Pete Pock-A-Doo and Beverly, Too : Memoirs of a Dad and Daughter

Abstract

The author creates a work of autobiographical fiction inspired by works by Scott Momaday and Sandra Cisneros that intersperses audio recordings of her father with her own memoir. In her introduction, the author describes her father’s cancer diagnosis when she was younger and his more recent struggle with kidney failure. She writes, “In the simplest terms, this is a memoir about me and my dad. It is the result of a search for clarity, but first, a clarification: My dad is not a cancer patient. I try to think of him instead as a man charged with the task of carrying an extra load, and although God isn't a name we throw around the house very much anymore, he believes that's who gave it to him. This project began when God chose to make that load a little heavier for several months during my last two years of college.”