ASSIGNMENT #1: THE ACT OF STORY STATEMENT
The protagonist wants to get rich quickly on the modern currency of travel. He gets hired as a ramp agent at JFK for The Airline, which comes with free flights. He sets out to travel as much as he can and amass a fortune of social media-worthy memories.
ASSIGNMENT #2: THE ANTAGONIST
The Airline. A corporation that only cares about profit. It put the characters in physical danger and puts them in stressful situations that provide conflict. It looms large over the entire world.
ASSIGNMENT #3: CONJURING YOUR TITLE
BELOW WING, THE RAMP, THE ESPERANTO OF JETLAG
ASSIGNMENT #4: GENRE AND COMPARABLES
Kitchen Confidential, The Things They Carried, Falling: A Novel
ASSIGNMENT #5: PRIMARY CONFLICT / LOG LINE
The narrator will do almost anything to travel for free but working on the tarmac at JFK could unravel his comfortable life in the west village. The stakes of working at JFK escalate until the narrator watches a co-worker die in front of him due to a piece of malfunctioning equipment.
His affair and a business venture with a flight attendant.
What does it cost us to travel? How does it become part of our identity? It’s impact on the environment? The human cost?
ASSIGNMENT #6: INNER CONFLICT & SOCIAL CONFLICT
The protagonist struggles to keep his two worlds, the ramp and the west village, separate. He begins to resent both worlds and his complicity.
He looks at the privileged life of his friends in the west village with contempt. He feels the need to lie to them about the truth of his job on the ramp.
ASSIGNMENT #7: THE IMPORTANCE OF SETTING
The reader is getting a behind-the-scenes look at JFK airport.
JFK is the size of a mid-size city. The center of imports and exports for NYC. Almost everyone who lives in New York has been to JFK and yet knows very little of the inner workings. The protagonist works at JFK and travels out of JFK. He is an employee and a passenger.
