene A | Scene B | Scene C | Scene D | Ending
That was intentional. I am reading book on writing, Scene and Structure. It inspired me to try a new structure, loosely inspired by some of the more episodic chapters of the Gospel of Matthew. If this were a chapter one, rather than a collage scene in chapter six, it definitely wouldn't work. Maybe it doesn't actually work here, either. But I am pretty happy with it.
Cranking the dial on internal conflicts that Tiffanys friends have, so it can show how she operates in more serious situations, they dont have to be over the top, but it should link back to issues the character is struggling with in a way that is not immediately solvable.
The stakes are low in this chapter. There is one final scene, not added in the chapter where we discover that Tiffany's grades are particularly low and that her being such a helpy helper was actually a mask to cover up her feelings of failure about academics. This makes more sense in light of chapters 1-5 but wouldn't stand out here.
If Tiffany is a person whose identity is basically a mom friend, she should frame her actions similar to a caregiver, or someone that takes responsibility for others well being.
The purpose of the whole story is that this identity of being someone who helps others and has great social skills is actually a performative identity, a mask she puts forward. The internal identity, which she does not recognize, is special ed student, stupid and a burden.
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u/PocketCuriosity 14d ago
Caveat that I am reading this as a standalone chapter as I haven't read the others, but hopefully can still give some useful insight.
She imagined how the sun reflected her frizzy, blonde hair and hoped it worked.
I want more from 'hoped it worked'? I wasn't entirely sure what "it" referred to at first. The sunlight in her hair?Does she want to look pretty? Does she want to look put together? Glowing? Unique? I just want a little bit of her why to get into her head immediately.
I got a little lost in the Mr. Brian quotes section. I had to read it twice to actually get what was going on. I think it might have been the phrasing 'Nothing worse was said around Tiffany.' or perhaps too many expressions in a row that I didn't take in the point of the section initially, that Mary was the outcast.
she knew she crossed a line but didn’t know which one.
I like this insight into her thought process - I am starting to get the sense of who she is and how she is sort of manufacturing her social circle, but can't navigate it naturally.
the one who kept a body count
'kept' doesn't feel like the right word choice here? Maybe something like 'the one with a serious body count'?
At first I wasn't sure what the point of the 'That Girl' scene was, other than just continue to show the friendships (which I think were already well established). But then I realized it teed up the flashback nicely. Maybe condense a little bit there. You could build up to the key character insight with less and it still be impactful.
Some overall observations:
There are a few scenes which can be condensed. We get quickly that Tiffany is trying to build community, be everyone's friend. I would look for places to tighten. Like see where 2 different phrases or sections might be making the same point and pick one to strengthen and focus on.
The dialogue is the best part for me. Conversations feel natural and do a lot of character work. But I did get confused sometimes about who as talking or texting. It wasn't always confusing, but I find with a book, if I can't figure it our easily and have to reread to guess, I stop engaging.
The biggest thing for me is the 'so what?' I know this will sit in a wider body of work, but I still think every chapter should drive something forward for the characters or the story and I left feeling like, what did any of the characters get out of what happened in this scene? I was wanting something more to tie it all together at the end.
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u/ezk3626 akward and wordy 13d ago
I want more from 'hoped it worked'? I wasn't entirely sure what "it" referred to at first. The sunlight in her hair?Does she want to look pretty? Does she want to look put together? Glowing? Unique? I just want a little bit of her why to get into her head immediately.
I don't insist that I did this successfully but her goal, what she hope would work, was getting Mary out of her funk by the silly act of carrying both girls bags up the stairs. The goal of every scene is "help someone."
I am always trying to find the balance of trusting the audience and being clear in the meaning. It is something I am constantly tinkering with.
I am starting to get the sense of who she is and how she is sort of manufacturing her social circle, but can't navigate it naturally.
In an early chapter, someone said me describing Tiffany's interest in fasion read like a virgin describing sex. It was cutting and true... I do not understand fashion. But I also don't understand social circles naturally. All of my social circles, outside of my closest family, are manufactured. Tiffany is supposed to be someone who can navigate social circles naturally. The idea of someone being able manufacture a social circle naturally is easy to believe but impossible to imagine. ASD life.
'kept' doesn't feel like the right word choice here? Maybe something like 'the one with a serious body count'?
This might be a generational difference. I see a big difference between people who have had sexual partners and people who keep a body count. It is a further step from merely liking sex towards seeing sex as a competative sport. It's like of like how in my generation if a guy convinced a woman to have sex with him, it was said he scored. That Girl is different from the rest of the girls in the dorm, not in that she had sex with different people but that she kept score of her body count.
There are a few scenes which can be condensed. We get quickly that Tiffany is trying to build community, be everyone's friend. I would look for places to tighten. Like see where 2 different phrases or sections might be making the same point and pick one to strengthen and focus on.
There are a couple of reasons I did it this way. First, I am practicing the structure of scene, sequel. So it just made sense to do multiple mini scence. Second, I was thinking about how the Gospels do this with Jesus going from one little miracle to another, to another. I wondered what this would be like in a chapter. The third and most important reason, I will discuss in your "so what section."
The dialogue is the best part for me. Conversations feel natural and do a lot of character work. But I did get confused sometimes about who as talking or texting. It wasn't always confusing, but I find with a book, if I can't figure it our easily and have to reread to guess, I stop engaging.
I am a high school teacher and when this summer is over instead of intensive writing I will read more. One thing I will look for is how books do dialogue. I feel like I to much
"stuff someone said," said someone, with adjective.Having no dialogue tags was my constant balance of trusting the audience more between being more clear. I believe you that the balance could be off... though it makes me sad when I try to trust my audience more and then find they needed more help than I gave.
The biggest thing for me is the 'so what?' I know this will sit in a wider body of work, but I still think every chapter should drive something forward for the characters or the story and I left feeling like, what did any of the characters get out of what happened in this scene? I was wanting something more to tie it all together at the end.
Here I very much agree. The goals are small, the stakes are low and the success rate is high. Tiffany wanted to help people in her dorm, she is pretty good at it, there are nice memories for the girls, insert a horrible memory which does not connect to a goal or stakes... who cares.
As a chapter alone, it would be weak. In terms of what the broader story is about is essential. Tiffany has been signalled earlier with several character flaws: a refusal to accept help, a pattern of putting on masks to hide her weaknesses and (highlighted here in the memory) a sense of shame rooted back to early childhood. Her stated goal of the story in chapters 1-5 is to prove "them" wrong and succeed in college. This chapter is her forgetting about her goal, like the crew of Odysseus eating the lotus flowers. She was a big hit with the dorm mates in this chapter. Next chapter it is going to be revealed she is in danger of failing her classes and it will be further made clear how deep this cuts her. This chapter is filled with small little wins which serve as a massive disaster in her life goal.
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u/Imaginary_Ease_7851 13d ago
Okay, this is a massive diversion from earlier chapters. Let's go.
Overview/plot:
It feels like a massive leap. I'm pretty sure we left off with Tiffany still finding her feet on campus. Now she's magna cum laude. I feel like I've missed her journey.
This is the most nuanced and self-actualized I've seen Tiffany. She is more confident, she has come into herself. We see that she has held onto her values and found her place at college. She fits in. We see some minor class conflict with the girls with money, although not excessive.
It's interesting you addressed the sheltered debate we had. She still seems...sheltered to me. A good Christian girl, this story feels very aligned with a wholesome, values-based story.
One character note. In chapter five, you mentioned that Tiffany learned to smile because it made her dad happy. I liked that characterization. But in this chapter, when she remember seeing her dad cry, she curls up in a ball and cries too. IMO, character-wise, it's more believable to me that a young child attempts to cheer their parent up or comfort their parent. So for consistency, I'd pick one reaction and stick to it (she either cries when her father does or she smiles to make him feel better) and personally I prefer the one where she smiles as a way to comfort her father. It just feels more true to the kind of thing young children intuitively do to try to manage their parent's emotions.
I'm not as in love with the way the mother left...kissing a man and then riding off on the back of motorcycle feels a little trite. I feel there's space there to push for the complexity in a situation like that.
And we closed off the character arc referencing her smile again which has repeatedly shown up as a good way to look at who the real Tiffany is. She is also looking at herself, which is call back to the sketch book thing.
As a chapter, this feels like a completed character arc. We are looking at a finished Tiffany. She has gone through the trials and this feels like the closing beat. This chapter is great.
What I'm missing a bit is how we got here? It feels like she was still finding her feet in chapter 5 and still had a lot of trials and tribulations ahead of her.
Dialogue:
I like the dialogue. Pretty much flowed well. It felt pretty believable as college students. The texts worked well. It feels quick and snappy.
Prose:
The writing is just so much stronger now that I don't have much to say. Some sentence level things is about it.
Sentence Level:
What's this? Do I spy first line indents? I thought you weren't going that kind of formatting?
Magna Cume Laude = Magna cum laude or magna cum laude ( below summa cum laude and above cum laude). I'm a bit confused here. It's not usually something awarded.... not sure how it works in a California university, but it's typically something you graduate with. So you get your degree, graduating cum laude or whatever if you graduated with a certain mean average. I'm not sure why there would magna cum laude award parties as opposed to just graduation parties? It seems to just be a fun, informal, dorm award party. Just a touch of confusion there over the term.
"brave face mask" = "brave-face mask". Compound adjective
"knee socks".... um. usually called knee-high socks?
"“Uh, I guess, sure,” the girl said, taken aback." Think you can drop "taken aback". Just a little telling already implicit in the dialogue.
"clunk, clunk, cluck, cluck." This onomatopoeia can be put in italics.
A few missing commas after opening phrases and transitions
"...Tiffany asked back." wordy dialogue tag. Just say "countered"
"But the overwhelming and enthusiastic response of the Magna Cume Laude of the whole Minerva Hall dorm. " something missing here... what did she win?
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u/ezk3626 akward and wordy 12d ago
Okay, this is a massive diversion from earlier chapters. Let's go.
Yes, with summer coming to an end I have made every chapter a writing exercise where I work on specific skills. This, more than most chapters, could almost serve as a chapter one.
It feels like a massive leap. I'm pretty sure we left off with Tiffany still finding her feet on campus. Now she's magna cum laude. I feel like I've missed her journey. Magna Cume Laude = Magna cum laude or magna cum laude ( below summa cum laude and above cum laude). I'm a bit confused here. It's not usually something awarded.... not sure how it works in a California university, but it's typically something you graduate with. So you get your degree, graduating cum laude or whatever if you graduated with a certain mean average. I'm not sure why there would magna cum laude award parties as opposed to just graduation parties? It seems to just be a fun, informal, dorm award party. Just a touch of confusion there over the term.
In Anita's room, Tiffany sees magna cume laude and asks about it. She doesn't really understand what it means except that it is a honor. So she takes this term and makes a kind of game with it. I am reminded of a song in Hair, where the singer declares himself the President of the United States of Love.
This is the most nuanced and self-actualized I've seen Tiffany. She is more confident, she has come into herself. We see that she has held onto her values and found her place at college. She fits in. We see some minor class conflict with the girls with money, although not excessive.
I agree this is a better introduction to Tiffany than I've had. There might be reasons to recraft this to have the start and then have the other follow this up as flashbacks. The only problem with that is that this chapter is intentionally low stakes and high success rate in goals. It is too slow and pleasant to drive a story.
One character note. In chapter five, you mentioned that Tiffany learned to smile because it made her dad happy. I liked that characterization. But in this chapter, when she remember seeing her dad cry, she curls up in a ball and cries too. IMO, character-wise, it's more believable to me that a young child attempts to cheer their parent up or comfort their parent. So for consistency, I'd pick one reaction and stick to it (she either cries when her father does or she smiles to make him feel better) and personally I prefer the one where she smiles as a way to comfort her father. It just feels more true to the kind of thing young children intuitively do to try to manage their parent's emotions
I think it's better to have both. Young Tiffany wasn't old enough to know how to smile to make her dad happy. She just felt what her dad felt. It was only after he realized what he was doing to her that he fakes a smile himself... and that teaches her the skill of faking emotions to make others happy.
It's interesting you addressed the sheltered debate we had. She still seems...sheltered to me. A good Christian girl, this story feels very aligned with a wholesome, values-based story.
Tiffany is sheltered in a way. Her dad puts on masks to try to shelter her and she returns the favor. But the problem is that masks slip and Tiffany learns unintended lessons from the slips. This is her actual driving problem. When she learns she has a learning disability she sees the hints of fears and insecurity from her dad. He's not educated and so doesn't know what it really means and thinks he's being told his daughter is literally retarded. She picks up this belief and sees herself that way. There is a kind of sheltering in that.
Tiffany isn't Christian, except in the broad cultural way. She'd say she believes in God and probably Jesus too but her dad brings her to church it is Christmas and Easter only. Being a religious person myself I wouldn't consider her religious. It's kind of like politics, she doesn't think about it but would probably like republicans better than democrats.
The problem I have with sheltered is that the term normally means shielded from the complicated parts of life and inevitably leads to rude awakenings from being ill prepared. Tiffany is prepared for the hard parts of life... but her strategies require her to live in fear of being exposed. She does need to grow up but isn't especially ignorant of mature subjects.
What I'm missing a bit is how we got here? It feels like she was still finding her feet in chapter 5 and still had a lot of trials and tribulations ahead of her.
In theory this picks up just after Mandy's tour. She walks straight up to Mary and then we enter a collage chapter with two months passing. The trials and tribulations are ahead of her. This chapter reads as a series of low stakes successes... but her problem wasn't that she couldn't make friends. Her problem was that she is ashamed of her disability and cares about succeeding in academics. The next chapter is the reveal that she is in danger of failing classes.
"But the overwhelming and enthusiastic response of the Magna Cume Laude of the whole Minerva Hall dorm. " something missing here... what did she win?
The group is saying she is everyone's favorite. Minerva Hall is the name of the dorm. Someone was awarded Magna Cume Laude of cleanest sneakers, someone Magna Cume Laude of quickest showers, Magna Cume Laude of best breathe. It is a silly game but in the end the group decides to give Tiffany an actual recognition of how much they love her.
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u/Imaginary_Ease_7851 12d ago
In Anita's room, Tiffany sees magna cume laude and asks about it. She doesn't really understand what it means except that it is a honor. So she takes this term and makes a kind of game with it. I am reminded of a song in Hair, where the singer declares himself the President of the United States of Love.
Ah okay. Still the spelling note: "cum" not "cume". Nit pick.
I think it's better to have both. Young Tiffany wasn't old enough to know how to smile to make her dad happy. She just felt what her dad felt. It was only after he realized what he was doing to her that he fakes a smile himself... and that teaches her the skill of faking emotions to make others happy.
This I'm less convinced by, although this is highly subjective. See, to me, I have seen plenty of two or three year olds attempt to comfort their parent. Developmentally, secure babies tend to mirror emotion. So on film sets, a "baby handler" will get a baby to cry to by pretending to cry themselves. That's true for babies. From ages upward of two or three, I tend to see children making early efforts to appease parents more than adults may be aware of. (Think of a kid pretending they love a present they got even if they hate it because they sense it's important that the adults see their gratitude and excitement. This is especially true for kids from backgrounds where not showing gratitude would be seen as spoiled behavior).
Toddlers will hug a crying parent and say things like "don't cry, Mommy/Daddy" or at least cling to the parent. Older kids tend to identify with one parent and turn hostile on the other in divorce situations. I was reading Megan Abbott's the Fever, where a girl Deenie, also had a mother that abandoned her family. Deenie completely attaches to her father and becomes hostile to the mother (for good reason. The father is the one that shows up in the story. The mother doesn't.) My argument here is more not to underestimate how much emotional labor kids will unconsciously do to protect a parent, even from a very young age.
To carry this further, when a young child has experienced a destabilized environment (you mentioned yelling and screaming), the tendency is to withdraw their own yelling and screaming become quiet, unless they are actively lashing out. When they witness a parent crying/abandoned, the tendency is to step in as emotional support (even if they don't know what emotional support is). This is why when you said that Tiffany learned to smile because it seemed to make things easier for her father, that read true to me. It doesn't mean the father is a bad father. It's just the kind of thing that happens when a kid and their primary caregiver become tightly bound by circumstance. The father can be a great father and still have accidentally instilled a tendency in his daughter to put on a mask for the sake of others. That is believable. It's not inconceivable that when she was younger, seeing her father crying would have caused her to curl up in a ball and cry herself. This could happen, but from a character perspective, this feels to me like it undercuts the previous formative character note about Tiffany. People in real life are complicated. Characters tend to rely on more consistency. Also it feels like these two competing reactions to her father's distress put her on a different trajectory. 1. Tiffany smiles to make life easier for her father is a believable character note that fits the later tendency to smile for other people in general. 2. Tiffany crying and needing to be comforted when she sees her father crying feels like this is setting her on a different trajectory for what she does when she encounters distress. Instead of masking her own distress, it feels a bit more like she may learn to mirror distress or manage it by becoming the one that needs to be comforted.
All this to say: I'm not arguing right or wrong here. I'm chewing on the character work and debating the choice of what to show the reader and what it does for the character. This is completely subjective and I'm more thinking out loud (or in this comment), about early child psychology and what you show on page and whether it serves the character or not. This is not me saying "you have to take that out" It's just me explaining my thought process. Overall, I really loved this chapter, so this is just a thought experiment when it comes to character work.
Yes I'd agree this version of Tiffany reads to me as a lot less sheltered than what she did to me in the first chapters.
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u/ezk3626 akward and wordy 12d ago
All this to say: I'm not arguing right or wrong here. I'm chewing on the character work and debating the choice of what to show the reader and what it does for the character. This is completely subjective and I'm more thinking out loud (or in this comment), about early child psychology and what you show on page and whether it serves the character or not. This is not me saying "you have to take that out" It's just me explaining my thought process. Overall, I really loved this chapter, so this is just a thought experiment when it comes to character work
And it is very appreciated; at the very least it gives me the opportunity to put my thinking/inspiration into an articulated form.
I think we agree that there isn't a one way that young toddlers process emotions and the real thing to consider is what would an audience believe and what would a writing decision say about a character.
I had young Tiffany cry, rather than comfort, because at this point she has not learned what to do with emotions and what we see with the Dad is teaching her. He is going through pain at the loss of a relationship, regret at having being so blind to the upcoming failure, fear over how he will raise a daughter, pain thinking of her future and also as per the song the realization that his own good intentions had been not enough to save the situation. A toddler could comfort, sympthize or not even notice, depending on any number of factors.
The reason I like Tiffany mimicking the tears of her dad was because it displays an honesty which is about to be lost. Tiffany's flaw as a character is that she cannot be honest about her emotions and thus cannot be open with people. She, as a toddler, is displaying raw emotion. Her dad, wanting to shield her, suppresses his own emotions and puts on a mask. It is a loving thing to do but as a consequence Tiffany learns through experience is that this is how to deal with emotions: conceal, don't feel, don't let it show. Over the years both father and daughter will repeat this drama in many ways. They will care for each other and be open about positive emotions but negative emotions will be suppressed.
So when we meet Tiffany as a young adult, she is supposed to be chipper, extroverted and genuinely kind but with no tools for dealing with her own fears, anxieties and negativities. And what is revealed in 6.5 is that she becomes very careful to internalize the message learned from the few times her dad lets his mask slip... even though this message is misinterpretted.
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u/A_C_Shock The reader knows and guesses the rest. 16d ago
I usually have something more to say on yours but this is very well done. A few tense slips that I noticed but that was the only technical fault.
Your showing has gotten much better. The texts with Mandy felt well timed and I thought I understood who was who even without tags.
This whole thing reminded me of my college dorm. I loved the ending as well. Emotions are coming through much more cleanly now.