Michael Barrera

So Shall We Pass Michael Barrera

So Shall We Pass is a first-person present tense narrative set in Wharton Texas, a rural and dilapidated town where cotton once made kings out of paupers. The story chronicles a young man's (Jacob's) deteriorating mental health as he copes with the death of his mother, the responsibility of raising a younger sibling, and a deranged father who breeds fighting dogs, deals drugs and rears children all from the once functioning family farm.  Jacob struggles to preserve his sister's naïve world-view while searching for meaning and hope in the dismal circumstances that surround him. When intense supernatural visions begin to cripple Jacob's ability to live productively, desperation consumes him. These phenomena lead him to believe that patricide is the only salvation from his rapidly crumbling world. Ultimately, this story is a literary sketch of a failed moral calculus and madness at its inception.  The narrative explores the ways in which an adolescent such as Jacob responds to the often overwhelming energies of life.