(Thanks Charlie! For getting the discussion started! I moved it to it's own page to make it more visible. I'm about to lose battery, so I'll have to wait to actually comment, but I think you make some great points. Welcome to the discussion!)
This is Gerard's friend Charlie here, and I thought I'd break the ice on this
one. I have to say that it took me a while to really get a hang on what was
happening in this piece. The prose was very detailed and evoked a nice scene for
me, but the back story (the world) is very important in science fiction, and it
took me most of my time reading to really get a sense for what was going
on.
As I still think I might be mistaken, let me throw my thoughts out
there. Effectively, the main character is mortgaging his own life by stepping
into this game. As in, if he loses, he'll be one of the people that they use to
incubate this miracle cure (like the guy who is taken into the back room). Is
that what everyone else got?
Since it took me almost my entire time
reading to piece this all together, I guess the poker scene lacked a bit of the
urgency that it acquired once I gained more of an understanding of the
situation. Maybe that is intentional (I'd have to say it is, given the way the
piece is structured). As it stood while reading, I thought it was a very
accurate account of a high-stake poker game, which was fun to read. I just
wonder if some of the tension in the piece is buried in the initial obscurity of
the world's backstory, because we don't realize what's at stake until the hand
has been played.
Anyway, I'm interested to hear what everyone else
thought, and thanks for letting me participate in these discussions.
