Where Am I? Sitka Story Lab Student Anthology
The Island Institute's Sitka Story Lab program released this new book of Southeast Alaskan student writing in May 2016. Called Where Am I?: Stories of Strange Landscapes, Wrong Turns, and New Worlds, the anthology features fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and zany creative experiments that convey the disorientation and the discovery that young people experience, from being in the wilderness to simply growing up. The young writers come from Sitka, Hoonah, Haines, Wrangell, and Skagway, and are as young as nine years old and as old as eighteen. "The writing ranges from fantastic and playful to emotionally moving and dark," said Story Lab Coordinator Sarah Swong. "I'm impressed at how creative and varied these writings are, and at how open students were to feedback and improving their work." The project offered students the chance to write a piece for publication and to hone their writing with an editor.
The Island Institute's Sitka Story Lab program released this new book of Southeast Alaskan student writing in May 2016.
Called Where Am I?: Stories of Strange Landscapes, Wrong Turns, and New Worlds, the anthology features fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and zany creative experiments that convey the disorientation and the discovery that young people experience, from being in the wilderness to simply growing up. The young writers come from Sitka, Hoonah, Haines, Wrangell, and Skagway, and are as young as nine years old and as old as eighteen.
"The writing ranges from fantastic and playful to emotionally moving and dark," said Story Lab Coordinator Sarah Swong. "I'm impressed at how creative and varied these writings are, and at how open students were to feedback and improving their work."
The project offered students the chance to write a piece for publication and to hone their writing with an editor.
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Mice of Vonna<br />
Hannah Thomas<br />
There are black holes in space, as most know, but there is only one that<br />
leads to an alternate dimension. In this dimension, there is a planet<br />
called Heirum. On this planet there are what humans would consider to<br />
be giant, walking, talking, cloth wearing rodents. There are many kinds:<br />
rats, squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits, but the most evil of all was a beaver<br />
named Mardon. Mardon was a seven-foot tall mighty and wicked beaver<br />
who sent his barbaric armies across the world to conquer. There was<br />
only one young hero brave enough, cunning enough, and sneaky enough<br />
to stop him. That was Martin, the little mouse from Vonna who looked<br />
like a small child compared to his enemy. Despite his size and his lack of<br />
war knowledge, he headed into Mardon’s lair, alone.<br />
I slithered into the cavern like a worm between the teeth of a great<br />
beast. The air was thick and warm, smoggy as if truly from inside<br />
a monster’s mouth. Moisture dripped down the walls like saliva,<br />
sticky and bubbling from the air pockets shooting up from deep<br />
underneath the Heirum. It was a deep dark that lathered the outer<br />
regions. As you looked into cavern there were four blazing torches,<br />
dancing in their victory over the shadows. And behind their vicious<br />
glow was the throne, a large seat roughly carved out of the rock,<br />
inside a column that stretched from the ceiling to the floor of this<br />
great cave.<br />
On the throne sat the one who destroyed my world once and<br />
threatened again: Mardon. I slid down in absolute silence. I placed<br />
my front paws on the floor and twitched my tail ever so slightly.<br />
My ears laid back flat and my heart beat faster with more fear,<br />
anger, and anxiety than ever before. The pads of my paws became<br />
wet with sweat.<br />
I scurried, silent as my shadow, and ducked behind a mass of stone.<br />
“It’s been a long time, Martin Tad Scots of Vonna.” The voice<br />
34 <strong>Where</strong> <strong>Am</strong> I?
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