[stylist] A deafbling girl (chapter 2)

[James Canaday M.A. N6YR]

Helene,
I was thinking about your book during my long walk with my dog this 
afternoon.

I like your writing, it is engaging and vivid.  in fact, sometimes it 
seems likt it could use a little scene and landscape just to pace it 
a little, it moves so flat-out.  but that's not such a bad thing.

my major comment is this: "a defblind girl" as a title?  I also like 
shorter titles.  but perhaps a title more tied to the magic, or the 
emotional struggles in the story would fit better and would better 
identify your story.

I do not like long titles like: "Upon the upside of the towering rock 
in the town square, or: how I lost my sense of innocence and became 
an adult in the 20th century upon my 21st birthday in an accident ..."
I was required to make my masters thesis title far clugier than I 
wanted.  I think its maybe fourteen words long!

anyway, keep the simplicity of the title, but perhaps closer to the 
characters or the story?

reads very well Helene!

oh, I think "snuck" might be better in that one place than "sneaked."
jc
Jim Canaday M.A.
Lawrence, KS

At 03:49 PM 9/5/2009, you wrote:
>Chapter 2
>First memories by Nadia Murat (1989)
>
>Where has Aunt Liza got to? She should be here by now, but she wasn't.
>I lay huddled on my bedroom floor, feeling more anxious by the minute.
>A wet and slightly abrasive tongue licks my face.  It was Bella the
>Growlin Shepherd, a failed police dog who slept on the bottom bunk.
>I let her continue to lick my face.  Then I wrapped my arms around her
>large furry neck.
>We were in a large spacious room full of toys and picture books.  I
>had a bunk bed that I shared with Bella. She had the bottom bunk and I
>slept in the top.
>  We had been expecting Liza to arrive soon after my babysitter left
>for the day, only she left hours ago.    Where on earth could my aunt
>have got to?
>My anxiety rose as the sun stopped shining from my small slit of a
>bedroom window. We began to get very anxious.
>My aunt did not come back that night.
>Instead the dragon came.  He was about twelve foot long and four foot
>high. His beautiful copper coloured skin had a lovely smooth texture
>to it.  I usually loved to stroke him, but today I was too worried
>about my aunt's failure to arrive.
>"I want my auntie.  Where is she?" I demanded, stamping my foot.
>Suddenly, an image of Liza flashed into my mind.   The image came from
>the Dragon who was communicating to me using Dramic, which is a
>telepathic language via words and images.
>In this image I saw Liza in a whitewashed hallway full of sick people.
>  She was lying down in a sort of large trolley.  There was something
>wrong with her legs, which were at an odd angle.  She seemed to be in
>a lot of pain.  I recognised that place.  I'd been there before but I
>couldn't remember when.  I just remembered that it smelt strongly of
>disinfectant and the well lit waiting room lights had hurt my eyes.
>I next visualized a bowl of dog food.
>"I can't eat that," I protested in sign language.
>I visualized a little girl with an empty bowl.  The message ended with
>a question mark.
>"Ice-cream, candy and a large packet of cookies," I told him.  This
>was not my usual diet but the dragon didn't seem to know this.  He
>came back with the food I had asked for.  I shared the rest of the
>cookies with Bella after she had finished her dog food.
>The food distracted me for a short while, but once it had been eaten
>my anxiety returned with renewed force.  What was wrong with my aunt's
>legs?  Would she ever be ok again?  I was unable to get to sleep so I
>began to pace from my bedroom to the toilet and back.  My stomach felt
>very delicate.  I ended up returning most of the food that the dragon
>had brought me in the toilet, which fortunately was next door to my
>bedroom.
>What would I do if Aunt Liza never came back?  Even Bella's furry form
>was unable to pacify me for long.
>
>                       ***  ***  ***
>
>I woke to feel a scaly hand nudging me, handing me my aphakic glasses
>which I wore firmly attached to my head by an elastic strap.   Another
>large scaly hand wrapped itself around my chest, tugging me towards
>him.  At that point I began to rise.  I looked up to see a large pair
>of wings moving back and forth towards the ceiling.    The dragon took
>me out of the door to the living room.  Like most doors in homes owned
>by dragons, it was situated on the ceiling.
>To my great relief, the dragon dropped me onto the thick green carpet,
>in front of Aunt Liza.  She had returned at last.
>I picked myself up, rushing to hug my aunt, who sat propped up with
>various cushions on the floor.   Both her legs were covered with a
>couple of large white plaster casts.
>  Aunt Liza is very pretty, with light grey skin and long black curly
>hair like mine.  She wore a loose red dress.  Around her neck she had
>a black cylinder shape called a Monocular.  She used it to help her
>see.
>Today there was an anxious look in her dark brown eyes.  She put on a
>bright smile when she saw me, but it did not stay on her face for
>long.
>"I was so worried about you last night," I complained using Darthrilan
>sign language.
>"Sorry Nadia.  Yesterday I did my parachute training.  Unfortunately I
>messed up on the landing.  If you fetch me one of your picture books I
>will read to you."
>  "I don't want you to read from a picture book today. I want you to
>tell me a real live story..."
>My aunt gave an exasperated sigh.  She sat motionless for a few
>minutes, deep in thought.
>"Ok, I'll tell you a story then. I'll tell you how you came here in
>the first place."
>"Wasn't I born here?"
>"No, you weren't.  You were born in a hospital somewhere in Darthrila.
>  I forget which one, but after that your mother took you back to
>Nazdonia with her.  You lived there until your triplet sisters were
>born.  I took care of you while your mother was in hospital.  After
>that I felt it necessary to rescue you"
>"Why did you do that?"
>"Your mother is a wicked witch.   You weren't being properly cared for
>and she was forever hitting you and your sister, even then"
>"Just one sister? I thought you said there were triplets?"
>"That's right, but the other two triplets were being cared for by
>other relatives as your mother didn't want them around.   Anyway your
>sister died after your mother shook her. Unfortunately your mother
>insisted on keeping you with her, and your father wasn't man enough to
>protect you from her, so I had to do something about it"
>"How?"
>"You were in Darthrila at the time.  You were having your cochlear
>implant.  Normally when you have a cochlear implant you don't get to
>stay in hospital for so long as you did.  When I had my cochlear
>implant, I only stayed overnight and went back home the following
>morning.
>"However, you were very small and malnourished with a lot of
>suspicious looking bruising.  The audiologists considered your home
>life in Nazdonia too unhealthy to recover in.   They were very
>concerned about your mother's behaviour.  So you stayed in the
>children's ward for several weeks.
>"Your mother expected you to hear normally straight after you were
>implanted.  When you obviously couldn't, she got very angry, demanding
>a full refund.  She put the painful curse on several of the hospital
>staff, and even threatened to curse their whole family if they didn't
>pay up.  In the end she had to be dragged away by the police.  They
>tried to press charges for harassment, but unfortunately your mother
>has connections. My aunt Beria is the chief police officer.  Another
>police officer is your mother's sister-in-law, P.C. Rickshaw.   Beria
>and P.C. Rickshaw let family ties interfere with justice.  The staff
>at the hospital felt they had a very raw deal.
>  "So they were more then willing to help me get you away from your
>mothers clutches.  Even without the bribe that I offered them.  They
>lied to your mother about your activation day"
>"What's that mean?"
>"That's the day your cochlear implant gets switched on.  They have to
>let your head heal first before they can expose you to sound.  That's
>when you first start to hear.  Anyway they pretended your activation
>day was a week later then it actually was.   A nurse sneaked you out
>of the hospital.  She even helped me to board you onto Talmon's back
>after you had been activated.  So I flew you here.
>"Of course mother soon found out what had happened.  Luckily Talmon
>was with me.  Talmon picked her up in his sharp claws and dropped her
>into the sea.  The next time she paid us a visit Talmon kept blowing
>jets of flames at her, until she agreed to leave our property..."
>"She didn't get burnt?"
>"No, she is a powerful witch, so she could put up a shielding charm,
>to protect her body from the flames.  She has never been back with
>Talmon guarding us, but I sense her waiting, biding her time to
>strike, when Talmon is not around.
>"Now that will have to do for a story today. I'm very tired.  I didn't
>sleep too well in the hospital bed.  I was too worried about how you
>and Talmon would cope without me.  Another thing, Talmon now knows
>what human children eat, so you won't get away with omitting the salad
>again."
>
>
>                 ***  ***  ***
>
>
>Aunt Liza spent a lot of time with me, while her legs were on the
>mend.  She would read to me from picture books that all seemed to
>feature flying children.    We would sit on the luxuriously thick
>green carpet together.  Dragon living quarters are very spacious
>affairs.  The room was the size of a large hall. The walls were lined
>with large metal shelves.   The ceiling was so high that it was out of
>my range of vision, and so were most of the top shelves.  Aunt Liza
>told me that there were several hooks on the ceiling where things were
>suspended from, including a giant hammock, where Liza and the dragon
>sometimes lay together.
>     I would be scribbling all over Liza's plaster casts when Talmon
>came to sit right next to us on the carpet.   He watched Liza
>intently, through half-closed yellow eyes.   His hands would reach out
>and stroke my aunt's long curly black hair.  His hands were very
>similar to human hands except for the scales.   His legs were short
>and stubby with sharp claws at the end of his feet. Liza regularly
>spent time trimming his claws. He had large bat-like wings that he
>often stretched, creating a light breeze against my face.  When fully
>stretched out his wings were twice as long as his body.    I used to
>peer inquisitively at him, reaching out and stroking his beautiful
>shiny back.    Aunt Liza would gaze adoringly at him.
>At that point Bella would often remind us of her presence by pawing at
>us.  So I stroked her as well.  I was so happy when we were all
>together like this.
>
>              ***   ***  ***
>
>At other times my aunt would insist on speaking to me while using a
>system that involved special hand movements called cued speech.  I
>would have to peer into her face in order to read her lips.
>  "I've been told not to use any sign language with you.  Beria says
>you don't need sign language with your cochlear implant.  She wants
>you to just rely on your cochlear implant to hear with.  What does she
>know about it anyway? She doesn't wear a cochlear implant, like we
>do."
>"Who's Beria?" I asked, thinking the name sounded familiar. I decided
>then and there that I didn't like Beria at all.
>"She's my aunt, and her dragon is friends with Talmon.  She's got a
>deafblind mother who doesn't use sign language, so she assumes the
>rest of us shouldn't use it either.  I am going to show them all how
>well you can do, with both systems.  You are not going to have to
>strain to lip read and decipher cued speech all the time like I was
>put through."
>"I thought you said your Nanny was Deaf and used sign language?"
>"Yes, that's right.  Talmon found Shania for me.  She is part of a big
>deaf community in Nassoli where I used to live.  In Nassoli everyone
>signs.  I could sign fluently and I was fully literate.
>Unfortunately Beria didn't think much of my speech.   She said I
>wouldn't ever amount to much unless I was taken away from that signing
>environment.  She persuaded Talmon to have me taught orally at Druzil
>School for the Deaf and the Blind.
>"Lip-reading is all very well but it involves a lot of guess work.
>Especially since I was born profoundly deaf and didn't get a cochlear
>implant until I was eighteen as they didn't exist while I was growing
>up. Even now with my cochlear implant, I still need to lip read.
>There are also times when I have to remove the speech processor to
>stop it getting damaged, like when I do my parachute training.    I
>find the instructions too hard to understand when I'm trying to
>decipher their lip patterns.   I get so lost that they may as well be
>using a foreign language.  No wonder I got the instructions wrong and
>end up in hospital with two broken legs"
>
>                              ***  ***  **
>
>
>In the early hours of the morning Aunt Liza shook me awake.   She gave
>me some clothes and my hearing devices to wear.  I then had to climb
>down a ladder into the basement where most of the dogs lived.
>"Beauty, Bramble and Beans aren't quite as soft as Bella," my aunt
>signed, "Bella's exceptionally good with children, which is why I
>trust her to spend so much time in your company.  They can be trusted
>but I would rather you kept your distance.   Don't try to hug or
>cuddle them and they should be okay.   I've had Beauty for a long
>time. She's quite old now.     The others are all failed police dogs.
>Bella, Bramble and Beans failed because they were too soft.  It's not
>what they are looking for in a police dog.   My other three are more
>aggressive.  I'm keeping you out of their way until you are older.  I
>had another dog when I was younger, but your mother set fire to her."
>"Why did she do that?" I asked.  I was quite horrified at the idea.
>"Because she's a cruel hearted monster, that's why. Let's go."
>  Like most homes in Darthrila, the main entrance was situated on the roof.
>  There was a second way out through a dog flap and down a narrow
>tunnel in the basement, which the dogs and I used to crawl through.
>This led to an outdoor dog run.  I could see nothing at all in the
>darkness outside.  I took a few careful steps forward.  My
>outstretched hand reached a wire mesh fence.  I trailed my hand along
>the fence until I could feel the wrought iron gate.   I sniffed the
>smells from the nearby beach, while I waited for Liza to get there.
>Normally the sea air delighted me, but today I felt sad, thinking
>about the poor murdered dog.
>Aunt Liza was too big to get out of the dog flap.   She used to abseil
>down from the roof instead.
>I felt a sense of relief when Liza's hand touched mine.  When Aunt
>Liza had told me about my mother burning Liza's dog it reminded me of
>the other story, about how I had needed to be rescued.  The more I
>thought about it, the more fretful I became.
>As Liza opened the gate, I felt several furry bodies squeezing past
>me.  Liza said something I didn't hear, because of the sound of
>seagulls and the crashing of waves.  Then the dogs started barking.
>"Could you please repeat that," I asked, reaching for her hands so I
>could feel what she was signing.
>"I was talking to the dogs.  What's the matter Nadia?" Liza said.  As
>it was so dark she was using tactile sign language.   A system where I
>lightly touched her hands while she signed, so I could feel what she
>was signing to me.
>"You said mother set fire to one of your dogs.  Would she set fire to me too?"
>"She won't get the chance, while you are here with me.  You are safe
>right now; Talmon is watching us from the roof.  He's guarding us..."
>I hoped my aunt was right.
>"What if she set fire to Talmon?"
>"Killing a dragon is a capital offence in Darthrila.  The police would
>come and execute her.   Even Beria's influence wouldn't help for an
>offence as serious as that. There would be one wicked witch less in
>the world. Wouldn't that be great?"
>We both held on to a dog each.  They led us for a walk along the sandy
>beach, which was not far from where we lived.    I could feel the cold
>wet sand under my bare feet.
>"Quick! Get under this blanket.  I think I can hear someone coming" My
>aunt signed. I felt my aunt's hands shake as she signed in frantic
>jerky movements.
>"I thought you said Talmon..."
>"Never mind Talmon, you could be dead by the time he gets to us" she
>told me.    She grabbed me in quivering hands, and pushed me under a
>coarse blanket which smelt strongly of dogs.  I sensed her fear as we
>waited for whoever it was to leave.
>
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