A Murder Foretold

        “A Murder Foretold” is a complex story supported by a variety of narrative techniques. As a first technique, the writer uses the third-person telling a story about others persons’ lives. The events are presented to us through someone’s eyes that had contact with the active characters from the story: “Mendizabal told me that he had never played both sides…”, “Castresana told me that CICIG […] had recently identified the alleged hit men who killed Musa.” Also, David Grann uses a dramatic and shocking introduction: “Rodrigo Rosenberg knew that he was about to die.” From the first sentence of the story he raises questions and mystery in readers’ minds. To the intensification of mystery also contributes the presentation of the story not chronologically. The writer adds stories that took place in the past, like layers, providing extra depth information and making the action more intriguer. For example, he starts the story describing Rosenberg’s live and next he makes a turn and starts talking about Guatemala’s dark and violent past and then he returns back to Rosenberg’s live. Furthermore, the writer uses specific descriptive details and a figurative language to describe the characters and their experiences. For instance, Grann describes Colom as a “tall and severely thin, with bent shoulders, receding gray hair, and owlish glasses”. Reading the sentence we have a clear image of Colom’s physical look. The story is full of lively descriptions that make the reader picturing and feeling every action and emotion that takes place. Because of such a developed descriptive narration, the writer captures the reader attention and keeps him in the middle of the action. For the story end, Grann chooses an unexpected ending, as is his introduction too. The end is a twist of the direction we have been guided by actions and information over the story. We are given to understand that the government killed Rosenberg; however, close to the end we found out that Rosenberg had plotted his own death. As emphasized ideas in the story are the ideas of murder mystery, of justice and honesty, of supreme sacrifice. The entire story is based on mystery and conspiracy. Rosenberg makes the supreme sacrifice to be sure that the truth will overcome. From his action we can inferred the idea of sacrifice for justice and love. The story also has a political theme which is emphasized by describing the corruptive political live in Guatemala. In conclusion, David Grann is a unique writer with an innovative writing style. Through his narrative techniques he keeps the reader interested and in suspense, a way that makes his writing very efficient.