The heavens turn by themselves

The Heavens Turn by Themselves is a literary fiction novel that tells the story of Rachel Hammond, a seventeen-year-old woman grappling with the repercussions of her mother’s death in an earthquake that strikes Victoria, British Columbia. Instead of allowing herself to grieve, Rachel takes on the responsibility of caring for her traumatized family, including her father, younger brother, and older half-sister who, burdened by guilt, runs away from Vancouver to the earthquake-ravaged city. When the family goes there to find her, their anguish is aggravated by the emergency conditions they confront: lack of electricity and clean water, unavailability of safe shelter, and strained social structures. Together, they seek both the lost sibling and a resolution to family conflict that would allow them to surmount their shared pain. Research to write this novel included a review of psychological literature describing common responses to trauma and stages of grief after the death of a loved one. Personal narratives of teenagers who have lost a parent were analyzed to understand the unique inner conflict they face: already in an uncertain transition between carefree adolescence and responsible adulthood, they must now cope with the absence of their departed parent and the care they had provided. To set these characters in a realistic context of a city in ruins, a survey was conducted of documentaries that showed the large-scale devastation of recent earthquakes in Japan and New Zealand, along with essays that told personal stories of those who survived the initial impact of these natural disasters and their gruelling aftermath. The Heavens Turn by Themselves explores the dynamics of a fractured family along with themes of grief, guilt, fate, and duties of care. My hope is the reader will better understand and empathize with mournful young people who, like the protagonist, prioritize the needs of others over themselves.Arts, Faculty ofGraduat