The Dogs Could Teach Me And The Sniper

748 Words2 Pages

Out of the three stories, “The Dogs Could Teach Me” by Gary Paulsen, “The Flowers” by Alice Walker, and “The Sniper” by Liam O’flaherty, “The Sniper” had the best suspense moments. “The Sniper” is a story about a civil war going on in Dublin, Ireland where one sniper is set up on top of a building and is facing another enemy sniper. At one moment in the story, the enemy sniper shoots the main character sniper in the arm. One of the best suspense moments was the line, “Then he lay still against the parapet, and, closing his eyes, he made an effort of will to overcome the pain.” The bullet in the sniper was lodged in deep in his arm, as he was trying to overcome the pain. The reader does not know if the sniper will live this or not, making …show more content…

“The Dogs Could Teach Me” is about a boy who is dog sledding, but then he gets injured. The boy required help, and one of the dogs named Obeah was there to lick the boy’s wound. One piece of suspense in the story were the lines, “Later I saw the beauty of it... But at the time I saw nothing,” which showed that the boy was at a beautiful place, but he could not see any of it. This piece of suspense was not at good as the piece from “The Sniper,” because this piece infers that the character will live. If the boy is able to talk back to the readers by saying, “At the time,” then it means that he was able to come back to the location of the accident and see the sight after he got over his wound. This part did not build up too much suspense since the readers know what will happen, making the suspense moment from “The Dogs Could Teach Me” not as good as “The Sniper” suspense …show more content…

One day, Myop decided to go gather resources in a different path than what was normally taken. While heading back to her house, she discovered a dead body. One suspense moment was, “By twelve o'clock, her arms laden with sprigs of her findings, she was a mile or more from home. She had often been as far before, but the strangeness of the land made it not as pleasant as her usual haunts,” showing that the path she was walking back on was not the normal and that she felt different. She felt different than normal when the text said the part, “Strangeness of the land,” meaning that she had never been to this part. This moment made the reader infer that something was wrong, and that something was going to happen to Myop because she did not feel that she knew the land that she was walking on. This is where the story leads into the part where she discovers the dead body, something that does not happen every day. The suspense from “The Flowers” is not as good as the suspense from “The Sniper” because the suspense from “The Flowers” only made the reader feel that Myop might have gotten lost in the path that she had felt to be strange to her. The reader does not think that she will die though, making the suspense not too great because the suspense does not have her in any way of harm so the reader knows Myop will live. However, the suspense from “The Sniper”

Open Document