• Vanessa was 6 years old, and Shallow Creek was a very cold environment o "No leaves grew...breath of seals and polar bears snuffled out steamily and turned to ice" - IMAGERY
• Chris was fifteen when Vanessa met him
• "...let him stay at the Brick House." significance?
• "...high low-sweeping spruce trees shutting out the sun with their dusky out-fanned branches." (pg 283) - IMAGERY
• "At last the front screen door was hurled open and Grandfather Connor strode into the house, followed by a tall lanky boy." (page 283) - IMAGERY
• Chris's physical appearance - "Grey eyes were slightly slanted, and his hair the colour of couchgrass at the end of summer when it has been bleached to a light yellow by the sun." (pg 284)
• "...warmly but shyly." - irony/oxymoron
• "...,looking as granite as a statue in the cemetery." - SIMILIE
• "He'd been lucky to get it, if you ask me anything, Wilf's family hasn't got two cents to rub together..." (pg 285) - grandparents are extremely judgemental of Chris's family, shows that Chris isn't the same "social" class as them
• "...curled into the bay window like a black giant seashell." - SIMILE
• "... just as though he had not heard a word my grandfather was saying." - shows that Chris had high tolerance
• "He simply appeared to be absent." significant?
• "The trees were still growing, and the leaves were firmly and greenly on them. The branches has been coaxed into formations of towers and high-up nests where you could look out and see for a hundred miles or more." - IMAGERY
• The lake was full of fantasy creatures - water monsters, creatures with necks like snakes, rooster's comb, hard leather tough.
• "Two riding horses" & "He missed the horses..." any significance/reference to title of story
• Story takes place during The Great Depression
• Vanessa was nine when Chris left Manawaka, mentions Brick House again
• "he was not at Shallow Creek. He has not gone abck...