Jaws of Life
In the hills of north central West Virginia, there lives a cast of ​characters who face all manner of problems. From the people who are incarcerated in West Virginia's prisons, to a woman who is learning how to lose her sight with grace, to another who sorely regrets selling her land to a fracking company, Jaws of Life portrays the diverse concerns the people of this region face every day -- poverty, mental illness, drug abuse, the loss of the coal mines, and the rise of new extractive industries that exert their own toll.
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While these larger concerns exist on the edges of their realities, these characters must still deal with quotidian difficulties: how to coexist with ex-spouses, how to care for sick family members, and how to live with friends who always seem to have more.
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Jaws of Life (West Virginia University Press) was released in February 2018.
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Praise for Jaws of Life
"Laura Leigh Morris proves to us that stories are, indeed, everywhere. She tells them with the sharp eye and wit of a master storyteller. Superb."
- Larry Heinemann, winner of the National Book
Award for Paco's Story
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"'Look for something no one else sees,' says one character in this fine debut, in which the people of Brickton lose many things -- loved ones, their tempers, a good night's sleep, five years of freedom -- but never their power."
- Joni Tevis, author of The World Is on Fire