Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 38-08, Section: A, page: 4832. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1977.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 37-12, Section: A, page: 7755. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1976.

The novel takes place in the South, among lower-middle-class working people, who--with one or two exceptions--did not finish high school and have never read a book. They are the kind of people referred to as "trailer-trash," people two or three generations removed from their genuine rural roots, who grew up in towns, away from the strong family ties and traditional small-town religion that their grand- or great-grandparents left behind, who have no urban traditions to guide their lives in towns, and whose values have consequently been formed around the only culture that speaks to them--American popular culture; movies, television, and pop music. Accordingly, their conscious thought and feeling tend to be stunted; in the novel, a layered narration tries to suggest the richer subconscious levels that coexist, in the characters, along with the less-developed conscious level. / The first narrative line takes place in a "real-time" span of the last four days of the ten-year marriage between two characters, Griffin and Sarah. Although these two are close emotionally, they are incompatible sexually and socially, and it is clear from the beginning of the novel that their marriage must end, not only because of their personal disjuncture, but because Sarah has become involved in an affair with a character named Mark, a more exciting relationship for her than her marriage, and a relationship she feels unable to give up. / The second narrative line is made up of a series of flashbacks, which take up about half the novel, begin in the childhoods of the three main characters, and attempt to show how Sarah became the ideal object of Griffin's youthful fantasy, how marriage to Griffin became a necessary escape for Sarah when she needed one, and how Mark's background shaped him to fit his place in the triangle. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-03, Section: A, page: 0507. / Major Professor: Jerome H. Stern. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 39-06, Section: A, page: 3579. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1978.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 36-08, Section: A, page: 5308. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1975.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 39-11, Section: A, page: 6762. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1978.

Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 39-11, Section: A, page: 6763. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1978.

The novel takes place in the South, among lower-middle-class working people, who--with one or two exceptions--did not finish high school and have never read a book. They are the kind of people referred to as "trailer-trash," people two or three generations removed from their genuine rural roots, who grew up in towns, away from the strong family ties and traditional small-town religion that their grand- or great-grandparents left behind, who have no urban traditions to guide their lives in towns, and whose values have consequently been formed around the only culture that speaks to them--American popular culture; movies, television, and pop music. Accordingly, their conscious thought and feeling tend to be stunted; in the novel, a layered narration tries to suggest the richer subconscious levels that coexist, in the characters, along with the less-developed conscious level. / The first narrative line takes place in a "real-time" span of the last four days of the ten-year marriage between two characters, Griffin and Sarah. Although these two are close emotionally, they are incompatible sexually and socially, and it is clear from the beginning of the novel that their marriage must end, not only because of their personal disjuncture, but because Sarah has become involved in an affair with a character named Mark, a more exciting relationship for her than her marriage, and a relationship she feels unable to give up. / The second narrative line is made up of a series of flashbacks, which take up about half the novel, begin in the childhoods of the three main characters, and attempt to show how Sarah became the ideal object of Griffin's youthful fantasy, how marriage to Griffin became a necessary escape for Sarah when she needed one, and how Mark's background shaped him to fit his place in the triangle. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 49-03, Section: A, page: 0507. / Major Professor: Jerome H. Stern. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987. / The novel takes place in the South, among lower-middle-class working people, who--with one or two exceptions--did not finish high school and have never read a book. They are the kind of people referred to as "trailer-trash," people two or three generations removed from their genuine rural roots, who grew up in towns, away from the strong family ties and traditional small-town religion that their grand- or great-grandparents left behind, who have no urban traditions to guide their lives in towns, and whose values have consequently been formed around the only culture that speaks to them--American popular culture; movies, television, and pop music. Accordingly, their conscious thought and feeling tend to be stunted; in the novel, a layered narration tries to suggest the richer subconscious levels that coexist, in the characters, along with the less-developed conscious level. / The first narrative line takes place in a "real-time" span of the last four days of the ten-year marriage between two characters, Griffin and Sarah. Although these two are close emotionally, they are incompatible sexually and socially, and it is clear from the beginning of the novel that their marriage must end, not only because of their personal disjuncture, but because Sarah has become involved in an affair with a character named Mark, a more exciting relationship for her than her marriage, and a relationship she feels unable to give up. / The second narrative line is made up of a series of flashbacks, which take up about half the novel, begin in the childhoods of the three main characters, and attempt to show how Sarah became the ideal object of Griffin's youthful fantasy, how marriage to Griffin became a necessary escape for Sarah when she needed one, and how Mark's background shaped him to fit his place in the triangle.

Organ Music is a comic novel of approximately 100,000 words about a playwright, Rosalind Lawson, and here attempt to escape from a fundamentalist-ridden north Florida town. When her husband, Henry, a folklorist, remarks that he would be willing to leave Ohumpka if Roz beat his salary, she accepts a job as a dialoguist for a new Atlanta-based soap. As her new job progresses, Roz finds her own life slowly turning to soap until she realizes that a person with a comic worldview cannot find happiness writing for a humorless medium any more than she can find happiness living in a humorless town. / The novel celebrates the Comic Spirit but also satirizes four dismal phenomena in our society: workaholism, soap opera, fundamentalism, and pornography. After four months on the soap, Roz is caught in a terrible tangle of the four, which have more in common, she discovers, than most people realize or would care to admit. Yet, it is this very tangle that enables her to escape from Ohumpka. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 50-10, Section: A, page: 3227. / Major Professors: Janet Burroway; Jerome Stern. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1989. / Organ Music is a comic novel of approximately 100,000 words about a playwright, Rosalind Lawson, and here attempt to escape from a fundamentalist-ridden north Florida town. When her husband, Henry, a folklorist, remarks that he would be willing to leave Ohumpka if Roz beat his salary, she accepts a job as a dialoguist for a new Atlanta-based soap. As her new job progresses, Roz finds her own life slowly turning to soap until she realizes that a person with a comic worldview cannot find happiness writing for a humorless medium any more than she can find happiness living in a humorless town. / The novel celebrates the Comic Spirit but also satirizes four dismal phenomena in our society: workaholism, soap opera, fundamentalism, and pornography. After four months on the soap, Roz is caught in a terrible tangle of the four, which have more in common, she discovers, than most people realize or would care to admit. Yet, it is this very tangle that enables her to escape from Ohumpka.

Tricks of the Heart is a contemporary Southern Gothic novel set in rural North Florida, in fictional Torreya County, focusing on the lives of two extended families, one white, one black. The story, which covers the events of a single winter night, is sparked by a death which could have been murder, and by the disappearance of an autistic child. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 51-04, Section: A, page: 1232. / Major Professor: Jerome Stern. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1990. / Tricks of the Heart is a contemporary Southern Gothic novel set in rural North Florida, in fictional Torreya County, focusing on the lives of two extended families, one white, one black. The story, which covers the events of a single winter night, is sparked by a death which could have been murder, and by the disappearance of an autistic child.