Semester
Spring
Date of Graduation
2018
Document Type
MFA Creative Writing Thesis
Degree Type
MFA
College
Eberly College of Arts and Sciences
Department
English
Committee Chair
Mark Brazaitis
Committee Co-Chair
Glenn Taylor
Committee Member
Kathleen Ryan
Abstract
RIDE is a two book, multi-voiced introspection into P.T.S.D., abuse, and the possibilities of recovery. The selection here, the first third of the two books, introduces the necessary background to understand the trauma of book one and the post-trauma of book two. Both books follow four main protagonists, whose overlapping storylines lead them to uncover a fatalistic reunion. First, Kru Blake, a carpenter from Knoxville, Tennessee, follows an Internet advertisement to seek familial healing. Gabriel Bellamy Isaacs, a Marine from Vincennes, Indiana, endures the confusing brutality of his Commanding Officer near Balad, Iraq, while coping with his own haunting past. Tin Jimenez, an eleven-year-old boy from Minca, Colombia, struggles to learn the limitations and uses of his healing ability to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to hurt and what it means to love. Lastly, Sara Blake, Kru Blake's homeless daughter in Knoxville, Tennessee, must come to terms with her trauma-based delusions surrounding her involvement in a child prostitution ring. Through various trans-national, trans-lingual, and trans-genre episodes, the narrators must come to know how slowly devastating and lovely the world can be, leaving them either healed or utterly broken.Up
Recommended Citation
Updike, Natalie Nicole, "Ride" (2018). Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports. 3956.
https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd/3956
Embargo Reason
Permanent Embargo – MFA Creative Writing