The Petals of Your Eyes

The debut novel by an award-winning author of short stories. Kidnapped girls trapped in a remote theater surrounded by mountains and jungle are forced into illegal performances, displayed in cabinets with curiosities, delicate limbs bound by straps, accompanied by dancing puppets fashioned of dead children's bones. conjures up a painful, poetic world that won't soon be forgotten. is an associate professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Parkison has received a Christopher Isherwood Fellowship, a Writers at Work Fellowship, and a Kurt Vonnegut Fiction Prize from North American Review. Her first collection, , won the Starcherone Prize for Innovative Fiction, judged by Cris Mazza. Parkison has an MFA in creative writing from Cornell University. She lives in Charlotte, North Carolina.