Fiction Commons^™

Pulse, Vol. 1 Spring 2022

PULSE: A Student Publication of Literary & Artistic Works

No abstract provided.

Dungeons And Devised Theatre: A Study Of Tabletop Gaming And Its Application In Playwriting And Character Development, Sabrina E. Becker

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is an exploration of the connections and application of tabletop gaming in theatre. It looks at the initial process that was used in devising a play from tabletop gaming and also the applications of using tabletop gaming to further character development. This paper serves as a journal of first-hand accounts and interviews during this process so you may be inspired to build your own process either based in what you read here or discovering your own. There is a sample excerpt of the play to show what can be accomplished as well as other artistic works that came …

The Mvohc Project, Brooke Day

All Theses

ABSTRACT

A Mvohc is a Morphic Vessel of Human Consciousness. The Mvohc Project traverses' theories of spatial identity in tandem with creative world-building as a method for examining the intricacies of the human condition and reimagining reality. My creations are designed to promote autonomy over the contemporary world's ever-evolving societal complexities to empower individuals, foster imagination and communication, and create space for positive change. This body of work incorporates fleshy biomorphic sculptures inspired by science fiction, deep-sea marine life, and the human body. The abject creatures are partnered with constructed audio-scapes that encompass the frenzy of an overarching internal monologue, …

The Role Of The Reader Is To Fallow: Responding To The Negative Reception Of Paul Verhoeven’S Film Adaptation Of Starship Troopers, Julian Meyerstrom

Undergraduate Research Symposium

Robert A. Keinlein’s science fiction novel Starship Troopers (1959), and its film adaption of the same title directed by Paul Verhoeven (1997), received mixed critical reactions. Both pieces came across as supporting fascistic ideals to most critics upon release, despite the two creators opposing political and moral beliefs. Using Louise Rosenblatt's reader response theory as a framework for analyzing both the novel and film adaptation, this paper postulates the film adaptation fails to deliver an accurate critique of the novel by placing the burden of moral knowledge on the audience. Keinlein’s novel guides the reader into his moral sensibilities, whereas …

Inscape 2021, Morehead State University.

Inscape: Art & Literary Magazine Archive

The 2021 edition of the Inscape: Literary and Art Magazine.

Night Of Awakening: Strength And Empowerment In The Young Adult Fiction Genre, Shelby Ann Davis

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The Young Adult Fantasy genre is often written off as a useless, or immature form of writing. However, there are studies that prove that this specific genre is not only engaging, but it is also empowering for young readers. By writing toward adolescent readers, authors are able to promote various ways in which their characters adjust or interact with their surroundings, which also influences their readers’ self and social awareness. By representing feminist perspectives and depicting the effects of trauma, YA literature fosters progressive social change and conveys the importance of mental health. In writing my own novel, The Night …

I Love You, Go Away (A Novel), John Matthew Steinhafel

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

I Love You, Go Away, a novel set in Milwaukee, tells the story of a twenty-two year-old nobody, Gabriel Driscoll, who meets and befriends a middle-aged, drug addicted, recluse actor, Beau Brooks. But less than six months into their friendship Beau commits suicide. At the funeral Gabriel meets a twenty-nine-year-old corporate executive, Michelle, the daughter of Beau’s long-time girlfriend. Gabriel and Michelle bond over their mutual grief and quickly strike up a romance. At the same time, Gabriel’s semi-estranged mother, Sadie, a recovering heroin addict, reaches out to him in an effort to rebuild their relationship. What follows for Gabriel …

Time Machine Research And Approach, Tarek Bouraque

Theses and Dissertations

Time Machine is a hybrid documentary that explores the logics of enslavement, colonialism, eurocentrism and their interconnectedness in our globalized world. Mustapha Azemmouri, born in 1502, undertakes a journey to the 21st century to recount his own story of enslavement and exploration, and reflects on a collective puzzle of 500 years of hidden history.

From The Shadows: Setting As An Expression Of Character Development In The Epic Fantasy Genre, Leah Henson

Senior Honors Theses

Epic fantasy is a genre defined by its setting. It offers writers the opportunity to be incredibly specific with the way setting contributes to the overall story, specifically as an aid character development. In order to successfully use setting to support character development, the writer must understand what preconceptions with which the reader enters the epic fantasy genre and what purpose setting plays in the overarching story world. The writer must determine what setting elements to include and, just as importantly, which to leave out. Finally, because setting is such an abstract component of writing, it is useful not only …

Hey Boo, I’Ve Been Lonely. What’S Good With You?, Khari Johnson-Ricks

Theses and Dissertations

I explore the interlacing macro and micro implications of capitalism on interpersonal relationships. In an attempt to reconcile that problem I use storytelling, painting, and performance to imagine radical futures when love safety and abundance are easier to access.

Inscape 2020, Morehead State University.

Inscape: Art & Literary Magazine Archive

The 2020 edition of the Inscape: Literary and Art Magazine.

Sadie Jane, Esther French

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Sadie Jane is a novella set in the town of Gypsum, a fictional location in rural Kentucky. The introduction covers the inspiration for the novella, which is based on Southern storytelling traditions and features the adventures of Sadie Jane, an independent octogenarian who returns to her hometown after many years. Sadie experiences the internal challenges of regrets and grief as well as the external challenges of busybodies and car thieves before finding her place in the community.

Hypha, Emily Ruth-Diehl Brooks

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

For hundreds of years, Ona and her people have been unknowingly enslaved. Ona has given everything she is to the spiritual people on the mountain, including her own son. So when rumors spread through the swamp’s magical mycelium that she and her people are slaves, Ona must find the truth and, if possible, reunite with her son before he becomes as evil as those who raised him. Meanwhile, her son has his own doubts after his people leave his friend to die. As he and Ona journey separately to save the people they love, they find everything they believed to …

Fistful Of Shovel, Marcee Wardell

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

My thesis project is a draft of a novel. It is literary/realistic fiction telling the story of a single father of a young daughter who struggles with navigating complicated relationships and building a meaningful life for himself and his daughter in their small town. In this draft, the protagonist, Clint, deals with developing new romantic relationships while managing his relationships with his daughter’s mother, her family, and his, as well as recognizing his portion of the blame in the dissolution of his romantic relationship with his daughter’s mother and the biases and expectations that prevent his healing and development.

The Sad Kitchen And Song Of Neon: Two Novellas, John Paul King

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The Sad Kitchen, a work of magical realism, tells the story of a saintly woman named Helen. She opens an underground kitchen where people who feel guilty can come to be comforted and nurtured in the middle of the night. The story is, at its heart, a reflection on forgiveness. Song of Neon, also of the magical realist genre, is an existential work about a nurse named Avery and her husband, an owl house maker, named Saul. Their town, Milliard, is under a trance. Avery and Saul struggle with their respective identities in the quiet, vacuum the town has become.

Kentuckiana, And A Dash Of Cambodia: A Collection Of Short Stories, Brodie Lee Gress

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The following is a collection of five short stories set in regions familiar to me: “Dewberry Park,” “YouLead,” and “The Color Violet” in Indiana; “Mens Rea” in Kentucky; and “Tory Ride” in Cambodia. Gay identity plays a role in many of these stories, and other themes explored include family, region, socioeconomics, gender, mentality, and change. These stories are concerned with people on the brink, failing and surviving all the same. Some of them are intended to weigh, and some to satirize. I hope they all nick their readers.

Nicole Sumida And Alex Yu Interview, Laraib Malik

Asian American Art Oral History Project

Bio: Nicole Sumida is a co-founder and co-publisher of Riksha Magazine, an online magazine featuring creative work by and about Asian Americans. Alex Yu is a co-publisher of Riksha and both have been involved in community arts organizing since the 1990s in Chicago.

“Riksha provides a space for capturing the Asian American experience through compelling writing, commentary, and artistic expression. We curate an online magazine that presents poetry, fiction, non-fiction, fine arts, and video and audio pieces. We also comment on and curate the bric-a-brac and ephemera of Asian American life.”

Universe Of Things: A Human Presentation Of Food-For-Thought., Madeline Halpern

Bachelor of Fine Arts Senior Papers

I present this statement under three loose categories: People, Objects and their Environment. I consider People as human, Objects as art objects, domestic objects, and food, and Environment as the shared space of the former groups. Food directs this statement as I present each concept and creative process as a metaphorical dish. Material exploration carried me from a direct practice of reorienting acrylic paint and questioning object functionality through personified sculptures into theoretical thesis work in which I use interpersonal relations and the idea of consumption to translate tactile, gustatory and olfactory sensations into digital film. In this meal I …

For Cheryl: The Long And The Short Of It, Rachel Lebo

Graduate School of Art Theses

Short stories are an indirect way of creating a truth by showing instead of telling. They are a way to observe and communicate a single idea. A short story for me is a vehicle for hiding my truth behind a character, exploring myself in the safety of an identity that is not my own. When I read Chunky in Heat, author A.M. Homes and I hide together behind her character, Cheryl, and find solidarity.

The following writings, paintings, and sculptures are collaborations between myself and the women of short story fiction. Those women being the authors, the subjects, and …

Painting A Biblical Worldview In Children, Brook Blackwell

Senior Honors Theses

Children are impressionable beings shaped by the changing world around them; this has become increasingly more true as the years progress and the impact and prevalence of media rises. Television shows, movies, music and books, no matter how insignificant they may seem, can play a tremendous part in the growth of children’s worldviews. It is important for authors and artists to delve deep into the impact of media on the growth and development of children in today’s media-rich world. In doing so, they should hope to find the best way to implement a Christian worldview into the media a child …

Inscape 2019, Morehead State University.

Inscape: Art & Literary Magazine Archive

The 2019 edition of the Inscape: Literary and Art Magazine.

A Fiction Of Fragmented Falsehoods: Curriculum Of Unwanted Roads Traveled, Katherine Wyatt

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This is an inquiry centered on lived ‘otherness’ in different social experiences. Fiction and illustrations are both creative outlets that provide opportunities of curriculum growth by offering the viewer realistic portrayals dealing with truth and factors that make us fundamentally human. “Fiction elicits an interpretation of the world by being itself a worldlike object for interpretation” (Dillard, 1988, p. 155). This study uses fiction and illustrations as vehicles of communication to provide an awareness regarding social issues in everyday lived experiences, exposing the reader to the social, cultural and historical realities persistently impeding the shared constructs of human experiences. Structuring …

Run Me Dusk, Zane Truman Dezeeuw

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This is a full-length novel with a critical afterward. Run Me Dusk is a falling-out of love narrative about twenty-seven-year-old Milo who, after being broken up with by his boyfriend Red, flees from Illinois back to his hometown in southwestern Colorado to meditate on his place and purpose in life. The themes covered in this book are gay relationships, family relationships, mortality, and the natural world.

The Earth, The Moon, The Stars: Stories, Cameron Jay Moreno

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This is a book-length, hybrid collection of short stories and poetry with a critical introduction. The narrative of these stories and poems are told through the perspective of Xavi Muñoz and various characters related to him. In theme, this collection explores machismo and Xavi’s attempt at overcoming it by discovering the intersectionality between masculinity, sexuality, gender, and gender roles. In addition, the introduction theorizes about masculinity by relating it to water.

Misassembled Monsters, Jenn Brown

Graduate School of Art Theses

This thesis is a narrative of personal and material history. Through my work in painting, sculpture, and installation, I seek to share my story of emotional armoring in an attempt to connect to an audience. In my work, I look to my personal memories of growing up in a small, midwestern town and armoring myself with emotional barriers against its social construct of “normalcy.” Inspired by Medieval suits of armor and the characteristics of Goth culture throughout history, I employ my work to present the stage of a theatrical battleground. Creating each of my pieces is a fight for the …

How To Be The Perfect Asian Wife!, Sophia Hill

Art and Art History Honors Projects

“How to be the Perfect Asian Wife” critiques exploitative power systems that assault female bodies of color in intersectional ways. This work explores strategies of healing and resistance through inserting one’s own narrative of flourishing rather than surviving, while reflecting violent realities. Three large drawings mimic pervasive advertisement language and presentation reflecting the oppressive strategies used to contain women of color. Created with charcoal, watercolor, and ink, these 'advertisements' contrast with an interactive rice bag filled with comics of my everyday experiences. These documentations compel viewers to reflect on their own participation in systems of power.

Mental Illness As Portrayed Through Art, Brianna Brown

Honors Theses

I was thinking of what to do for my thesis while taking classes with Vin about Anthropological Research and I realized how flawed it all was. Anthropology was born from colonialism where scholars from the United States would go to some far-off places to study the people there in hopes that they have found an interesting enough culture to get common people like you and me to want to read a book they later publish. The only way it would sell though is if this story, emphasis on story, read like a book of fiction, so far from what we …

The Keepers: A Collaborative Constructive Narrative Podcast, Shay Carroll

Honors Projects

This is a fictional podcast series that presents a story that is completed through roleplaying. The structure follows that of a video game, with the main characters, or "players," interacting with a set plot while deciding their own course of action. I act as the narrator for the story, controlling the plot and setting as well as non-player characters, or "NPCs." For the purposes of consistency and making sure the characters do not do anything that would be considered too over-powered or unrealistic, I have chosen to use the rule guide and statistics modifier system presented by Wizards of the …

Inscape 2018, Morehead State University.

Inscape: Art & Literary Magazine Archive

The 2018 edition of the Inscape: Literary and Art Magazine.

On Nature's Prototypes: Character Design And Worldbuilding, Taylor J. Bardon

Theses and Dissertations

Nature’s Prototypes is an ongoing narrative series that blends realism and fiction to create both dialectic plot structures and image sets. For substance, the series utilizes biological inquiries into fields, like ecology, pathology, and bioengineering, to imagine action-centric vignettes, where animalistic to monstrous characters become the predominant actors in a post-dystopian worldscape. Throughout these vignettes, these characters are subjected to the trials and tribulations of the catalysts and flux that are imposed upon them. In the series’ larger scope, these vignettes are sequential events within a larger timeline and an original mythos that delve into the implications and the intrigue …