The overarching theme of these stories is the relationship between love and hate, especially the connection between kindness and violence. In this fictional world, love often begets hate, and hate, love: a man's capacity for empathy serves as the catalyst for an act of brutality; a character's loneliness, his desire...
DOUBLE EXPOSURE is a novel concerned with the phenomenon of memory. The story explores such questions as: To what extent does "memory" (and the narratives we construct from it) explain who we are? How is memory influenced by others-and does it matter if it is? Can a memory that is...
The narrator of Fortunate Son is Jake, a 21 year-old who has recently arrived in Tucson, Arizona, after the death of his mother. He's spent his entire life on the road with his mother, possibly followed and antagonized by his father, whom Jake has never seen. He has come to...
This thesis consists of four short stories and Chapter 1 of a novel in progress. Each of the four stories are thematically linked through a common protagonist, Nancy, and through a relatively chronological following of events in her life. I chose to tell Nancy's stories in an attempt to gain...
This thesis, a collection of short fiction, attempts to surface some of the discrepancy between inner and outer lives, between who these characters want to be and who they've become, between the lives they might have had and those they've chosen because the former are too chancy and the latter...
Living by the Wayside and Other Stories explores the tension between control and dependence and how that tension affects the ability to sustain intimate relationships. These are stories about women who struggle for independence, but experience the cost of self-rule as isolation. Living by the Wayside and Other Stories focuses...
This collection of stories explores moments of stillness in human relationships: moments during an argument when there is nothing to say, moments of quiet contemplation which precedes inevitable--and often unwelcome--life changes, moments of frustration, confusion, despair, and grace. In the chaotic lives of these characters, stillness is neither tranquil nor...
Set in the dryland farming country of Eastern Oregon in the late 1950's, this novel follows a year and a half in the life of a young girl as she comes of age. A water rights dispute, the plight of nearby ranchers, disappointments in her own family and a harrowing...
Scenes from the Tarot is a novella that explores the desire to control time. The narrator, Truth Aiken, spurred by fear of her own death, recounts the story of her sister Beauty's death and its effects on Truth's highly unusual family. Proceeding backwards through time, Truth describes her tumultuous relationships...
You Stay Here is the beginning of a novel that centers on the notion of family, community, and the expectations that drive our interactions within these circles. The novel tells the story of brothers Mills and Nance O'Malley as they interact with their parents, Richard and Margaret. The brothers own...