Discussing Me (Moth) and my take aways

They say to get better at writing you need to read more...

This week was originally supposed to be the introduction to a long term intermittent project known as The Marrow Chronicle, but this week I read a beautiful book. Since I read it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. This book is called Me (Moth) by Amber McBride, and it was a beautiful breath of fresh air. They always say to be a better writer, you need to read more. Well, that’s exactly what I’m doing!

In the past when I’ve discussed what I’ve learned, I try to do this with older books - books like Red Mars or American Gods, but this book is much newer. Me (Moth) was published August of 2021, which means it would qualify much better for my quick reviews on notes that I typically do, but this story just absolutely struck a chord. Maybe it hit me at just the right time. Maybe it was just extremely relatable. Or maybe it has the workings of a classic (in my opinion). 

Obviously I like this book, but that’s not why we’re here. Instead of giving you a review, I’m going to talk about some lovely things I learned from this piece! Before that, let me give a quick breakdown of the general plot…

Moth is a 17 year old ballerina who’s the only surviving member of a car crash that kills her family. She ends up living with her alcoholic aunt and begins to take up as little space as possible, refusing to dance or follow her dreams of going to Julliard. Moth meets Sani, a 17 year old Navajo boy who was forced to move to the suburbs with his mother and stepfather, away from the reservation where his father - a medicine man - still lives. Moth and Sani quickly fall for each other and run away together, starting a cross-country tour to make it to the Navajo nation where Sani’s father lives. Along the way they stop at significant places and connect deeper with their spiritual roots - Moth as the granddaughter of a hoodoo Rootworker and Sani as the son of a Medicine man.

Now there’s one significant thing I didn’t mention about this story yet: Each chapter is an individual poem. These poems are absolutely beautiful, and though I don’t share it often on my substack, I am in fact a regular poet (which you can totally check out on my instagram, @literary.lenses!), and I think this would be a great way to discuss both some storytelling devices as well as some poetic devices. I’m going to focus on three specific things that I learned in this discussion: White Space, Bringing a story together, and Characters after death.

White Space

 I’ll never forget my freshman year of highschool when I wrote an absolutely terrible poem (we don’t need to talk about it - yes I do still have it. No I will not be sharing it at this time), but I did something I thought was rather innovative: I wrote all around the page. I wrote things sideways, in the margins, in the center, you get the idea. When my english teacher saw it, she informed me that in poetry that was called utilizing the white space. I’ll admit, I was a little annoyed. There I was, a thirteen year old thinking that I had just reinvented poetry as we knew it. I thought I had come up with the next big thing.

I hadn’t.

But McBride has utilized white space in such a beautiful way, that it reminded me that it can have more meaning than doing it just for the fun of showing its doable. One of my favorite ways she utilizes the space is during dialogue. Almost all dialogue in Me (Moth) is between Moth and Sani. During conversations, typically one of them gets one side of the page and one of them will get the other side. This adds so much weight to the conversations. It standardizes discussion instead of having to remind you of who is talking regularly. It’s beautifully done and so much fun.

Another fascinating trick in which McBride utilizes white space is in repetition. Sometimes Moth will say the same word over and over again. As the word is repeated and a new line is started, the world will slowly creep closer and closer to the center, adding a fascinating dramatic effect that is hard to describe. McBride did something absolutely beautiful and thoughtful with white space. When you do things like this in stories and poems, you need to do it with intention and carefully, and that is done perfectly in Me (Moth). I don’t do much white space play in poetry anymore, but I think I’d like to try again and do it with true intention and thoughtfulness.

Bringing a story together

Poetry aside, this is a part of this story that could easily apply to any writing. McBride does an amazing job calling back to older ideas as the story goes on. An important part of Moth’s character is that she and her brother used to write songs together on summer road trips. Then when she meets Sani and they start to fall for each other, they start writing a summer song together as they experience their journey on the road together. The thing that brings this idea together though is that (Minor spoiler), the final chapter is the song they had slowly been writing throughout the story, making for this amazing coalescence as the story is retold but through the rose-tinted eyes of two people who fell in love singing this song about their story. It was so clever and I genuinely found it to be beautiful.

Another amazing way this story is brought together is just through the foreshadowing that is constantly present, leading to a fantastic ending. McBride seeds so many concepts throughout the story that can mean so many things, but all put together they make perfect sense to the story. A very good one that seems relatively small, but becomes extremely important is what the pills that Sani takes are. Sani is seen taking pills early on, and continues to take them throughout the story, and they end up being significant to his character and his and Moth’s journey.

One last thing that draws the story together is the slowly encroaching realism of spirituality and mysticism. What I mean by this is that the religious beliefs of the characters are established but aren’t rooted in magic right away. Sometimes magic or spiritual events seem to be happening, but it isn’t clear if that’s the case or not. Then as the story’s climax comes closer, the hoodoo and medicine practices of characters in the story begins to take on a true life that creates a spiritual climax.

I would love to try something like that - a story where you aren’t really sure if magic truly exists in the world until you make it to the end and by the end there is no doubting that something so beautiful and spiritual exists. As a writer, I think that’s something worth trying. It is extremely difficult to start off in a very realistic place and carefully cross the line into spirituality and it feels so smooth that the transition becomes seamless. I need to refine my own ability enough to do something like that. It’d be an absolute joy.

Characters after death

I’ve spoken a few times in this story about characters who have died. This reminds me of ancient Greek or Shakespearean plays when characters are spoken about but never truly seen in a story. This is a classic concept, but something that is important to do when you have dead characters off screen is to give them emotional weight. When Moth talks about her family, there’s a weight behind it. It feels solemn, it feels hurtful. The death of her family weighs on her and has a direct impact on the story. 

There’s a common trope in tabletop roleplaying games of the edgy brooding character whose entire family dies and they’re a loner… in a collaborative game. That’s not entirely ideal and makes for terrible cooperation, but what if in a situation like that, you have people close to you who make you feel safe and at home? In this case a romantic interest, but what about a found family or a close friend? After someone dies, you may even develop survivor’s guilt - something that Moth struggles with throughout the story.

My point is that the death of her family isn’t just a plot point, it impacts the character’s choices and how she interacts with the world for the entire book. Even after death, who they are to the story - and to the people who loved them - should be felt after death. Dying isn’t just a plot device (though it is a good one), it should be something that your character feels the fallout of. In this case it’s easy to say because death is an important part of the plot, but when writers choose to kill off a character, it can’t just be something that happens. Death should be felt and experienced, not just thrown in for the convenience of the plot. It should change relationships - but not change an entire character’s personality to shun all relationships. Instead, what if a character has a powerful desire to love and be loved, but they are afraid? I feel that fear in Moth and I love how it comes across the page.

And believe me, I’m speaking to myself here too because there’s some stuff in The Trials of Astra that I see myself tweaking slightly in the future because death can’t be just a plot device. It needs to matter. It needs to have weight and emotion in the story.

Concluding thoughts

Me (Moth) was such an amazing experience. This book is 244 pages and I read it in about two hours, and had already decided upon finishing that I can’t wait to read it again in future! Me (Moth) is advertised towards young adults, but I think it is worth reading regardless of your age. I had found this book in a bookstore and the cover immediately caught my attention. It looked so pretty. The cover depicts a young girl with a gaping scar going down her face. I couldn't help but wonder what the story was behind it. When I took the book to check-out, the employee working the cash register told me that I had just so happened to choose one of her favorite books. I immediately felt excited - I must’ve made the right choice then, hadn’t I? I can confidently say now that I did make the right choice.

I feel like I learned a lot from this book, and I can’t wait to reflect on it more. This is a more casual than usual post, but that’s because I really just wanted an outlet to talk about this lovely story. I do recommend giving it a read, and maybe keeping in mind some of my reflections! I think books like these - regardless of how old or new they are - will always have something to teach us.

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Thanks so much for reading this short reflection! Coming up next week, I will be sharing The Marrow Chronicle. After that, we’ll be starting a new serial in the world of Astra!

In the meantime, this past week I compiled all my Astra stories and horror stories into their own posts where you just need to click the title and it’ll take you to the story, so if you are looking for somewhere to start, maybe click on those directories…

Astra directory

Horror directory

I’m considering making one for my nonfiction posts as well, but I don’t want to bombard my Substack with a bunch of different posts of posts, so I’m stopping here for now!

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I’ll catch you next week with the first episode of The Marrow Chronicle! Until then, catch you around!