THE DISAPPEARANCE OF SHANNON WHITE

The Disappearance of Shannon White is a Mystery-Thriller novel. The aim of the piece is to explore thematic components including perseverance, socio-economic inequities, the stigmas and medical malpractice of the American mental health system in the late twentieth century, and, ultimately, to entertain. My earliest love in the literary world was science fiction and fantasy. Writers like Robert Jordan, and more recently, Simone St. James, create worlds that test the bounds of reality in a way that I find liberating, and I seek to implement this in my own work. Such authors have taught me that fiction offers freedom to the imagination, and creates a space for the artist to take internalized and important matters to the public sphere. I try to create art that both speaks to my desire to be an entertainer while also unpacking current topics with the same urgency that realism often harnesses well. Ultimately, I desire to create art that captures an audience with the high-impact entertainment factors of genre while also incorporating bigger, more abstract ideas that color the nature of our humanity.