The Purging

The Purging is a short, engaging coming-of-age story that observes a time and place to perfection.

It is Easter weekend, 1990. AIDS still threatens life. Alternative sexuality is not so widely accepted. Racism is still alive and kickin’ in the South. And the World Wide Web had not yet arrived. Young Thomas McKinnough attempts to sluice himself of those things that bring him anxiety by confronting religious confusion, testing the limits of his sexuality, and questioning the loyalty of ‘friends’ with hateful baggage. Join Thomas in his obsessive soul-cleansing to see if he succeeds in purging all of his demons. All in one nihilistic weekend.

Raised in the Southeast, Mark spent most of his years in Soganofla, the fictional state in which the story takes place. A popular regional opinion is that South Georgia and North Florida constitute a congruous demographic area completely removed from the likes of Miami or Atlanta. In 1990, Mark graduated from Florida State University with a degree in English - concentration in writing. Mark lives with his partner in Atlanta. They enjoy motorcycling, hiking and whitewater at their weekend getaway in the North Georgia mountains. Mark’s major literary influences are James Joyce, Thomas Pynchon, Milan Kundera, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez.