Carnival Stories
by Victoria
Hobbs Olsen
Carnival Stories
begins with the recounting of Victoria's
onset of multiple sclerosis in 1986. Her story is based on her real-life
experience; however, she has changed the names of people and locations.
In Carnival Stories, we meet Victoria's
character, Julia, at three different stages in her life, stages all connected
by the fact that she was at a point of transition, building a new life for
herself out of the ashes of the past. The thread tying these points together
is her encounter with one remarkable man when she was a young, newly single
mother.
The lessons she learns over the course of her short
contact with the mysterious Jonathan become more valuable over the years,
as her life progresses. And it is not until twenty years later that she is
fully able to understand the implications.
Victoria Hobbs Olsen is the past GCWA President
and editor of the Magnolia Quarterly, a publication for creative
writers. Utilizing her master's degree in Consulting Psychology from Harvard
University, she has held many workshops over the past twelve years, most
recently facilitating a fundraising event for the Gulf Coast Writers Association
called The Tapestry of Psychological Type and Temperament and the Creative
Process, held at a local community college.
Victoria came to Pass Christian, Mississippi from
Long Island, New York, in the fall of 1994. She was completing a novel,
Carnival Stories, based on her short stay in
Mississippi back in 1976. She fell in love with the area and the ambiance,
and decided to move her family to the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
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