AP Lit. horror group discussion

When I thought of Maine I thought of a lively town with trees in full bloom and animals and a sense of community but when reading I felt a different feeling. It's weird how people are mysterious missing, and Aphorodite and her son seem isolated. You have to take a boat to their house and they have huge dogs. I just feel like Maine and Aphorodite& her son creep me out a bit.

Well it is a horror genre so it can't necessarily be butterflies and sunshine all the time. Aphrodite kind of parallels Cass because she is also like a washed-up, but famous photographer. The whole idea of the island she lives on itself is creepy to me. I agree with Carolyn that when I think of Maine, I think of sunshine and the beach and etc. but this version of Maine is so depressing and dark. What is even darker is what Cass learns. The two things she learns when she is in Paswegas are that teenagers have a tendency to disappear from that part of Maine. Some of them are runaways, but some of them have more complicated reasons for going missing. Also, she learns that Aphrodite was involved with groups of people living together and sharing possessions and responsibilities, communes. One of them was murderous. She has to solve the mystifications on the creepy island in order to restore her photographic side that she is so passionate about. I think the island and setting of Maine deals greatly with the fact that a generation loss of local occupants matches Cass’s own self loss and youth loss/ childhood loss. It is also there on that island where Cass becomes conscious that she too might die out just like the artists and poets that live on the island. Ultimately, the setting parallels the overall feel and mood of the text.

I think the setting a perfect mirror for Cass, even though she's initially so disdainful of it and thinks she doesn't belong. The island is in a remote, nearly uninhabited part of Maine where people go to escape the outside world. Although Cass loves the city, she is just as isolated from other people as the residents of the island are, though in her case it's a mental blockade and not physical. Cass also is a self-described has been, constantly referencing how she never made it and blew her one shot at fame and success. When Toby is bringing Cass over to the island on his boat, he mentions how the artist colony on the island is referred to as "burnout."