Fiction Commons^™

Double, Double, Toils And Troubles: Analyzing The “Magical” Relationships Between University Leaders’ Personality Traits And Their Self-Efficacy In Leadership Situations, Fay Ludvine Boudreaux

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This present study investigated the relationship between higher education leaders’ personality traits and their self-efficacy in leadership situations. A total of 151 leaders employed across the nine institutions within the University of Louisiana System completed a survey that prompted them to identify their personal values, traits, and skill sets, as derived from the online Pottermore quiz, the official Harry Potter Hogwarts House sorting instrument. This niche personality metric was chosen to cater to higher education’s evolving landscape, as it welcomes an influx of Millennials into leadership positions. Participants’ responses were eventually recoded to “sort” them into their respective Houses: Gryffindor, …

Pal, Alex Tronson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A collection of short fiction set in the Midwest.

Heritage Dreams, Southern Nightmares, Chanèl P. Etienne

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The stories compiled here are the fruits of many deep discussions, late nights, and countless cups of coffee. The themes come from what I have dreamt of, fretted over, and/or hope will never come true. They took up so much room in my head that I had to spill them into paper. Tread lightly in the dreamscape.

The Wallpaper Man And Other Stories, Allyson M. Langhoff

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In this collection of short stories, female-driven storylines in both speculative and realistic fiction focus on the themes of feminism, becoming one’s own hero, and the pain of lost love.

We Built This Kingdom, John H. Cape

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

We Built This Kingdom is a collection of short stories which strive to examine the nuances of queer love, lust, connection, aggression, affection, masculinity, and heartache.

My intent is for these pieces to stand alone as short stories, but when read sequentially, the reader should be able to parse a connection between the texts and follow a tether from one to the other.

This collection of short fiction represents a cumulative body of work in partial completion of a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing.

Let’S Speak Of The Things We Don’T Tell Each Other, Meghan N. O'Brien

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A collection of short fiction that examines human loneliness and the animal strength found in isolation.

Enough, Michelle K. Bourgeois

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This collection of short stories follows the themes of trauma and the feeling of not being enough for yourself or others. This includes the pressures we put on ourselves to keep trying to be “right” or what we’re “supposed to be”. The idea is apparent that reaching out instead of self- isolating benefits the characters. What also connects these works is a hint of Southern flair, family, and humor. An irreverent voice connects the work and most of the characters. The inclusion of humor to get through suffering and as a way to talk about tough subjects is a concurrent …

Boys Will Be Boys, Kirsten Quarforth

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This is a work of fiction. The following five stories are all interconnected and of the young adult (YA) genre.

Not The Only Star In The Sky, Faith Elizabeth Poynor

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a collection of fiction short stories written in fulfillment of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of New Orleans. These speculative stories share a common theme of longing for connection. The characters are searching for meaningful connections with each other to alleviate their loneliness.

Becoming A Constellation, Meredith P. Contreras

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In the following thesis, titled “Becoming a Constellation,” nine short stories navigate themes of womanhood and illustrate the ways in which life experiences shape a person. Each piece occurs in the fictional Louisiana town of St. Denis and explores setting as an integral piece of character development. The narratives offer a glimpse into the lives of several young women as they grapple with inevitable change and difficult relationships while becoming the women they choose to be.

Serious Men, Michael Jesse Bass

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a Fiction story collection written in fulfillment of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of New Orleans.

Cherchez Les Femmes, Sheila M. Arndt

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Cherchez les Femmes is a collection of short stories set in 1890s New Orleans. It follows a group of women as they struggle to find their ways in the world and explores how their lives are affected by a visiting circus sideshow, the eponymous “Cherchez les Femmes.” The collection is concerned with the following: women’s bodies as sites of both suffering and liberation; freedoms metaphorical and literal and how such freedoms are often constrained by gender; performance as it relates to gender and the body and the ways in which such performativity is both tribulation and elation. It also just …

Fool I'Ve Been, Blake Carpenter

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Hindi For Beginners: The B Side, Dylan E. Hawkins

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a work of fiction written in fulfillment of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of New Orleans.

The Seven Temptations Of The Sea And Eight Other Tales, Greta C. Hayer

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This short story collection is a thesis in fiction written in fulfillment of the Master in Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of New Orleans.

Unboxing, Margaret Herlocker

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Unboxing is a collection of short stories that all try and grapple with the complexities of female relationships. Whether the relationship between mothers and daughters or two friends, this collection attempts to show the importance of these relationships in a world that often seems set against them.

Good Daddy, Layth Sihan

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Holtalanders, Ross W. Nervig

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The Holtalanders is a story cycle is set in the Viking era and follows the inhabitants of Holta Island. Where many works of Viking fiction focus on the seafaring warrior that defines the epoch, The Holtalanders is concerned with the folks found in the margins of the sagas: women, slaves, eunuchs, misfits, children and the elderly. Beyond the raiding and pillaging for which they are known, beyond the longships and the erroneous horned helmets, those living during the Norse medieval age were subsistence-level farmers and fishermen tied to the cycles of nature. In these pages, the author explores what it …

Cydonia, Luke Sirinides

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Cydonia is a Young Adult novel. It is the first novel in a planned trilogy.

The Bird Woman, Erinn Beth M. Langille

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Spinners' Tales, Sierra N. Offutt

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

“The Spinners’ Tales” is a loosely connected story collection exploring the lives of a variety of supernaturally gifted characters, referred to within their own community as Spinners.

We Will Plant Birds Of Paradise, Genevieve A. Rheams

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Sixth Form, Adrienne Barton

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The ten stories in this short story collection explore the liminal spaces created by certain physical spaces as well as times in the characters’ lives. The stories are largely related to a school environment, and the relationships and experiences that are unique to the players living and moving within that context. How much are the relationships and actions of the characters influenced by the setting. What weight do institutional forces and tradition carry in the characters’ lives, and how do they exploit it for their own will or conform?

Crossroads And Crow Feathers, Travis E. Bowman

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses the short story form to examine the influence of myth, magick, and the supernatural on the interstitial areas of the United States. The power of words as a force for change figures prominently in these stories. This thesis looks at the monstrous as it moves in the darkness and in the minds of humans, but also at the tremendous depths of compassion and courage we find in ourselves when faced with monstrous situations.

Road Closed To Thru Traffic, Jordan C. Crook

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This collection of nine fiction stories explores the journeys of men and women who find themselves unable to continue on the path they've set for themselves. So often, the roads we follow are dictated by social conditioning. This collection considers how are paths are predetermined by social norms and follows the characters as they react to unexpected obstacles encountered in common scenarios. Will they forge new paths? Turn back? Or will they take a detour and return to their original road?

The First Rule Of Improv, John M. Gilder

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

The First Rule of Improv is a collection of fictional short stories concerned with loss, life’s unfairness, the weight of the past, and how people succeed or fail in coping. Each story explores these notions through its characters, who vary wildly in terms of both dramatic severity and success in the face of adversity, with the first rule of improv—to accept and build—being suggested by the author as the healthiest manner of approach, if not necessarily the easiest.

Undertow, Adam Karlin

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A short story collection that explores themes of culture, history, race, movement, stagnancy, and freedom. All stories are connected by elements of water, swimming, rivers, or wetlands. All contain characters seeking to escape their circumstances, with varying degrees of success. For some characters, the arc of their development lays in their movement; for others, it lays in their learning to live with a lack of movement.

Dark Smoke Rising, Matthew Knutson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A collection of short fiction set in and around Southern California.

“To Be Men, Not Destroyers”: Developing Dabrowskian Personalities In Ezra Pound’S The Cantos And Neil Gaiman’S American Gods, Michelle A. Nicholson

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Kazimierz Dabrowski’s psychological theory of positive disintegration is a lesser known theory of personality development that offers an alternative critical perspective of literature. It provides a framework for the characterization of postmodern protagonists who move beyond heroic indoctrination to construct their own self-organized, autonomous identities. Ezra Pound’s The Cantos captures the speaker-poet’s extensive process of inner conflict, providing a unique opportunity to track the progress of the hero’s transformation into a personality, or a man. American Gods is a more fully realized portrayal of a character who undergoes the complete paradigmatic collapse of positive disintegration and deliberate self-derived self-revision …

The Half-Lives We Were Living, Chelsey K. Shannon

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This short story collection deals with themes of race, kinship, desire, subjectivity, and appearance vs. reality.