Your eyes open: a memoir

Set between the years of 2009 and 2012, Your Eyes Open: A Memoir is not only a portrait of adolescence but also an intimate look at a contemporary American family—one in upheaval. This novel manuscript uses the author’s family as a case study: their narrative serves as a testament to the unfilled promises inherent in the so-called “American Dream” as well as the isolating effects of upward mobility. Suburban malaise, mental health issues, and internalized ideologies duke it out across these pages as I, do my best to, record the messy process of self-making. Multiple points of view and the manipulation of time serve to underscore the narrator’s impending personal crisis as the text asks: how do we proceed after our experiences leave us shattered?M.F.A.by Matthew Lowell Stalnake