There are a couple of things that make one suspects the credibility of the dogs’ story. As Jeremy narrates it, when one of the dogs attacks June, it “the animal sank its jaws into the rucksack.” (127) and then June gets the courage to stab it in its belly and sides. “It surprised her, how easily the blade went in.” (ibid) This quote needs some contemplation; how can stabbing a huge animal like that with a small knife be easy?! Is the knife really that good? Or is she imagining the whole thing?! Interestingly enough, when Bernard finds her after a while and she tells him what happened, he does not find any trace of the blood-covered knife but strangely enough he does see the holes that are made in the rucksack. Reality If someone picks up …show more content…
Accordingly, Jeremy does not let go of his old habit even after marriage and even though he feels like he got over it somehow; he develops a friendship with his parents-in-law June and Bernard Tremaine. This friendship leads him to the conclusion that the emotional emptiness he experienced throughout his life affected him intellectually and he grew to be like an empty shell, as if he has lost his purpose. He …show more content…
The action of studying June and Bernard’s photograph that hangs in the young couple’s kitchen makes Jeremy notices the change in June’s face: How did a round face become so long? Could it really have been the life, rather than the genes, that caused that little crease above the eyebrows pushed up by her smile to take root and produce the wrinkle tree that reached right to the hairline?... In repose her face had a chiseled, sepulchral look; it was a statue, a mask carved by a shaman to keep at bay the evil spirit. (5) Jeremy’s words gets one to think that June’s long-term search for something sublime has worn her out and it is very obvious on her face. In fact, that it is just the natural process of aging but it is Jeremy’s imagination that portrays June in that way. The reference to the shaman carved mask probably indicates that she really faced evil and is trying her best to fight against it. She insists that her story is “literal, anecdotal, true.” (6) The use of the word ‘anecdotal’ here is ironical since it means ‘not necessarily true’ or ‘unreliable’. So there is a possibility that she might be making it