One part of chapters 12 and 13 that was interesting to us was the part about Jack and his saber-toothed tiger rock. Jack found this rock while building a fieldstone fence for some lake ladies, which had what appeared to have a footprint shape on it. Jack has dedicated much of his spare time trying to figure out what is on the rock. This story was interesting to us because it was different than most of Perry's other stories. The story didn't really have a moral or meaning to it, it was more like entertainment for the reader. We also found it intriguing because the story wasn't one he was directly involved in. He knew about it and had seen it, but the story was based around Jack instead of on Perry. We also liked that it left us wondering if the rock actually had a saber-toothed tiger footprint on it. With most of his short stories, Perry explains the significance and the end result of them, but with this one, he leaves us wondering. Chapter 12 also was different from the rest because of its title "Penultimate". While discussing we realized that most of us had not known what it meant and had looked it up individually while reading the book. The title means "next to last". All of the other chapters are given titles to what they are about such as "Death", "Running the Loop", and "Beagle". If we could ask him a question this would definitly be on our list because we are interested to know why he gave this chapter such a literal name when the rest of the chapters are descriptive, inlcuding the last chapter entitle "Sarah". It just didn't seem to fit.
This last part of the book we spent the most time discussing and analyzing, particularly the last chapter entitled "Sarah". This chapter is very different from the rest of the book. Perry wrote it with different language, a softer feel to it instead of the usual sarcastic tones and quirky insights. The chapter is about his brother Jed's wife; how they come to be married and how Sarah's life comes to a short end not long after she and Jed are married. The way Perry wrote the ending a reader can tell that it is still a painful subject and he goes about describing it carefully. A quote caught out attention. "The tough times start the day the last casserole dish is returned" This quote made some of us stop reading and really think about it and we found this quote to be true. Right after someone dies, there are always people around but eventually they start coming by less and less and suddenly the person grieving is left on their own. This quote may not give much to the overall aura of the book, but we found this quote to be one that left us pondering.
We felt he could have ended the book differently. The entire last chapter is about Sarah up until the very last paragraph. He throws in that he has a girlfriend and then turns back to how he hopes Jed can overcome this tragedy. We felt it was a sudden ending and didn't wrap up or conclude the book at all. We had predicted in the first journal that he would end up with his old girlfriend he breifly mentioned. Is it the same girl? We also predicted that the book would start from where it began just as the chapters all had. This didn't happen either. Although our predictions never came true and the book could have ended differently for our liking, we still think it was a good ending. Obviously this was a hard time in his family and we can feel his emotion. He really connects with the reader in this final chapter and ends with well wishes to his brother.
Overall we all really enjoyed this book, though it was different from our origincal expetations and would recommend this book to anyone. Perry is a fantastic writer with an eye for small details that make the story realatable and personal.
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