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"The only child of a single mother, Jeremy Guillory is used to moving often, sleeping in bedrooms that aren't his. His mother's friends all rent houses along the same dead-end street the landlord calls Watson Road whenever he wants to charge higher rent, though it doesn't really have a name and even the town police department will need directions to find it. Settlers from Iowa named the town after their home state but, wanting a fresh start, pronounced the name Io-way even as they kept the spelling. The town has always been a place people come for new starts, always been a place they can't quite leave the past behind." - Page 9

Device: Repetition - "The town has always been a place..."
Purpose: The repetition here helps to set the tone, it seems to create an ominous one because of the juxtaposition of a supposed fresh start with the inability to leave the past behind.

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"Ricky climbs the stairs after him. He wants only to watch Jeremy play--later he will say this, later he will swear to it. But the watching changes something in him, and from this point on it is as if he is in a dream. He walks up behind Jeremy and hooks his forearm around the child's neck, lifting him into the air. Jeremy kicks so hard his boots fall off. Ricky squeezes. Jeremy stops breathing." - Page 11

Device: Syntax - The short and abrupt sentences that each start with a name.
Purpose: The shorter sentences help to make the scene more tense: *beat* His boots fall off. *beat* He squeezes. *beat*...

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"Sometimes Jeremy and the Lawson boy, Joey, will sit out here on the frame and fire their BB guns off into the woods for hours. But it's empty now, the woods nothing but quiet. She gets out of the car and leans on the four-wheeler frame. "Jeremy!" she calls. "Jeremy, it's your mama! Can you hear me? Jeremy!" There's only silence. Not even a bird." - Page 20

Device: Imagery - The auditive imagery of the scene is made  very clear, with a contrast between the silence and the calling that Jeremy's mother does.
Purpose: The use of auditive imagery and the contrast helps to show the isolation she feels in this moment, as well as the desperation.

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"Now, in the closet, Jeremy Guillory's body stands rigid, wedged in, wrapped in the blue blanket from Ricky's bed, a white trash bag covering his head and shoulders. The hiking boots that fell off while Ricky was strangling him tucked neatly at his feet. The BB gun was placed beside him. Ricky had him in there and shut the closet door before the children came into the room. The boy has a sock in his mouth now, a piece of trout line around his neck that Ricky pulled tight. He'd kept making gurgling sounds." - Page 36

Device: Alliteration - wedged in, wrapped, white trash bag.
Purpose: Helps to create a kind of tension again. He wedged him in, then he wrapped a blanket, and then, he had to cover his face as well. It makes it more emotional, focusing on the disturbing aspects of the scene and gives the passage rhythm.

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"As my grandmother lies in a half empty bed in 1984, and my grandfather pauses on the stairs, there still remains a chance. Maybe tonight, unlike every night that has come before, my grandfather will turn around. He will climb back down the staircase, and he will leave my grandmother to a story of her marriage — to a story of her life – that does not include hearing his climb. He will leave me to my childhood bed, and my sister and hers, where we each now lie silent, listening. We both know what we listen for, but we have never said the words out loud. Or maybe tonight, unlike every other night that has come before, my grandmother will let go of her prayer card, open her eyes, and rise from the bed to walk toward the sound. She cannot help but hear — But no. The stair. My grandmother in her bed, my sister in hers, me in mine, we listen." - Page 44-45

Device: Allusion - The author doesn't directly describe what they are waiting for, but the reader can understand it is about sexual abuse.
Purpose: The allusion makes the scene more raw. It is as if the author cannot bear to fully articulate what occurred. It also creates suspense. Is it not mentioned directly because it doesn't end up happening? Are we guessing correctly what the grandfather will do?

# data[].attributes.headline
THIS ISN'T ALLUSION; PARENTHESIS; ANAPHORA; ANADIPLOSIS; INTENTIONAL FRAGMENT

# data[].attributes.subject
THIS ISN'T ALLUSION; PARENTHESIS; ANAPHORA; ANADIPLOSIS; INTENTIONAL FRAGMENT

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"My sister is too little for the tooth fairy, but maybe, my mother reasons, she got the five dollars by fetching his cap for him, or his cane. My mother decides to play along. 'And how did you earn that?' she says. 'I sat on his lap,' my sister answers. The whispers that follow are sheathed knives, fierce with contained urgency. Voices are not raised; doors stay closed. Behind one, I am questioned, and I know to keep my voice low, that my parents do not want my grandfather, grandmother, or brother to be here. I answer simply. Yes, my grandfather has touched me. Yes, it's been happening for years. They ask more questions — where, what do I remember, what did I see around me – to determine how long. Five years is the answer. I began to cry. Not because of what happened. Because now my mother knows. Some part of me has been waiting for this — but more of me is terrified. I am convinced that we will all be safe if she does not know this about her father. I am convinced it is my job to save her from that. That to say out loud that her father is capable of this would be the most terrible thing." - Page 74

Device: Syntax - The author uses a combination of shorter sentence fragments and repetition of the phrase I am.
Purpose: This sentence helps to make it seem matter-of-fact. The author knows this all occurred, and it's not a surprise. The contrast between this and the response of the people around them shows the shock of the others and the acceptance of the author.

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"Ricky is scheduled for five appointments in July, and comes to everyone. Last month, after his arrest, he says, he took 40 over-the-counter aspirin, and waited to die. The only way to get the bad feelings out was to kill himself. But the pills just gave him a stomach ache and made his ears ring. So he's here. Angry but trying. Sometimes he carves long slashes into his arms and watches himself bleed. He drinks household cleaners and walks into traffic, daring the cars to hit him. Now he tells the caseworker he wants to be hospitalized so he can't molest anyone. 'It seems like the harder I try not to do it, the more I do it.' But they won't hospitalize him. He's clean and kempt, the caseworker checks off. He acts appropriately. He is not that sick. Rather than being hospitalized, he is assigned to outpatient therapy." - Page 125

Device: Irony - He does not appear sick enough to be hospitalized or arrested.
Purpose: The irony in Ricky's situation lies in the fact that despite his desire to be hospitalized to prevent harming others, the system deems him not sick enough for hospitalization. This makes us question whether the system's assistance could have prevented his later actions.

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"Ricky will spend the rest of his life puzzling over this act. An hour after Lucky and Dixon arrest him, he confesses to the murder, but tells them he didn't molest Jeremy. An hour later he confesses again, slightly different details, and says he did. On three videotapes, and over several months to notepads hast to leave scribbled on by prison guards when Ricky says he has something to add, he gets different versions of the murder. He describes undressing Jeremy to molest him. (When Jeremy was found, he was clothed.) He says he killed Jeremy in an effort not to molest him. (Possible, but Ricky's semen was on Jeremy shirt.) He says the crime wasn't sexual at all, but murder, and what he really wanted was to get a gun and go down to the elementary school, "do some shooting." (maybe, but it's pedophilia that Ricky struggled with for decades. Not violence.) He says he killed Jeremy, because he was overcome with the feeling of not wanting Jeremy to become like him. Ten years later, he'll still be confessing, unable to stop telling the story in different ways. He casts about for stories, as if he's casting about for an identity, trying to figure out who is, and who this means he'll be." - Page 177-178

Device: Parenthesis - Interjects with author's thoughts.
Purpose: The author helps the reader, as, with the author's knowledge, they are able to tell the reader what they think is most likely. If they had not provided this, it would just be up to the reader's interpretation, without many solid facts.

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"The funeral parlor is thronged with people she doesn't know, people she hasn't seen in years, people she sees every day. Their arms come at her, their cheeks, she must feel herself wrapped into their hugs, and held nervously at a different distance between their palms. She is surrounded by a buzzing, like she's wandered into a colony of bees." - Page 204

Device: Hyperbole - Everything is overexaggerated. "Their arms come at her," "held nervously at a different distance," "surrounded by a buzzing".
Purpose: The hyperbole here is used to help describe how overwhelmed and anxious the person feels. She is surrounded by a droning buzzing, she is being pushed and pulled and surrounded by body parts of people she hasn't seen for a long while.

# data[].attributes.headline
ASYNDETON; SYNECDOCHE; SIMILE; THIS IS NOT HYPERBOLE

# data[].attributes.subject
ASYNDETON; SYNECDOCHE; SIMILE; THIS IS NOT HYPERBOLE

# data[].attributes.body
"I turned to my grandfather. 'You molested me,' I said. Such simple words, and they'd never been spoken. 'I remember.' I told him what I remembered." - Page 245

Device: Repitition - Both "I" and "remember" are repeated, seemingly on purpose.
Purpose: The repetition of "I" emphasizes the personal involvement the author has. It was not necessary to continue to repeat "I", but they use it to show how their grandfather has personally affected them and to show how deeply they are personally confronting him. "Remember" is repeated to emphasize that the author is still processing the events, even as they are speaking. The separation of "I remember" and "you molested me" is done to emphasize both of these statements and show how this person is still currently remembering.

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"There were no words when I picked up, only his labored breathing. He'd done this before, calling the house and just breathing when he heard me pick up. 'Hello?' I said. 'Hello?' I was ready to hang up. But this time he spoke. 'I'm an old man,' he said. 'I'm going to be dead soon. I need your forgiveness to go to heaven. Do you forgive me?' I remember the phone ringing. I remember the light through the window and the black plastic receiver, smooth on my palm. I remember the sound of his voice, wavery, and gruff and old, and the way my skin prickled and my heart thudded to hear it. I remember his question. I have no memory of how I answered him." - Page 281

Device: Repetition - "I remember" is once again repeated.
Purpose: The repetition is used to create rhythm and contrast once it stops. It emphasizes how they forgot one thing in this interaction, and it's how they answered. It mirrors how the author described the repression of their trauma early on in their life, connecting the present interaction to their past experiences.