Reviews by Karona

Why do I like Don’t Rock the Boat? For one thing, I like horror. For another, I have long wanted to experience IF about a women’s sports team, and because this work focuses on a women’s rowing team, it is the first I’ve found that scratches that particular itch. And while not essential to the story, I love that the author did something I had yet to see another author of choice fiction do and include credits, which I found to be quite moving.

The work is structured as nine storylets—parts of the story accessible from a hub that presents them as choices, each associated with a position on the boat. I haven’t put a lot of effort into determining what the optimal sequence of positions would be, but I will say that I was glad to have clicked on Nat’s position last, and I wished Carol’s position had been the first I clicked on and Sofia’s had been the fourth, which for me would have meant reading the nine perspectives in sequence. This raises a question people who love to analyze the craft will find significant: If reading the perspectives in the order presented by the author would have been a better experience for me, what did I gain from the interactivity? I think the answer lies in the words at the top of the nexus: “Select your position.” The story is written in third-person limited, but we are not limited to the same character throughout. Each choice gates the transition that takes us from a position looking just over the shoulder of one of the crew to looking over the shoulder of another. The presentation of the choices makes it less likely that we will complete the work without understanding how the members of the team and the parts of the narrative fit together.

With that out of the way, I have a confession to make: I don’t have a good analysis of the story and the themes of this work. I thought I had one, but when I read about the events while looking over the shoulder of Nat, whose position on the boat is last, my theory was shattered. And that makes me ecstatic. In my opinion the best horror leaves the audience with more questions than answers, and this work delivers wonderfully.

What I can say now is that I appreciated the author’s handling of the sport. Elliot Degrassi indicates that a significant part of her knowledge about rowing came from two of the persons listed in the credits. I’m not the person to ask if she got everything right, but I did get the impression that she had spent a lot of time thinking about what it would be like to be in the positions of people who do, and that helped to immerse me in the story.

I can also tell you that the work is not without its humorous moments. In particular I found this line to be hilarious: (Spoiler - click to show)“A part of her wondered if her UTI recovery might make for a good performance piece. Something about cranberry juice being the color of menstrual blood... She’d have to think on it after the race.”

In short the work is brilliant. Why not give it some more of the attention it deserves?