workshop--amanda

"Whose Fault is it Anyway?" by Amanda Hamrick
I think this piece is about how sometimes in life, there really isn't just one person to blame. Sometimes, maybe there's no one to blame. I like that you opened on a concrete scene, the fight between your parents. On page 3, I really love these lines: "I stared blankly at the Strawberry Shortcake pictures that covered my walls. She just stared right back at me." It really sums up your age and your helplessness in that situation. The transitions between scenes was a little awkward to me; I think you can find a better way to do it than putting "A few more days later" or something. On page 4, the scene with you and your brother is hilarious; a nice change from the serious tone of the piece. Your voice is good overall; it really shows how old you were during all of this. You might want to consider using even more of a childlike voice, to help us feel exactly what you were feeling.
While I like the scene at the beginning, I think you could move the order of some of the crots around. On page 6 when you start with "How does an alcoholic father get custody over a caring mother?" it really caught my attention. Maybe you could go from there? I feel that after page 6, when your father gets custody of you and your brother, that the focus of the piece gets a little lost. Do we need to know all the details? Or just what was happening with the divorce, how it's nobody's fault, etc? I really like the note that you end on though, it really summed up the feeling of the piece. You might want to think about focusing more on just one aspect of this part in your life, like what it was like while they were getting divorced, or go more in the direction of how your father tried hard even though he wasn't perfect.