For information on short story cycles, see Paula's lecture Short Stuff: Short Stories and the Short Story Cycle. |
Book Club Info If you would like the author to attend your book club either in person or by phone, please email her at brokenwater@sbcglobal.net Reading Group Guide Discussion Points 1. Why do you think Morell chose broken water as the title? How does water imagery work throughout the cycle? How does birth imagery work? 2. The cycle is made up of 10 stories, 7 Ellie stories and 3 Elizabeth stories. Why do you think the author chose to tell her story this way? Why, thematically, are Elizabeth's stories where they are (3rd, 6th, and 9th)? Would the stories have the same effects, both individually and as a whole cycle, if read in a different order? 3. broken water is centered around perceptions. What do we as readers know that the characters do not? What effect does this have? 4. What imagery is repeated throughout the stories? What effect does this have on the cycle as a whole? 5. We see the majority of the cycle through Ellie's eyes. What would you say Ellie's central conflict is? What is she struggling with through the cycle? Does she change over the course of the cycle? If so, how? 6. Each of the family members struggles with his/her own issues, yet each has a depth that the others cannot (or will not) see. How is this reflected throughout the stories? What might Morell be suggesting about this? 7. The story "The Channel" is the only story in the cycle that does not have any of Ellie's family members directly in it. What is the significance of this story? How, symbolically, does this story point to the overall theme of the cycle? 8. The cover of the book is a stamp of a Ferris wheel. This image appears in "Circling." What do we learn in this story? What effect does this story have on the reader and what s/he has already learned in the stories before it? How does this title work, both in the story itself and in the cycle as a whole? |
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Book Club Info If you would like the author to attend your book club either in person or by phone, please email her at brokenwater@sbcglobal.net Reading Group Guide Discussion Points 1. Why do you think Morell chose broken water as the title? How does water imagery work throughout the cycle? How does birth imagery work? 2. The cycle is made up of 10 stories, 7 Ellie stories and 3 Elizabeth stories. Why do you think the author chose to tell her story this way? Why, thematically, are Elizabeth's stories where they are (3rd, 6th, and 9th)? Would the stories have the same effects, both individually and as a whole cycle, if read in a different order? 3. broken water is centered around perceptions. What do we as readers know that the characters do not? What effect does this have? 4. What imagery is repeated throughout the stories? What effect does this have on the cycle as a whole? 5. We see the majority of the cycle through Ellie's eyes. What would you say Ellie's central conflict is? What is she struggling with through the cycle? Does she change over the course of the cycle? If so, how? 6. Each of the family members struggles with his/her own issues, yet each has a depth that the others cannot (or will not) see. How is this reflected throughout the stories? What might Morell be suggesting about this? 7. The story "The Channel" is the only story in the cycle that does not have any of Ellie's family members directly in it. What is the significance of this story? How, symbolically, does this story point to the overall theme of the cycle? 8. The cover of the book is a stamp of a Ferris wheel. This image appears in "Circling." What do we learn in this story? What effect does this story have on the reader and what s/he has already learned in the stories before it? How does this title work, both in the story itself and in the cycle as a whole? |
Paula on Short Stories An Interview Published in New Works Review, Vol. 6, No. 4 Oct-Dec 04 NWR: How long have you been writing stories, and what prompted you to get started? Morell: I wrote my first poem when I was around 8 years old, my first play when I was 12 (and my class performed it for the whole school), my first short story when I was 14, and my first novel when I was 22. I have become more and more interested in the short story over the years, and now in my mid-30's that's predominately what I write. I guess what prompted me to get started was the need to write. I use writing as a way to both escape and embrace things going on around me. NWR: Who are some of your influences? Morell: My biggest influence to date is Jean Toomer's Cane. Cane was written during the Harlem Renaissance, and in graduate school I was given the small book by one of my mentors, the short story scholar Dr. Mary Rohrberger. It blew me away. The way Toomer uses language and symbolism, as well as how he merges poetry with prose to create stories and vignettes in the book, is unique and very interesting. During that period I was told that one of my stories was very "Toomer-esque" -- I couldn't think of a better compliment. I love classic Southern writers such as Eudora Welty, Flannery O'Connor, William Faulkner. There's a richness in Southern writing that I'm drawn to, and the symbolism and symbolic substructures intrigue me. As far as contemporary writers, Sandra Cisneros' work, both her short stories and her novels. Gabriel Garcia Marquez is another favorite, as well Amy Tan. I also admire Barbara Kingsolver's novels, Animal Dreams and The Poisonwood Bible in particular. My first fiction mentor, Dan Wakefield, encouraged me to develop my voice, and I was drawn to his writings as well as his spirituality. Through Dr. Mary Rohrberger, I was introduced to short story theories as well as multi-cultural classic and contemporary short story writers. There have been other teachers along the way, some of them disguised as students. And the writer Allison McNeill and poet Paula Hilton have been instrumental in encouraging me and honoring my work. NWR: Do your stories revolve around one particular theme? Morell: I am very interested in family relationships, perceptions, interactions, and communications. I find that people are most closely themselves in their relationships with their family members, and this is where we love the most and hurt the most. NWR: Do you think that studying the short story as a genre helped or hindered you as a writer? Morell: Oh, I think it helped me tremendously. Before studying the short story, I thought that short stories were just short novels. This couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, I've found that short stories are much closer to poetry than they are to novels in their effect on the reader (because they are read in one sitting as opposed to over time) and their use of symbolism and symbolic substructures. Like other art forms, I think it is highly beneficial for a short story writer to study the "masters" of the form as well as read contemporary and classic theories of the short story. For me, doing so has opened up my own writing and helped me to not only understand others' work better but also my own. NWR: What are your future writing plans? Are there any long-range projects you are thinking about or currently working on? Morell: My first book, broken water (a short story cycle), will be out in mid-September (www.brokenwater.com). The cycle is an interweaving of a mother's and a daughter's stories, and it revolves around how family members and their secrets, perceptions, and miscommunications affect each other on all kinds of different levels. Two of the stories in this issue are from the cycle: "The Channel" and "Pieces of Me." Six of the ten stories have been published independently, and now they will be published together in the cycle the way that they were conceived and created. I am also working on my second novel, a story of two estranged sisters set in southern Arkansas. |
For information on short story cycles, see Paula's lecture Short Stuff: Short Stories and the Short Story Cycle. |
