It surprises me that something that looks just fine to me on my computer screen is a horrible mess of bad word choices, screwy grammar, odd constructions, and wrong homonyms when I hold a paper copy in my hand. As a result, I'm reckoning that I'm going to need to plan on printing at least one draft to edit by hand before I print a copy for review by anyone else. Anyway, I'm starting to favor Through Other I's as a working title, so unless I am advised strongly against it, expect to see passages marked with that title if we work in a similar setting again.
I've almost decided that the narrator needs to be given a personality. I've almost decided that he needs to be removed from the story altogether. Most likely, I'll develop some kind of a compromise. It's too easy describing things as seen in the first person. It will also help later, I think, in conveying the feeling and mood evoked by experiencing the lives of others. [Like for instance, when the narrator of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance allows the reader to realize that he was not the first person to live in his body, that once it was the vehicle of the Eldorado character Phaedres.]
The more I write, the more I realize how much needs to be done to make the story at all comprehensible, let alone a good read, the more I realize that I've just barely gotten started, that I haven't yet written about those things that I had felt were the significant ideas behind all this. Let's see. The fragment entitled Frank 1 comes before any previously submitted pieces (with the possible exception of the one headed Geertje 1) calenderwise, although I currently think that it should appear about a third of the way into the completed manuscript. The little girl is, of course, the character currently named Marie. This passage would come out of chronological order, and the reader would know instantly (as soon as French is used) who it was, but the narrator would not yet have met her. Later, when the flow of time is restored, he would, possibly, notice an old, bent-up ten sou piece in a box of trinkets/keepsakes that Marie has, and it would come back to him. Too corny? Perhaps.
Names? I'm not in love with any of the character's names, and any or all of them could be changed without difficulty, although I may want to do some punning with them later on. I do sort of like the idea of using names that are slightly sidestream without being bizarre. Thus, I think a name like Lars or Thor would be okay, but Beeblebrox or Geertje might push the readers' patience too far.
Several days later. I'm still desperately avoiding thinking about my speech. The story takes me off into side paths, keeps me from the meat of the idea. Eventually, it will flesh out, but I need the characters to tell me more about themselves. I need this twilit world to become a little less cloudy. My word palette is austere for now, I need to learn the mood before I can start to paint it. It is becoming too ethereal, and I think that much needs to be cut in order to enhance its plausibility. This is no great message story. It's just an exercise that I'm afraid is a bit too ambitious for a first outing.