Episode 2, simply titled Alice continues the protagonist’s journey on the road, though there are no hints as to how much time has passed since the previous episode with her encounter with the mysterious man. The protagonist tells the radio that she is driving through a town called Charleston, though she mentions that she had already passed through the small town earlier, notifying the same stoplight, fields, and even a “tiki motel” on the side of the road. More notably, she describes the inhabitants in her immediate surroundings behaving oddly. A girl, parked in a muddy, white car at a gas station with her face pressed against the windshield, facing away from the protagonist, an old man across the street behaving similarly, though with his face pushed up against a street light, as well as a woman and her son with their faces pressed against the outside side of a door to a room of the motel, all while being completely still as though frozen in time.
A very distinct style of story-telling that Alice Isn’t Dead uses is one that switches between two unrelated narratives; where the protagonist is in some point in time, jumping back and forth in time recent to the events she is experiencing, and expositional dialogue as the protagonist talks about (or more specifically, “to” Alice). In this episode, the protagonist reveals through narration that she was a part of groups and circles, presumably to help her get over the death of her wife, however, she then talks about the news and how there was frequently stories on tragedies; strangely, she mentions that she would see Alice in the background in all of them, noting where the tragedies took place with her on scene and making a map of America using them, leading her to come to the conclusion that she isn’t actually dead, provoking her to take action and search for her. Additionally, she says that she still joins circles occasionally to tell her story, but more so that she tells them through the radio as well in the hopes that Alice herself would hear them, the first mention of why the protagonist is talking into a radio and adding sense to the odd narrative-switching story-telling used in the episodes as she explains where she is and her feelings towards Alice.
The narration once again returns to the present, describing the events taking place in Charleston. Now, the gas station is on fire, chaos abrupting throughout the scene as the protagonist tries to describe what is going on, getting caught up in the heat of the moment (pun intended, sorry). A figure walks away from the station, their body ablaze; it is the old man. In one moment, the protagonist describes his eerily calm walk despite being on fire, the old man disappearing for a second only to appear in the passenger seat of her truck the next. Terrified, she asks him what he wants, the old man simply pointing to the road leading away from the town, the protagonist understanding, driving off, the old man disappearing unprompted.
The narrative style of Alice Isn’t Dead makes it difficult to follow along with the story at times (and even more difficult to explain, sorry again), but does so in a way that adds to it. The jumbled switching and contrast between multiple narratives being told at different points in time creates a sense of anxiety and confusion, leaving the reader disoriented yet with enough information to understand the story being told. Just as the protagonist had experienced in Charleston with the old man, reality does not seem to make sense in this universe, the reader experiencing such disjunction themselves through the way information is conveyed.
Hi Brandon,
This sounds like a wild podcast! I had to go back to your original post in order to get some context since, as you mention, this story is weirdly complex. From what I understood, the protagonist is a truck driver who searchers for her deceased wife, Alice whom may or may not actually be dead? As you mention it is a fictional story, though I would say that more often than not fiction has a great foundation in reality, and so even though as a reader of this summary that you have written, I’m well aware that some people do go into deep bouts of denial when someone close to them passes away. So then, I think that the narrative albeit fictional to us, may have some greater meaning to people who can relate to the main character’s feelings toward Alice. Just from reading the way in which you describe the events that unfold in the story, I mean to me personally I can envision the scenery and setting, though I lack empathizing with her because I haven’t (and hopefully will not soon ever) lost someone that particularly close to me. I think, if anything, like you mention this sort of narrative choice to throw audiences for a loop, in such a way that you can begin to relate to the psychological state of someone dealing with grief. In other words, if we were to create a fictional narrative of anything else, we would ideally want our narrative to be linear for this same reason (avoid confusion). Even then, we could incorporate lapses in time if we wanted too and it would work here because it plays together with the main storyline, however in the case of this podcast the significance I believe with the distorted and unrelated narratives is because of overarching themes like dealing with grief. This narrative choice is also in the “Bear Brook” podcast I listen to and discuss, essentially in the third episode it’s the first time the narrator hears about the murders, yet the series starts off with how the first barrels were found. For obvious reasons, they do this to draw interest immediately, yet I thought that it could’ve equally been as interesting if episode 3 had been 1. There’s similarity here also, where Bear Brook jumps around to different timelines and whatnot in order to explain the series of events, which is in part to be analytical and exciting rather than having the answers be given to you.
I enjoyed reading your summary Brandon, thanks for sharing!
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