MFA 2017
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Item How to Match the Sky(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Hoeft, KendallHow to Match the Sky is a collection of poetry focusing on the struggle between freedom and control through an examination of familial expectations and social norms. These poems question cultural boundaries and racial lines, in pursuit of authenticity and deep self-acceptance. A father appears as a retired show girl. A mother cripples her son. A daughter baths her father. A white girl gets kicked off a playground. A woman makes love to a plant. A murder is committed on a porch. A boy learns how to match the sky. A reader can get lost in this hauntingly irreverent meditation on family, suppression, race, addiction and the struggle for liberation. Readers can also be found and find themselves inside this collection, as they catch pieces of their childhood souls in Hoeft’s reflective poems. How to Match the Sky leaves those who partake of its body with the consciousness that there will always be a sense of that encounter’s intimacy that can never be left behind.Item American-Cuban(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Medrano, OscarItem I Know Why the Revolutionaries Cry(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) Ebanks, AshleyItem Hell is Empty(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Talley, SamanthaHell Is Empty reinterprets Arthurian myths by setting them in the world of drug cartels. The title originates from The Tempest, a play often analyzed through a postcolonial lens. In Hell Is Empty, different narrators explore America’s imperial conflicts using Europe’s own legends. Lance (Lancelot) lives near Big Bend in West Texas. Alarmed by border violence, he joins a vigilante group that hunts down drug traffickers and cartel scouts. Its leader, a Mexican-American named Arturo, does not reveal much about his past; but a powerful cartel has a mysterious vendetta against him. Across the border, Porter (Palamedes), the son of the vigilantes’ patron, visits the ruins of Teotihuacán. He and his cousin, Tristán, seek an underground MMA ring that competes in one of the ancient courtyards. During their search, they vie for the affections of a Mexican archaeologist named Izarra. Meanwhile in Alaska, Texan native Evelyn (Lynette) is trying to escape her home state. Yet even in this distant land, problems pursue her. The same cartel sends scouts to establish an Alaskan crystal meth trade, and one takes a twisted interest in Evelyn. In Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Parzival, the Grail bears the following engraving: “Any Templar appointed by God’s hand to be master over foreign folk must forbid the asking of name or race and help them to their rights.” As Joseph Campbell points out, this early Arthurian myth actually affirms universal dignity. Hell is Empty thus examines what happens when colonialism attacks these unalienable rights.Item A Collection of Glossed Over Moments(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Santiago, ElializGlossed-Over Moments is a collection of seven stories that examine the lives of multi-cultural characters. The unique landscapes of obscure towns run through vivid snapshots of the 90’s to the ever-changing surroundings of today. The universal complications that eventually lead to the maturation of the protagonists mirror the human processes of growth and often the desire to escape the very moments that catapult the changes.Item Florida Avenue Torch Song(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Russo, GiannaHow do we love home when home includes ugliness? Can we treasure a place whose history, values and politics have supported injustice and suffering? And if those societal wrongs are still evident today—then what? Florida Avenue Torch Song, a collection of 56 mostly free verse, lyric-narrative poems, attempts an answer. Here, home is the South generally, and Tampa, Florida, specifically. Russo, a Tampa native, examines her own culpability in accepting a host of biases and, in doing so, forces us to examine our own. The collection is peopled with the working class and working poor, those who’ve just made it and those who are still struggling. At the same time, these poems set mostly in Tampa’s iconic old neighborhoods and along its historic thoroughfares, acknowledge everyday goodness and celebrate backyard beauty. Ranging over personal experience, historical events, and today’s socio-political issues, ultimately these poems bear witness to a century in Tampa. The poems in Florida Avenue Torch Song urge us to question our attachment to the places we cherish and to each other with compassion and candor.Item Expectations are Seeds Not Blossoms(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Rosengrant, VanessaThe following essays explores the construction of identity and the clash of the expectations of adulthood with its realities. The essays use a dry, humorous tone to showcase the relationships between people and the speaker’s reflections. Through the use of dialogue, metaphors, and hyperbole, the text flows from one anecdote to the next to capture the reader’s attention and explore the heights and pitfalls of adulthood.Item Love and Cells: an infertility memoir(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Riviere, HayleyIn Love and Cells: an infertility memoir, Hayley Riviere reveals she always had a gut-instinct that she’d have difficulty getting pregnant, despite doctors reassuring her otherwise. Once married, she discovers she had been right all along, and a battery of tests reveals her diagnosis of Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome, or PCOS, one of the most common types of female infertility. Despite PCOS affecting ten percent of all women, Riviere feels isolated from the people around her, especially after her husband tests normal for reproductive capabilities. In turn, this causes her to wrestle with her identity as a “fully functioning” woman. This memoir invites the reader into exam-room scenes of invasive procedures, and unleashes wit in sections of found forms and flash non-fiction, revealing the slap-to-the-face social interactions often unintentionally cause during a fertility struggle. Riviere’s portrait is self-depreciating, spans the course of three years, and captures infertility “in the heat of the moment.” The author’s quest for motherhood and self-love yield palpable lessons of empathy for all readers, regardless of their relationship with parenthood.Item First Steps(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Kiely, DeborahThe poems are intentionally accessible and holding at their core observations or concerns that are meant to be meaningful to the reader. Topics are drawn from an experienced life; work in corporate America, the domestic life of a mature family, the experiences in a small town community. The author tends to explore the nature of our temporal existence and the social norms of belonging. The work is written in a narrative free verse style often utilizing the second person to deliver a more quirky feel. The writer is simultaneously learning her own lessons in form and meter while delivering to the reader a diversity of experiences. In this work each poem stands as an original event.Item Black-Woman: and other stories(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Johnson, BriannaBlack-Woman: and other stories, a twelve story collection, provides a glimpse into the lives of various black Americans as they navigate such issues as loneliness, adulthood, and desire. Told from a variety of perspectives and backgrounds, the collection utilizes themes of “us vs. them” and “innocence vs. experience” in an effort to dismantle preconceived notions, and highlight the diversity within “blackness.”Item Jeffers - Master Magician(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Hooks, ChristopherIs Jeffers an Alligator Zoo Park magician or the Messiah? “Jeffers – Master Magician” is the story of two friends who live unapologetically on the edge of poverty in the rugged, un-decorous part of the South. Jimmy, a single father with an addict ex, and Jeffers, a magician whose tricks are closer to miracles, are immersed in a place where trailers and Hot Pockets dominate the landscape, and alligators roam free. Jimmy witnesses “losing” his best friend to his biggest trick gone awry, which dives the story into the friendship as it emerged in the Alligator Zoo Park and elsewhere. It isn’t until Jeffers’ return, clean-shaven and alligator bitten, that we realize his trick is a mere prelude for actual departure from this low world – leaving Jimmy behind in his hopelessness. Why do some of us escape and some of us stay? And what lurks there, gator-like, in the question of staying?Item Luxury Sex(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Hite, N'NekaItem House of Ash(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Carlson, Zoe BrittanyHouse of Ash is a novel of fiction that follows Ana, a young vampire duchess living in Florida who is torn between her unhappy marriage, her familial expectations, political allegiances, and the stirrings of war. She also seeks to understand herself and find her own happiness in the world. The novel is a work of Gothic literature that focuses on themes such as passion and repressed fears or desires, the nature of death and finding meaning in life, and the nature of obligation and expectation. The novel utilizes imagery, motif, and an intimate first person point of view in order to create an authentic, characterdriven narrative.Item AFTERLIGHT(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Berry, StevenAfterlight is a modular work which utilizes 17 found artifacts from a collection of many objects discovered by the author. The author functions as a curator, presenting these artifacts to the reader. At the core of the work is a mystery: a town which has disappeared from both records and the physical world. Found items in Afterlight are presented in their original forms, both to preserve their integrity and to filter out narrator bias. The curator and reader investigate the artifacts together, piecing together evidence and making conclusions along the way. Instead of solely reading the book, the audience is expected to act as a co‑investigator. The premise of Afterlight is an experiment in presenting a narrative that deviates from traditional structure and instead is meant to be experienced like an exhibit or case file. Afterlight is a vehicle to explore motifs of secrecy, finding identity, the pliability of truth, the terrors of uncertainties and unknowns, coming of age, the illusion of innocence, and to what extent anything can truly be forgoen. The variety of source material utilized throughout the book provided ample opportunities to work in different modes and tones, resulting in a product that more closely resembles reality than a first‑ or third‑person narrative method. Most importantly, Afterlight was created as a record of a place with no record; it no longer exists outside of these pages. Therefore, preserving the memories and events of that place was a prime motivator in the creation of the book.Item Hell Is a Strip with Neon Lights(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-06-15) Araujo, CamileSamantha DeLuna is a Dade-County Homicide Detective who watches her own body enter an ambulance on a stretcher. While she fights for her life in the present time, Hell Is a Strip with Neon Lights recounts the three and a half days that pushed Samantha to confront the facade of lies inside and outside the Department. The bright lights and festive atmosphere of Miami hide more secrets than they expose. The psychological intensity escalates as Samantha gets closer to solving the case. She must learn how to trust herself before she can see the dangerous truth threatening to consume her.Item The Justus Files: Book One(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) McGuire, HollyBy the cycle 2030, safe human cloning was not only possible but viable. Within thirty cycles, two million human clones were introduced into the population. Due to major flaws, The World Peace and Health Accords of 2060, outlawed human cloning. All nuclear weapons were ordered destroyed, and the use of fossil fuels banned. The nation’s defense contracts were privatized to “The Company,” helmed by Chairman Amil Sisk, II. In 2075, medical advancements designed to eradicate disease created a population far eclipsing the planet’s capacity, at over ten billion. Pollution and “Climate Change” caused the planet’s temperature to rise by twenty degrees. The planet’s air and water were toxic. Natural disasters abounded. The planet was dying of dehydration, starvation, and oppressive heat. Millions were lost, but the planet remained over-populated. The polar ice caps melted. The ozone layer suffered irreparable damage, allowing ultra violet rays to reach levels never predicted. Coastal flooding consumed great land masses and the world map changed. The Water Wars erupted in cycle 2081. The official story: Radical religious sects attacked the nation’s vunerable water supply and the Company retaliated creating a chain reaction of global proportions. This was a lie of such magnitude, it resulted in mass genocide. The actual purpose was to control water. A resource the world’s forefathers valued less than fossil fuels, which polluted the planet almost to extinction. The Company coordinated a militarized attack utilizing millions of cloaked drones armed with white flash bombs, concentrated on over-populated areas that burdened the planet’s dwindling resources. Chronic poverty areas were targeted with pinpointed, precision strikes. Entire cities left decimated. On the seven continents, much of the population was eradicated. Other areas were left wholly untouched. The morally and fiscally bankrupt government of the nation collapsed. The Capitol was destroyed. In the immediate pandemonium that ensued, representatives of the people called “politicians” were disposed of and all other nation’s governments were simultaneously disassembled. The Company formed “The New World State,” headquartered in a former colony once called the Triangle, New Carolina, located thirty miles inland from the Eastern Ocean. An information repository known as the “internet” was dismantled and history re-written. The war was efficient and quick, like cutting out a cancer. In less than one cycle, eight billion, three hundred million people were dead by white flash bombs, instantly disintegrating bodies to dust. The population was reduced by eighty percent. By cycle 2097, a different world recovered and white flash bombs were outlawed. This mass genocide was widely suspected to be orchestrated by one man, Amil J. Sisk, II. He vowed to repopulate with only the best of humanity to save the planet. “Perfects.” Those who were less than Perfect, were branded “taboo,” and forced to serve Sisk’s Perfect society. Taboos exist on the fringes. All are called “Citizens,” feigning a free society. No one is free. Everyone is the property of the Company. Citizens of the New World State, devoted to their savior and his mission to uphold the Perfect nuclear family and protect the planet. In 2175, fifteen-cycles-old Harmony Blue Justus’ bubble collapses in a global tragedy. Nothing is what it was. No one is who they seem, and life is far from Perfect. As Harmony and her best friend, Angus Cartwright search for their families, uncover truths about Amil Sisk, the Company, and themselves.Item Instincts of My Own(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) Weber, Michael RyanInstincts of My Own explores how family, friendship, and love irrefutably shape the present-day perception of self. The poems wind in and out of actual and imagined space, which is determined by the demands and restrictions that are repelled or submitted to. In 72 pages, the reader is taken from a crab apple orchard in upstate New York to the replica Trojan Horse in Troy, Turkey; from adolescence to adulthood, from first love to first love-making to first heartbreak, from familial bliss to familial loss, and ending in a place somewhere between optimistic trajectory and the fear of no more firsts. In the tradition of bildungsroman, the manuscript exposes the constant struggle between masculine bravado and unabashed sentimentality. Instinct of My Own demonstrates impulses toward storytelling, musicality, colorful imagery and lyricism, as the collection attempts to convey the human spirit by earnestly exploring the learned instincts of a single human.Item Cultural Diplomacy, A Creative Mind(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) Syarikin, Ninie"Cultural Diplomacy, A Creative Mind" is a collection of cross-genre writings, that features poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction. Not only is it a product of creativity and imagination, it is also a deeply extensive and personal journey, spanning decades of life that have gone through many countries, languages and cultures. As dynamics and diversity emerged, so did culture shock experienced by the author in stages of life, which, fortunately and delightfully, was welcomed by sound and optimistic outlook, which, most of the time, was derived from her Islamic values that she practices as a way of life. The author’s esteemed mentor, Josip Novakovich, described his mentee’s endeavor as follows: “Ninie’s writing is full of positive energy and good will to understand our complex world in such a way that culture clash should be a source of consciousness-raising, rather than animosity. She has a great wisdom in how she approaches various cultures and her own, in a highly individualistic and original way, yet, respecting the family, extended family, and nations.” Novakovich’s observation comes in agreement with one of the most quoted Qur’anic verses, which is: “O mankind! We have created you male and female, and have made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know one another.” In presenting the principle themes of her thesis, the author utilizes several forms of expressions, namely poetry, short story, chapter of a novel, memoir, autobiographical essay, personal essay, lyrical prose, flash fiction and flash nonfiction, all that compliment and complement her literary adventure.Item Women I Have Known(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) Stramella, DonnaWomen I Have Known is a collection of intimate portraits of six dissimilar women. Although they have distinctive life experiences, they are alike in the fears they face and the joys they seek. Some speak more passionately than others, but each has a story to tell and each of those stories has affected the author. Each of the six chapters features one of the women. Some tell their whole life stories—including one cut dramatically short—and others focus on select, defining periods of their lives. Aesthetically, these portraits are revealed through: scene and dialogue; anecdotes; conflict; affirmation and negation; and the author’s personal reflections on the women’s influences. Through interviews, research, and memory, each subject is presented true to her essence. Collectively, the pieces explore several themes: motherhood; the struggle between darkness and light; and the fear of loss, specifically the loss of a child. For two, their greatest fear is realized.Item The Ditch Between(MFA in Creative Writing, The University of Tampa, 2017-01-05) Starling, AmandaThe Ditch Between is a collection of ten short stories set mostly in the seedy fictional city of Renton, Florida. Each story showcases multi-dimensional characters and their journeys from innocence to experience, focusing on the strange details of how humans interact with one another. Most of the main characters grapple with loss, and many are left to question love, their faith, and their connection to the spiritual world. The collection as a whole seeks to examine and tear down the nature of labels often assigned to members of the working class, race, and mental illness.