Project Portfolio

Books by Marissa Elizabeth Stone

Project Scope:  Publication & Promotion of Original Works

This collection of stories reveals, discusses, explores and educates its audience about the ways in which extreme familial dysfunction affect children, teens and the adults who survive these environments.  Adaptation to normal social values requires an ever evolving understanding of the crimes committed by parents against their children.  Frequently the dynamics of maintaining a horrible family secret are surprising to those of us who have never lived under this tyranny of deceit.  Yet professionals who treat the psychic wounds of this significant segment of our population know that in these families, keeping the secret is more important than the survival of the person who experienced the betrayal of their abusers. 

The purpose of these works is not to whine about the ways in which life can appear unfair, but to educate and illustrate to others the ways in which intimidation, ostracisation and denial lead to the people you love and trust committing the most significant atrocities of all. 

In this life you can choose to be a victim.  You can choose to be a survivor.   You can choose to accept that you had a difficult experience and go on to thrive despite the ways in which you were at risk of being destroyed.  You can define yourself on your own terms, rather than accept the definition of the perpetrators in your life.  From a spiritual perspective, the most significant action you can take is to embrace something bitter in your life, and transform it into something sweet by allowing your pain to lessen the pain of others. 

• Hello Babylon - This work began as an autobiographical account from childhood until Ms.Stone's early forties.  The work, now approximately 14 chapters, stopped at the point that the author wrote about her sister and the breakdown of their relationship. 
  
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• Tsunami Across My Heart - As described by professional story teller Rivka Willick of Simply Extraordinary Tales, "This story is about the importance of saying what needs to be said when it needs to be said."  From Ms. Stone's perspective, the significance of the story relates to the value of being authentic to oneself and to another, as well as understanding the choices we make have the capacity to ripple on forever.
  
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• The Meaning of Betrayal - The expansion of the first chapter of "Hello Babylon" examines the role of the "non-offending parent" in the abusive family dynamic.  This is the story of the sins of one generation being delivered to the next, and again to the next.  Denial of serious and destructive circumstances leads to a resentful, pathological mother enabling the dynamics of abuse to be perpetuated against her daughter for decades.  Pretending that the sins of her drunken husband were accidental and therefore inconsequential to her devastated daughter leads to irrevocable alienation.  The dynamics of the relationship beg the question, what is the difference between evil and insanity?
  
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Under Development