COMPOSITE ARTS No.18: YOUTH

I am happy to announce my story, "Fumbling Towards Greatness," has made its grand debut in Composite Arts Magazine's current issue (No. 18: Youth)
And there was much rejoicing

"Fumbling Towards Greatness" is the title piece from my short story collection (and MFA thesis), and the piece I chose for my graduation reading in Berlin this summer. While I am fond of all the stories in my collection (with a few more to be still completed), in many ways this one is the most directly autobiographical. Not because I wanted to be a boy scout (though I  did. Mostly because I envied the sharp look of the blue Cub Scout uniforms, whose gold kerchief accent seemed to afford the Cub Scout boys a certain gravitas I could never quite achieve in my Brownie outfits, what with their brown and white collared shirts that looked, in my mother's own words, "like men's long underwear." Thanks, Ma!) but because I struggled with––I still struggle with––navigating the internal and external pressures that shape a person's slog through life and ultimately mold us into our identities. The search for identity is probably at the heart of this story: Who we are, who we can be; What we are, what we can be. Entangled in that search is the complicated notion of Destiny as colored and shaded by our favorite piece of folklore, The American Dream.

Anyway, this story found its way over to the Youth Issue of Composite Arts Magazine, thanks to a certain editor who also happens to be in the same MFA program yours truly was so recently graduated from, so thank you Joey Pizzolato! I truly hope you will take time to visit Composite Arts because the journal is innovative, funky, thoughtful, and artistically compelling.  And I am not just saying that because my words grace the center of the current issue. The journal as a whole is a beautiful and visually stunning piece of work so please check it out at this link below:

http://issuu.com/compositearts/docs/composite_no18youth . 

Thanks for reading, and have a Happy Wednesday!