Rulfo, Juan. Pedro Páramo. Translated by Margaret Sayers Peden, Grove Press, 1994.
Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo is a ghost novel of magical realism, centered on generational trauma during and after the Mexican Revolution. The story follows Juan Preciado, who travels to the town of Comala after his mother’s death in search of his father, Pedro Páramo. What he expects to find is the beautiful town his mother once described to him: “a beautiful view of a green plain, with a bit of yellow from the ripening corn” (13). Instead, he arrives in a decaying landscape, almost entirely occupied by ghosts.
The guide who first leads Juan into Comala describes the town as “the very mouth of Hell” where the dead return to reclaim their blankets (15). From the beginning, death is normalized within the setting itself. The living and the dead exist together, conversations blur between memory and hallucination, and time moves in fragments rather than straight lines. Juan eventually becomes consumed by the voices and ghosts surrounding him, dying from fear and exhaustion before continuing the story as one of the dead himself.
One of the most striking aspects of this novel is its nonlinear structure and fragmented narration. The story shifts between timelines, memories, conversations, ghosts, and interior thoughts without warning. At times, this can feel disorienting, but it also reflects the emotional collapse of Comala itself. The town is haunted not only by literal ghosts, but by the lingering violence of exploitation, corruption, revolution, and abandonment.
Setting as a Protagonist
What interested me most in this novel was the way Comala itself functions almost like a protagonist. The town is not merely a backdrop to the story; it actively shapes the emotional atmosphere of every scene. Comala represents exploitation, ruined revolution, abandoned women, inherited suffering, and the decay left behind by powerful men like Pedro Páramo.
Throughout the novel, the setting constantly shifts between memory and reality. Damiana Cisneros recalls hearing celebrations and parties in the streets: “There was a time when I could hear the commotion of a party that kept going night after night…” only to discover “Nothing” when she investigates (50). Ghosts roam through the town as though death itself has become part of the landscape: “If only you could see the horde of shadows roam the streets” (60). Yet memories of the past briefly illuminate the darkness through Juan’s recollections of his mother describing carts filled with corn and life moving through the streets (55).
The novel repeatedly contrasts beauty with decay. One moment, the sky is described as bright and full of light, and the next, the physical world becomes suffocating and grotesque:
“The bed was made of otate reeds and covered with burlap sacks that smelled of urine…” (64).
The environment mirrors the emotional and moral collapse of the town itself. Rain, heat, rot, dust, and darkness all become extensions of grief, violence, and abandonment. Later, after Susana San Juan recounts traumatic memories connected to her father, the narration shifts outward:
“Outside it continued to rain. The Indians had left. It was Monday, and the valley surrounding Comala was still drowning in rain” (100).
The environment reflects the narrative’s emotional state. The endless rain feels less like weather and more like accumulated grief soaking into the town itself. In Pedro Páramo, nature and atmosphere become emotional language.
Pedro Páramo and the Corruption of Power
Pedro Páramo’s influence poisons every layer of Comala. Wealth protects him from accountability while everyone beneath him becomes disposable. When a woman comes demanding justice because Pedro’s son murdered her husband, Pedro’s administrator attempts to pay her off with corn rather than acknowledge responsibility:
“I offered her fifty hectoliters of corn if she’d forget the whole thing…” (74).
When Pedro asks who the grieving people were, and his manager responds that he does not know them, Pedro simply replies that they therefore “do not exist.” This moment captures the emotional core of the novel: people without power become invisible. Comala is haunted because suffering was ignored rather than healed.
Susana San Juan becomes one of the most emotionally powerful figures in the story. Her mental instability, trauma, sensuality, and longing are written with poetic intensity. Before her death, she speaks of swimming naked in the ocean and surrendering herself to the sea (105). Water becomes symbolic of purification, release, and returning to something natural beyond suffering.
When Susana dies, the town erupts into celebration:
“They buried Susana San Juan and few in Comala noticed. They were celebrating” (126).
The celebration is not because of Susana’s death itself, but because the town is distracted by festivities while Pedro loses the only person he ever truly loved. Her death marks the emotional collapse of his power. Just as Pedro spent his life taking from others, loss is finally returned to him. After Susana’s death, Comala fully descends into ruin.
What I Take Into My Own Writing
This novel taught me how setting can function as an emotional force within a narrative rather than simply a location. Through memory, atmosphere, ghosts, weather, and fragmented storytelling, Rulfo transforms Comala into a living embodiment of generational trauma.
For my own work in Discordia, I want to explore a similar setting by showing Zetheus before and after societal collapse, using memory, hallucination, storytelling, and environmental shifts to reflect emotional change within the world itself. Pedro Páramo also reminded me to pay close attention to diction, pacing, and the emotional rhythm of sentences. Even in confusion and darkness, the language remains poetic and intentional.
Beneath its ghosts and fractured timelines, the novel ultimately becomes a story about how violence and exploitation echo through generations long after death itself.
Butler, Octavia E. Parable of the Sower. Grand Central Publishing, 2019.
Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler is a dystopian science fiction novel set in a near-future California, where climate disaster, addiction, violence, poverty, and political corruption are collapsing the state. Told through the diary entries of Lauren Olamina, the story follows a young woman trying not only to survive societal collapse, but to create a new moral philosophy within it. Through Lauren’s belief system, Earthseed, Butler explores religion, adaptability, community, and the human need to create meaning during times of chaos.
The story begins in a gated Los Angeles neighborhood, where Lauren lives with her family. Her father, a Baptist minister and professor, attempts to preserve structure and faith within a rapidly deteriorating world. After his death, the fragile safety of the neighborhood collapses completely. Drug addicts obsessed with fire burn the community to the ground, forcing Lauren to flee northward on foot, disguised as a man. Along the way, she gathers companions, slowly building a community of survivors connected not through blood or traditional religion, but through shared ethics and collective care.
Eventually, Lauren meets Bankole, a doctor who owns land in Northern California. The group travels there hoping to create Earthseed, a sustainable and intentional community built around Lauren’s philosophy that “God is Change.” However, even upon reaching their destination, violence and destruction continue to follow them. The property has already been devastated, and corrupt systems remain close behind. Still, Lauren refuses to abandon her vision.
Religion as Adaptation
One of the strongest themes in the novel is not simply survival, but transformation. Butler presents religion not as rigid doctrine, but as something living and adaptive. Lauren does not inherit her father’s Christianity directly. Instead, she develops her own spiritual philosophy through observation of the natural world, human behavior, and change itself. Earthseed becomes both a religion and a survival strategy.
The world Lauren inhabits is already accustomed to suffering: “Seven of the homeless people sleeping inside on that last night burned with it” (2). Violence has become normalized to the point where people emotionally detach from it. Lauren’s response to this chaos is not despair, but the creation of a moral structure centered around intentional ethics, adaptability, labor, and community responsibility.
What stood out to me most is how Earthseed represents the refusal to blindly follow inherited systems that no longer serve humanity. Lauren creates a belief system aligned with her own understanding of justice and survival rather than simply repeating tradition. The novel asks an important question: how do we build morality in a world where institutions have already failed?
Humboldt County and Returning to the Land
As someone living in Humboldt County, the ending of this novel resonated deeply with me. Butler’s depiction of people migrating north toward the land felt eerily familiar to the history of Humboldt itself. Many people came to these mountains searching for freedom, sustainability, self-governance, and a closer relationship with nature.
I especially connected this to the Green Rush and the migration of cannabis growers into Humboldt County. People originally came to the mountains seeking alternative ways of living outside traditional systems, but over time, corruption, cartel involvement, outside investment, overregulation, and corporate expansion transformed the culture entirely. The same systems people hoped to escape eventually followed them into the mountains.
That connection made Butler’s novel feel less like distant science fiction and more like a warning already unfolding around us. Parable of the Sower suggests that societal collapse is not simply caused by violence or environmental disaster, but by the breakdown of shared ethics and collective care. Lauren’s answer to that collapse is not perfection, but a community rooted in intentional values and cooperation with the earth itself.
What I take from this novel for my own writing is the importance of creating belief systems within stories that shape every layer of the worldbuilding, character decisions, and themes. Butler does not simply tell the reader what Earthseed is—she builds the entire narrative around its philosophy. The story becomes a reflection on how people survive not only physically but also spiritually and ethically during times of collapse.
Jones, Stephen Graham. Mongrels: A Novel. HarperCollins/William Morrow, 2016.
Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones is a coming-of-age horror novel told through the perspective of an unnamed boy growing up in a nomadic family of werewolves. Living alongside his Aunt Libby and Uncle Darren, the nephew struggles to understand who he is as he waits to discover whether he will eventually transform himself. Throughout the novel, Jones uses the werewolf figure not simply as a monster but as a metaphor for poverty, marginalization, generational trauma, displacement, and survival.
The nephew is rarely named directly. Instead, he is often referred to through shifting identities such as “the nephew,” “the vampire,” “the mechanic,” or “the prisoner.” This creates a feeling of instability surrounding identity itself, reflecting the uncertainty of adolescence and self-discovery. Although his experiences are supernatural, the emotional core of the story feels deeply human: the desire to belong somewhere while fearing what you may become.
As the family is forced from town to town, instability becomes their normal way of life. Darren works dangerous and degrading jobs, while Libby repeatedly pulls the family back together whenever things fall apart. Eventually, Darren disappears after falling in love with a woman outside the family, leaving the nephew once again abandoned by a male role model. Shortly before the nephew’s own transformation, Libby promises she will remain beside him:
“I’ll still be here,” the aunt says, reaching her hand across, taking his. “Just like Darren,” the nephew says. “Werewolf promises aren’t any good, don’t you know that one by now?” (296).
That line captures one of the novel’s strongest emotional themes: the fear of abandonment inherited across generations.
Werewolves as Social Outsiders
One of the most powerful aspects of Mongrels is the way Jones compares werewolves to the poor, the criminalized, and the socially unwanted. The nephew grows up believing imprisonment and suffering are inevitable for people like him: “Everybody goes to jail at some point. Werewolves especially” (53). The family survives through scavenging, temporary work, theft, and constant movement. Childhood friendships are temporary because they never last long enough to take root.
The werewolf mythology becomes a framework for exploring inherited trauma. The nephew’s mother became pregnant after an act of violence and died during childbirth. Throughout the novel, there are fragmented stories surrounding her death, some softened or disguised by family storytelling. The grandfather often “humanizes” horrific events through strange, indirect narratives instead of telling the truth directly. One disturbing example involves him describing killing a rabid dog:
“Once I hit her that first time, little pup, I like to have never got that next lick in…” (17).
The story feels awkward, violent, and emotionally detached, especially through the child’s eyes. Later, however, the novel reveals a much darker parallel beneath the story: the brutal death of the nephew’s mother during childbirth while infected with the werewolf condition. The grandfather seems more comfortable transforming trauma into folklore than confronting the real violence directly. In Mongrels, the “humanized” stories often become the fantasy, while the true human experiences underneath remain unbearable to speak aloud.
Memory Through Cars
One literary element that deeply stood out to me was the way cars function throughout the novel. The vehicles are disposable, stolen, temporary, patched together, and constantly changing, much like the family itself. Yet at the same time, the make and model of each car becomes a way of tracking memory, emotion, and periods of life. The cars become emotional landmarks.
Jones repeatedly introduces vehicles with careful specificity:
“Nearly two weeks later, he finally drifted in again. What he drove… was a pretty pristine old Mercury Monterey” (71).
And later:
“The Sabre wasn’t close to street legal anymore…” (71).
The naming of the cars grounds the timeline emotionally. Instead of remembering life through stable homes or permanent places, the family remembers periods of survival through whatever means carried them at the time. The cars become connected to memory, identity, grief, movement, and family history. Each one marks a chapter in the nephew’s life. Because the family is constantly uprooted, the vehicles become one of the only consistent ways to orient time and memory.
This detail resonated with me deeply because it reflects how people living unstable or nomadic lives often attach memory to objects in motion rather than permanent locations. In Mongrels, cars become temporary homes, escape routes, symbols of survival, and emotional timestamps all at once.
Monstrosity and Emotional Truth
What I take from this novel for my own writing is the permission to lean into dramatized or monstrous figures to express emotional truth. By filtering lived experiences through imaginative characters like werewolves, the novel creates a bridge between realism and metaphor, allowing readers to emotionally inhabit difficult truths. The supernatural elements never feel disconnected from humanity. Instead, they intensify it.
Libby’s warning to the nephew echoes throughout the novel:
“Not all kids born to a werewolf are a werewolf” (21).
Beneath the horror and mythology, Mongrels becomes a story about inheritance—what we fear inheriting, what we cannot escape, and the possibility of becoming something different despite where we come from.
Grace by Natashia Deón is a historical horror novel that follows the life and death of a young Black woman named Naomi. Told through a nonlinear narrative, the novel follows Naomi as a ghost after her death, watching over her daughter Josephine while reflecting on the trauma, violence, love, and resilience that shaped her life. The story blends ghost story, historical fiction, and lyrical prose into something emotionally devastating and deeply human.
Gender roles and the brutality of slavery play a major role throughout the novel. Naomi begins as a hidden child, concealed by her mother from Massa, the slave owner who controls their lives. After witnessing abuse and violence against her family, Naomi kills Massa in order to protect herself and avenge her mother. She is then forced into survival alone, wandering through a world where Black women are constantly vulnerable to exploitation and violence.
Throughout the novel, men repeatedly fail the women around them through manipulation, abandonment, rape, cheating, and abuse. Yet alongside this darkness is an equally powerful theme of motherhood and feminine endurance. Naomi’s mother survives by complying outwardly while secretly protecting her children. Hazel, Naomi’s sister, becomes an example of survival and sacrifice. Even when Naomi herself is betrayed by Jeremy—the first man she truly loves—she eventually refuses to remain trapped in abuse. Jeremy attempts to pimp her out, abandons her during pregnancy, and later returns only to shame her. Naomi ultimately walks away, choosing both herself and her child over submission.
Motherhood Beyond Death
Shortly after Josephine’s birth, Naomi is killed by slave catchers. However, death does not end her connection to her daughter. As a ghost, Naomi remains tethered to Josephine, unable to fully let go. Some of the most haunting moments in the novel are not the supernatural ones, but the emotional truths surrounding motherhood, attachment, and grief. Annie tells Naomi’s spirit:
“One day you will leave her, by your choice. It’s what you’re supposed to do. At some point, every mother has to let her child go” (185).
That line stayed with me long after reading the book. It transforms the ghost story into something much larger about the pain of motherhood itself: loving someone enough to eventually release them into the world.
Lyrical Prose and Emotional Rhythm
One of the strongest literary elements in Grace is Deón’s lyrical prose. She slows down intimate moments and emotional observations until they almost feel suspended in time. Her writing often moves with a poetic rhythm that makes even painful scenes feel beautiful and deeply sensory.
“I wish he would smell sweet to me like a man looking for love or seemed soft like a man who could love me silly and forgive me for the thangs he didn’t know about me” (38).
The prose lingers inside physical sensation, emotion, memory, and desire. Rather than rushing through events, Deón allows moments to fully breathe. Her storytelling carries humor, sexuality, tenderness, and humanity even within the horror of slavery and violence.
What I take from this novel for my own writing is the importance of slowing down and honoring the details of life itself. Grace reminded me that storytelling is not only about plot progression but about fully inhabiting emotional moments, relationships, and sensory experience. The novel feels like a ghost story not simply because of Naomi’s spirit, but because it honors the cycle of life, motherhood, trauma, love, and memory itself. It suggests that even after death, the emotional imprint we leave on one another persists.
Little Lost Forest 