Summary of Tell-Tale Heart

The narrator keeps saying that's he's not mad, but just nervous. He loved the old man, but because he was scared of his eye- pale blue eye with a film over it. The old man treated him very well, and never insulted him, but just because of the eye, the narrator decides to kill him. For 7 nights in row, the narrator went to him bedroom and spends one whole hour just sticking his head inside the door. He couldn't kill the old man at night because he was only scared of his eyes, but when the old man was asleep, his eyes were closed. The narrator wasn't able to kill the old man at those times. On the 8th night, he couldn't stand it anymore. When he went into the room, the accidentally chuckled, which startled the old man. Both of them stayed in the same position for a long time without moving a muscle. The narrator then opened the lantern and he then saw the eyes of the old man and got furious. He dragged the old man on the floor and threw the bed on him. After the old man died, the narrator cut the body into pieces and hid them under the floor. Then, policemen came knocking on the door. The narrator chatted with the policemen and the policemen didn't suspect him too. But then, he started to feel nervous and he heard his heart pounding. Louder and louder as he felt more nervous. The heartbeats made him feel nervous also. In the end, he admitted that he killed the old man because he couldn't stand the feeling.

Deception

I think that the author of "The Westing Game" wrote the book like that because he's using the technique, foreshadowing and he wants to try to make us be suspicious all the time to all people. The mood of the story becomes weird. Actually, not only the mood of the story, the whole story is weird when I saw the line, "There was no such person as XXX", but then the XXX kept talking in the book. It just seems so weird, and I couldn't get anything else afterwards because I just kept thinking about how it is possible for a person that doesn't exist to be talking all the time? In this book, there is so much uncertainty and it makes me feel two ways. Two really opposite ways. The first way is that I think it's good, because it makes me nervous and make me think. The second way is that I actually don't want to read it sometimes because I just don't get what the story is trying to say. I feel depressed and thinks that if I don't get it in the beginning already, how am I supposed to know what the book is trying to say in the end?

Narrator

In "The Tell-Tale Heart", the author shows that the narrator is not reliable by saying in the beginning that how much the main character says that he's not mad, just nervous. But to us readers, we all think that he's not only mad, but insane already. Who would spend one whole hour just sticking their head into a door? Who would want to murder a nice old man that treats them really nice, just because they have eyes that scares them? Who would do such things that are so weird? Only people that are weird will do things that are weird. The author purposely chose to create a narrator that isn't reliable because it's a part of the plot and it's a thing that the author wants us to think about throughout the story. In real life, you can see that a person isn't a reliable when you look at their facial expressions and how they are acting. For example, it would probably be obvious to see when a person is lying. Well, not for all people, but for a lot of people, they will start to act nervous, and they will be scared to look at your eyes, and will start to have some small but rapid actions going on.

Scary Stories

To me, I think that in order for me to consider a story to be a scary story, a murder must happen, and the author must be good at adding suspense and must have a good foundation of the language he or she is writing the story in because he or she should be good at describing scenes, feeling of characters, actions that characters are taking, and all other things that will happen in the story. In another kind of horror story, there should be ghosts or monsters that kill. The description of how, where, who, why, and what should be really detailed, so it can scare people more. I've read many Chinese novels that are scary, although a lot of them are really fake, and unrealistic, but so what? The author makes me feel like I'm in the book, and feels like the ghosts are around me, trying to get me too. Some movies that I've watched that I think are scary, are "My Soul To Take", "Orphan", and "Alone". "My Soul To Take" is a movie that is recently played in the theatre. Although the plot is kind of lame, but the actors and actresses acting skills are really good, that it made me really scared too. "Orphan" is scary to me too because of the acting skills and the way the director filmed it. The screams were terrifying. I haven't watched all of "Alone", because it's too scary for me.

Lunar New Year

In this new year break, I went to Singapore with my family. It was pretty fun, but it was too hot and a lot of the food was too spicy for me. There were two kids that were at the age of three that were so cute! They weren't in the same family, but they were so close with each other and kept holding hands. And because they were so small, they didn't walk fast, and because people were afraid that they would trip and fall, everyone walked around them, really slowly. So, we called them the prince and princess. One of the cutest things was that the girl keeps holding the boys hand first, and when the boy didn't want to hold her hand, she cried out loud. And when the boy heard the girl cry, he quickly grabbed her hand and held it. It was just so cute for kids in that age. Another thing that is very memorable to me is when we went to eat breakfast, I got some noodles, and when I wanted to add some sauce, I saw a sauce that was brown, I thought it was a kind of sauce I always use, so I added a lot inside. And I mean A lot as in REALLY A LOT. And when I started eating, I realized that it was super duper spicy. But because I was really hungry, I had to eat it all. I was sweating and my lips were all red and were hurting. It is one of the things that I really can't forget.