I really want to talk about Patrickson's story “The French Exit”, posted 11 Feb 2022.
I originally posted most of this as story feedback straight to Patrickson back in May. But I'd never used the Feedback option before, and this is a LONG post, and I think the Feedback text box doesn't do paragraph breaks. I imagine my comment came thru to Patrickson as an unbroken wall of text. That would have been no fun to try to wade thru. The reason I mention all this is, in some places here I address “you”, and when I do that the comment was originally directed to Patrickson.
This story is WONDERFULLY written. I'm a Loving Wives junkie, but at first I avoided reading this one because it's so long. Once I finally started it, the story was riveting. Quick, exciting read, and very rewarding.
What defines the “angry” LW stories here on Lit (as opposed to the sharing, swapping, group or happy-cuckolding LW stories) is the OUTRAGE. The stories are outrage porn. Those of us who are addicted to these stories, what we're savoring is the outrage. I don't know why we like it; probably it says something unhealthy about us. But whatever, we dig the outrage. This story really, really delivers the outrage. It's as pure a jolt of outrage as any of the most-favorited “angry” LW stories on here, like “February Sucks” or “Another Love”, etc. Really great. And along with that there are the great characterizations and the fine writing and the careful storytelling. Very, very well done.
The author is content with a really slow burn, to let the events and the insults and the evidence really start to accumulate. Every character speaks for themself, and nothing is just given away. Everything is earned. We readers understand what's happening a little before our main character does; but of course we know what section the story is posted in: and anyway we only FULLY get it a little before he does, and it's clear that part of the reason is that he's coping with denial.
Spoilers abound below, so if you have any interest in reading the story, you might want to stop here.
I have three teeny-tiny comments. Not “criticisms”, or even suggestions: I think there are good reasons why these items should stay the way they are. But I think they're worth commenting on.
One: There are a ton of Britishisms in the writing. They become more frequent toward the end, after Sal gets home. "Whilst" and "on holiday" and "at the weekend". "I quite liked her." I think "moulding" appears with the UK spelling, and also there's a reference to "a multi-million-pound development deal". None of these are BAD: in fact I enjoy Britishisms in fiction. But they do disrupt the illusion that Sal is from NYC and Lucy is from Texas.
There's another reason I don't mind the Britishisms in this story, but I would like to tie it into the next point.
Two: Most of us fans of the "angry" LW stories will want to see Donald get his ass kicked. Boy, does he need it. There's a whole lot of set-up to suggest we'll get to see it. All the talk about New York Division 1 boxing, and how Sal has been doing it since he was 10 and loves it for the discipline and the technique, etc. The punch-in-the-gut to Reuben early is a tasty warmup. Our LW tropes tell us that Donald will be on fire to beat up Sal after his big financial deal falls thru; and that he will get a very nasty surprise when he tries it. When the story has ended and Donald HASN'T gotten his ass kicked, it leaves us a bit up in the air, as if Chekov's gun went unfired. Chekov's boxing gloves. It's a mild dissatisfaction.
But, thematically I understand how it wouldn't happen in the story. Sal is determined all thru to take the high road. Sal is like – and here is the tie-in to why I don't mind the Britishisms – he's like a Dick Francis character in the way that, while he's tough, he's not focused on revenge but rather on living a good life. The Dick Francis narrators never indulge themselves with revenge, they just try to do the right thing and move on. This story has a very similar flavor. And the Britishisms, which I think are accidental, actually help to emphasize that. Maybe this won't come thru to people who don't read Dick Francis; but the way the Britishisms (accidentally?) reinforce the high-road-taking by the main character, really works for me.
There are two more good reasons why Sal wouldn't give Donald a beat-down in this story. First, Sal has already hit Donald where it hurts the most, in the wallet. Donald has to scramble to hold his multi-million-dollar" (pound?) deal together, and maybe he's not completely successful. That's a shrewd knock. And second, the logistics don't work. How would a confrontation between Sal & Donald even happen? At the resort, Sal is committed to saying "undercover" until he has his evidence. Back in NYC, if Sal can stay away from Alice and her parents, then of course he could stay away from Donald just as easily. That's if Donald even cared to try to find him, which maybe he doesn't, being too busy with work and his deal unravelling. To get a fight, you'd have to construct a situation where Sal runs into Donald at an event that Sal is photographing, or something. Clunky in terms of plot, and maybe it would disrupt the story flow.
These things – taking the high road, hitting Donald in the wallet, logistics – are all very solid reasons why a fight would not happen in the story. Still, it nags at me that Donald doesn't get his ass kicked by Sal. He REALLY needs it; and maybe I need him to get it.
Three: Alice is a ghostly image. We have very little sense of her. She's barely present in the story. We have a much more concrete sense of Lucy. That's a weakness, since Alice is the wife.
But I'm not sure how it could be any other way? The whole crux of the story is how Alice is abandoning Sal on their getaway. She is literally absent; not with Sal. That's the prime driver of the story. And we do finally get some sense of her in flashback in the last section, the history of their relationship. The only other thing I can think of that would fit within the plot and give us a greater sense of Alice EARLY in the story, would be if we got to see the day they spent together on the one excursion she agreed to go on. It happens between paragraphs on page one, from "he felt that tomorrow was going to be better" to "Alice had signed him up again for a trip … the happiness of the previous day seemingly all forgotten." There's a whole wonderful day of Sal-Alice interaction hidden between those two grafs. We don't get to see any of it, so we don't know Alice at all and we don't know why Sal would value their relationship. That missing day would give us a more vivid picture of Alice. My intuition is that it would add to the impact of the story.
But there's an obvious counter-argument. Maybe that would slow down the narrative too much? Sal moves quickly once Alice ditches him again, and maybe we need that momentum. It's a long story. I don't know the answer.
I want to emphasize, these are TINY reservations. They're not even nitpicks: ultimately I'm not sure anything should change. It's a great, great story.
One excellent thing that I only caught in re-read: on page 8, literally halfway thru the story, Sal tells Alice "Don't say another word to me." AND SHE DOESN'T! She. NEVER. Does. That's the very last time they ever speak. It's amazing. Brutal. The last conversation Alice is EVER part of with Sal is the one where Sal says cheaters are gutless cowards who are beneath contempt, pathetic subhuman scum; and he tells her there won't be another conversation. French exit indeed. Harsh. I love it.
That scene at the table over drinks after dinner occurs almost exactly in the middle of the story. It is electric. No one at the table knows how much the other party knows. Sal knows way more than Alice & her lovers think. And Alice's lovers know about Sal's chastity, which is unthinkable to him when he sits down – and which knowledge spells the end of Alice's marriage. Which she doesn't know. Sal's composure here is magnificent and infuriating. I desperately want him to lash out. Instead he holds it together, so he can gather enough evidence to take them all down. Very tough scene.
As an aside, I got a chance to read your other story, the ultraviolent one, before it got removed. For excessive violence, I guess? That would be understandable. It is FASCINATING how different the narrator in that story is from Sal in this story. Sal is super determined to take the high road here; do the right thing and move on with a good life. The other narrator has no interest whatsoever in the high road. He wants gruesome vengeance, and he luxuriates in it. Both stories are entertaining; I'm sorry the other one (anyone remember what it was called?) got pulled. The two stories are such bookends around the concept of BTB / revenge. In my imagination, Patrickson absolutely bust a gut holding himself back in writing “French Exit”, to make Sal take the high road and be the better man and not sully himself with revenge; and the other story was backlash, an orgy of violent revenge that got pent up and spilled out. The two stories definitely go together.
Honestly I would love to see a sequel to the other one, where the wife runs into the narrator say two years later, maybe somewhere in Asia or Australia. (A sequel later appeared! It's called "Grave Conversation".) What would they have to say to each other? But maybe there's nothing to say. (There was!)
Hope to see more work from you!
Best regards,
JZ
I originally posted most of this as story feedback straight to Patrickson back in May. But I'd never used the Feedback option before, and this is a LONG post, and I think the Feedback text box doesn't do paragraph breaks. I imagine my comment came thru to Patrickson as an unbroken wall of text. That would have been no fun to try to wade thru. The reason I mention all this is, in some places here I address “you”, and when I do that the comment was originally directed to Patrickson.
This story is WONDERFULLY written. I'm a Loving Wives junkie, but at first I avoided reading this one because it's so long. Once I finally started it, the story was riveting. Quick, exciting read, and very rewarding.
What defines the “angry” LW stories here on Lit (as opposed to the sharing, swapping, group or happy-cuckolding LW stories) is the OUTRAGE. The stories are outrage porn. Those of us who are addicted to these stories, what we're savoring is the outrage. I don't know why we like it; probably it says something unhealthy about us. But whatever, we dig the outrage. This story really, really delivers the outrage. It's as pure a jolt of outrage as any of the most-favorited “angry” LW stories on here, like “February Sucks” or “Another Love”, etc. Really great. And along with that there are the great characterizations and the fine writing and the careful storytelling. Very, very well done.
The author is content with a really slow burn, to let the events and the insults and the evidence really start to accumulate. Every character speaks for themself, and nothing is just given away. Everything is earned. We readers understand what's happening a little before our main character does; but of course we know what section the story is posted in: and anyway we only FULLY get it a little before he does, and it's clear that part of the reason is that he's coping with denial.
Spoilers abound below, so if you have any interest in reading the story, you might want to stop here.
I have three teeny-tiny comments. Not “criticisms”, or even suggestions: I think there are good reasons why these items should stay the way they are. But I think they're worth commenting on.
One: There are a ton of Britishisms in the writing. They become more frequent toward the end, after Sal gets home. "Whilst" and "on holiday" and "at the weekend". "I quite liked her." I think "moulding" appears with the UK spelling, and also there's a reference to "a multi-million-pound development deal". None of these are BAD: in fact I enjoy Britishisms in fiction. But they do disrupt the illusion that Sal is from NYC and Lucy is from Texas.
There's another reason I don't mind the Britishisms in this story, but I would like to tie it into the next point.
Two: Most of us fans of the "angry" LW stories will want to see Donald get his ass kicked. Boy, does he need it. There's a whole lot of set-up to suggest we'll get to see it. All the talk about New York Division 1 boxing, and how Sal has been doing it since he was 10 and loves it for the discipline and the technique, etc. The punch-in-the-gut to Reuben early is a tasty warmup. Our LW tropes tell us that Donald will be on fire to beat up Sal after his big financial deal falls thru; and that he will get a very nasty surprise when he tries it. When the story has ended and Donald HASN'T gotten his ass kicked, it leaves us a bit up in the air, as if Chekov's gun went unfired. Chekov's boxing gloves. It's a mild dissatisfaction.
But, thematically I understand how it wouldn't happen in the story. Sal is determined all thru to take the high road. Sal is like – and here is the tie-in to why I don't mind the Britishisms – he's like a Dick Francis character in the way that, while he's tough, he's not focused on revenge but rather on living a good life. The Dick Francis narrators never indulge themselves with revenge, they just try to do the right thing and move on. This story has a very similar flavor. And the Britishisms, which I think are accidental, actually help to emphasize that. Maybe this won't come thru to people who don't read Dick Francis; but the way the Britishisms (accidentally?) reinforce the high-road-taking by the main character, really works for me.
There are two more good reasons why Sal wouldn't give Donald a beat-down in this story. First, Sal has already hit Donald where it hurts the most, in the wallet. Donald has to scramble to hold his multi-million-dollar" (pound?) deal together, and maybe he's not completely successful. That's a shrewd knock. And second, the logistics don't work. How would a confrontation between Sal & Donald even happen? At the resort, Sal is committed to saying "undercover" until he has his evidence. Back in NYC, if Sal can stay away from Alice and her parents, then of course he could stay away from Donald just as easily. That's if Donald even cared to try to find him, which maybe he doesn't, being too busy with work and his deal unravelling. To get a fight, you'd have to construct a situation where Sal runs into Donald at an event that Sal is photographing, or something. Clunky in terms of plot, and maybe it would disrupt the story flow.
These things – taking the high road, hitting Donald in the wallet, logistics – are all very solid reasons why a fight would not happen in the story. Still, it nags at me that Donald doesn't get his ass kicked by Sal. He REALLY needs it; and maybe I need him to get it.
Three: Alice is a ghostly image. We have very little sense of her. She's barely present in the story. We have a much more concrete sense of Lucy. That's a weakness, since Alice is the wife.
But I'm not sure how it could be any other way? The whole crux of the story is how Alice is abandoning Sal on their getaway. She is literally absent; not with Sal. That's the prime driver of the story. And we do finally get some sense of her in flashback in the last section, the history of their relationship. The only other thing I can think of that would fit within the plot and give us a greater sense of Alice EARLY in the story, would be if we got to see the day they spent together on the one excursion she agreed to go on. It happens between paragraphs on page one, from "he felt that tomorrow was going to be better" to "Alice had signed him up again for a trip … the happiness of the previous day seemingly all forgotten." There's a whole wonderful day of Sal-Alice interaction hidden between those two grafs. We don't get to see any of it, so we don't know Alice at all and we don't know why Sal would value their relationship. That missing day would give us a more vivid picture of Alice. My intuition is that it would add to the impact of the story.
But there's an obvious counter-argument. Maybe that would slow down the narrative too much? Sal moves quickly once Alice ditches him again, and maybe we need that momentum. It's a long story. I don't know the answer.
I want to emphasize, these are TINY reservations. They're not even nitpicks: ultimately I'm not sure anything should change. It's a great, great story.
One excellent thing that I only caught in re-read: on page 8, literally halfway thru the story, Sal tells Alice "Don't say another word to me." AND SHE DOESN'T! She. NEVER. Does. That's the very last time they ever speak. It's amazing. Brutal. The last conversation Alice is EVER part of with Sal is the one where Sal says cheaters are gutless cowards who are beneath contempt, pathetic subhuman scum; and he tells her there won't be another conversation. French exit indeed. Harsh. I love it.
That scene at the table over drinks after dinner occurs almost exactly in the middle of the story. It is electric. No one at the table knows how much the other party knows. Sal knows way more than Alice & her lovers think. And Alice's lovers know about Sal's chastity, which is unthinkable to him when he sits down – and which knowledge spells the end of Alice's marriage. Which she doesn't know. Sal's composure here is magnificent and infuriating. I desperately want him to lash out. Instead he holds it together, so he can gather enough evidence to take them all down. Very tough scene.
As an aside, I got a chance to read your other story, the ultraviolent one, before it got removed. For excessive violence, I guess? That would be understandable. It is FASCINATING how different the narrator in that story is from Sal in this story. Sal is super determined to take the high road here; do the right thing and move on with a good life. The other narrator has no interest whatsoever in the high road. He wants gruesome vengeance, and he luxuriates in it. Both stories are entertaining; I'm sorry the other one (anyone remember what it was called?) got pulled. The two stories are such bookends around the concept of BTB / revenge. In my imagination, Patrickson absolutely bust a gut holding himself back in writing “French Exit”, to make Sal take the high road and be the better man and not sully himself with revenge; and the other story was backlash, an orgy of violent revenge that got pent up and spilled out. The two stories definitely go together.
Honestly I would love to see a sequel to the other one, where the wife runs into the narrator say two years later, maybe somewhere in Asia or Australia. (A sequel later appeared! It's called "Grave Conversation".) What would they have to say to each other? But maybe there's nothing to say. (There was!)
Hope to see more work from you!
Best regards,
JZ
