Tones of Gray : A Collection of Short Stories

Abstract

The author writes about her collection of six original short stories: “the variety of these stories is purposeful, to a certain extent, because I wanted my SIP to reflect the range of writing I have absorbed in my time at K. I feel the six stories in this collection are an accurate representation of the skill I have accumulated, for this range includes pieces written in first, second, and third person, as well as a mixture of lengths and genres. This assortment was purposeful, and I feel that it does show the dexterity of my writing. What does connect these stories, however, is the theme of despair, which is relevant—albeit to different degrees—in each piece, as a concept I was not conscious of at the time of their creation. This 'hopeless' theme was a puzzling realization for me. When I think of my time as a Kalamazoo College student, hopeless is not the immediate feeling or thought I reach. In fact, my experience at K has been the opposite; I do not think of the past four years as hopeless, but as an integral period of my life that has held much self-growth, discovery, and development as a human being and as a writer. Yet the stories in this collection are the culmination of my time at K, the purest exemplification of what I have learned about the craft of writing over the past four years, and I do not believe the theme of despair is accidental across many of the pieces I have written throughout this time. This has led me to understand the culprit behind much of the pain in these stories can be attributed to perhaps the largest factor impacting my senior year: a global pandemic.”