Oh, also, I was watching Jurassic Park last night and got to thinking of you and your story. 
What struck me in particular that might be of interest to you is how the characters (Dr. Grant, Ellie, Ian Malcolm) become the voice of the audience asking Hammond all the questions that the audience would be asking and expressing the same kinds of concerns that the audience might express. "How can you be sure the dinosaurs aren't breeding in the wild?" "Because they're genetically engineered to all be female." "How can you be sure the animals won't spread off the island?" "Because we've given them this Lysine deficiency where if we don't 100% supply them with Lysine they'll all die." Etc.
It gives the audience essential expository kinds of information but it also serves two other functions: (1) It makes the characters look smart to the audience in a "hey, I was just thinking that!" sort of way, and (2) it gains the audience's trust by asking and immediately answering a question, so that when you come to a point where you have a hanging question the audience trusts that that question will eventually be answered.
I'm not saying that this example exactly translates to your story since, you know, you only have a single character (so far) and don't have the sort of luxury of having the Hammond character there to answer questions, but I think your narrator is sort of the Hammond character, and your readers are the Dr. Grants - we're asking questions about the story that your narrator has the opportunity to address and answer right away so that when you get to the big story question of "is this narrator really the only person left alive?" (Which is my understanding of the story so far) and leave the audience hanging, you've already invested the time gaining their trust so that they're more likely to stick with you to see where things go.
Does this make sense??
What struck me in particular that might be of interest to you is how the characters (Dr. Grant, Ellie, Ian Malcolm) become the voice of the audience asking Hammond all the questions that the audience would be asking and expressing the same kinds of concerns that the audience might express. "How can you be sure the dinosaurs aren't breeding in the wild?" "Because they're genetically engineered to all be female." "How can you be sure the animals won't spread off the island?" "Because we've given them this Lysine deficiency where if we don't 100% supply them with Lysine they'll all die." Etc.
It gives the audience essential expository kinds of information but it also serves two other functions: (1) It makes the characters look smart to the audience in a "hey, I was just thinking that!" sort of way, and (2) it gains the audience's trust by asking and immediately answering a question, so that when you come to a point where you have a hanging question the audience trusts that that question will eventually be answered.
I'm not saying that this example exactly translates to your story since, you know, you only have a single character (so far) and don't have the sort of luxury of having the Hammond character there to answer questions, but I think your narrator is sort of the Hammond character, and your readers are the Dr. Grants - we're asking questions about the story that your narrator has the opportunity to address and answer right away so that when you get to the big story question of "is this narrator really the only person left alive?" (Which is my understanding of the story so far) and leave the audience hanging, you've already invested the time gaining their trust so that they're more likely to stick with you to see where things go.
Does this make sense??
Teenaged X-Files obsession + Bermuda Triangle episode + Self-led school research project = Atheist.
