We Live In Water Summary

The short story, “We Live in Water” by Jess Walter, describes a man named Michael in search for his father and the other story describes the events leading up to a homicide. The prominent themes in this short story are determinism which is what is determined and not chosen for the characters, free will of the character’s conflict between morally right or the wants or needs of the character, and karma with the actions of the characters. Determinism, free will, and karma all manifest in this short story within the characters Michael and Oren but determinism is the predominate theme in the story because it relates to the whole story and the lives of the characters. In the story, “We Live in Water”, both Michael and Oren, Michael’s Father, manifests determinism which “…is the belief that all apparent acts of the will are actually the result of causes which determines them” (Holman 124). One instance was when Michael craved a cigarette “He craved …show more content…
Oren slept with Barren’s wife and stole money from Barren’s safe which is ironic because “Flett always said: only three kinds of trouble out here—money, women, and Ralph Bannen. I hit the trifecta, Oren thought” (Walter 27). Michael experienced karma when he cheated on his wife which led to divorce, although it is not such obvious karma his actions came back to haunt him “My wife and I split—so matter-of-fact and impermanent, making it sound no different than My wife and I bought a home or My wife and I joined a Softball team. So what was the truth? That he threw his life away? That he self-destructed and threw away the whole goddamn thing?”(Walter 35). This theme is the least prominent because even though there are many instances in the story it is not as strong of a theme as determinism and does not connect to the whole story as well as determinism