Sometimes when I’m feeling stuck with my writing, all I need is a great story to lift me up and make me feel inspired and motivated again. This is what happened recently when I heard Danticat read her story, ‘Without Inspection’, for the The New Yorker podcast. This is the story of Arnold as his life flashes before his eyes in the last few seconds of his life— a moving story of love, trauma, and migration. It reminds me in some way of Tobias Wolff’s classic short story, ‘Bullet in the Brain’as what rises to the top in those last few seconds of life is love— love, in this story, for the loved ones that the main character leaves behind.
First published in The New Yorker, May 2018, and available to read online here. Hear the author read it online here
