Tara McGuire has received an honourable mention for her essay, “I Can Feel Him Breathing” in Room Magazine’s Creative Non-fiction contest. Her book, about the accidental opioid overdose of her son, Holden, will be published in the fall of 2022 by Arsenal Pulp Press.
Here is the jury’s citation:
The story’s goal is to show the impact of drug addiction; and the pain of losing [those you love] to drugs. The narrator provides a clear description of the state of a mother who has lost a son to overdose from heroin. One can feel the hopelessness and lack of energy that surround the family. The narrator wants us to remember every detail of the mothers’ experience as she struggles to gather courage to go find out why her son became an addict, witnessing the consumption of heroin; a scene that makes the reader shed tears. This is a very powerful story and the narrator provides vivid descriptions of every scene. You can actually see the images in your mind. — Dr. Njoki Wane
And here is the link to the essay: https://roommagazine.com/i-can-feel-him-breathing/