A Good Man Is Hard To Find and Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?

Both of these short stories, "A Good Man Is Hard To Find" and "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" deal with men and unsuspected murders. The stories are completely different but very similar in building suspense and foreshadowing to the death of innocent people. It definitely reveals Gothic Elements throughout the stories. In both of the stories there are innocent people who are suspected to be killed. In "A Good Man Is Hard To Find" it is a family and grandmother driving to Florida, and in "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"the innocent person who is suspected to be murdered is a fifteen year old named Connie.

In both of these stories, these people are isolated from society around them before they are killed. The family traveling to Florida turned down the wrong street and was stopped by their killer, also known as The Misfit. The whole family was taken into the woods to be killed except for the Grandma. Once the Grandma was alone, and heard her family get shot in the woods, The Misfit, shot her three times. Directly after shooting her he started cleaning his glasses, as if nothing was odd about that. Regarding Connie, she stayed at her house by herself as the rest of her family went to a family barbecue. An older man who was clearly stalking her came to her house and enticed her outside of her house to take a ride with him. The reader is suspected to believe that he takes her away from her house, rapes her, and kills her.

These aspects of isolation and murder reflect Gothic elements because it creates an eerie tone to the stories. The reader feels uncomfortable reading these stories because the short stories are very real to life and could essentially happen to anyone.