How To Breathe Underwater

Orringer, Julie. How To Breathe Underwater. New York, 2003.

I began reading this book when I switched English classes in December, 2007 while I was still at Bishop's. I had nothing to do the first couple days of Ms. Rettaliata's class because they were finishing up a project, so she handed me this book and assigned me a few of the stories to read. It is a collection of fictional short stories, all of them about girls or young women. All of the stories are set in recent times, but each is in a different state in America, and one is in Greece.

Each of the stories is unique, but some of my favorites were The Isabel Fish, Note to Sixth-Grade Self, Stars of Motown Shining Bright and Stations of the Cross. The Isabel Fish is a story about a 14 year old girl named Maddy who attempts to conquer her fear of swimming after she almost drowns in a sinking car that her older brother's girlfriend had accidentally driven into a lake. Her brother's girlfriend, Isabel, is not so lucky. However, the fear of swimming, though ironically Maddy loves water, is not the only thing she struggles with in the story. Since the accident, her brother had been treating her like it was her fault, and she suffers from the loss of his friendship and love.

Note to Sixth-Grade Self was a fascinating story to read because it is entirely in 2nd person. The speaker speaks to the main character as though she is in her head, saying "Do this," or "Don't do that." The voice constantly reminds her of what she should do next and how she should behave and act. It reads very much as though she is talking to herself. Throughout the story, the girl attempts to gain the attention of the most popular boy in the dance class with her good dancing skills. It is a struggle, because she has to compete with the popular girls, who exercise their power to make fun of her. However, she prevails in the end when the boy stops by her house and they go ride bikes together.

Stars of Motown Shining Bright is one of the more mature stories. It is set in Michigan and the gist of the plot is that two girls who were friends meet up to go drive to a young man's house, who they both like. The main character, Lucy, had recently had sex with him, but before she gets a chance to brag about it to her friend Melissa, she finds out that Melissa and the boy, Jack, are engaged and planning to go live in California. They both spend the night at Jack's during which time Lucy sees that all he cares about is the sex, and she finally has to resort to dragging Melissa out with a gun in her hand to get them away.

Stations of the Cross is a story about a Jewish girl, Lila, who has moved to a small Catholic town. She luckily befriends one of the most popular and girls in the school, Carney, and therefore is saved from much of the descrimination and isolation she would have felt otherwise. The town members, including Carney, are still fairly racists. When Carney's half-black cousin Dale visits with her aunt for Carney's first Communion, she ends up tieing him to a constructed crucifix and beating him during a reenactment of the Stations of the Cross. Lila, who was part of the reenactment, then realizes how vulnerable she really is as a Jew.

The girls in each story have a unique realism to them in the way that they perceive and respond to the event in the story based on their background. One of the more vividly described characters is Carney from Stations of the Cross. She is Catholic and loves drama. The more heroic or dramatic, the better. She is not affraid to be in charge and frequently conducts 'games' or reenactment scenes and generally what she says goes. On a couple of occasions, Lila talks about how lucky she is be to friends with Carney, because otherwise her life would be so much harder. In some ways, Carney represents the antagonist, because she holds the values that both Lila and Dale have to fight against. Initially, the author describes her as a nice girl, and a friend of the main character, but by the end, it is clear that she lacks some compassion for people that are different from her, mostly blacks.

I enjoyed the book very much. Each of the stories holds a lesson about the challenges that young girls and women all over face. Not all of them end with the girl triumphing over the antagonist, but each girl does learn a valuable lesson from her experiences during the story. Campared to most of the main characters, my life has been very sheltered. The backgrounds and experiences of each girl vary so much and each responds to the events uniquely. Some of the stories even describe situations, thoughts and feelings that I am not at all aware of. I think that it is a great book for young women to read, but i would not necessarily recommend it to all boys.

Julie Orringer is the Helen Hertzog Zell Professor of Creative Writing at the university of Michigan. Other books she has written include Short Stories for Students and Silver Rose Anthology, both also collections of short stories. This is the first time I have read a collection of short stories like this. I would certainly consider reading her other books if I ever came aross them, but I probably will not go out and buy them.