Closer Than Rust is a multimedia novel.

Synopsis:

A bi-curious African American woman dreams of escaping her rural Southern hometown just as a lesbian Vietnamese American woman dreams of settling there and founding an artist colony. A queer Caucasian townie dreams of living freely – free to love who she chooses and to express his gender identity as ze wishes. It’s a hot, listless July, and everyone in this town has a wish. But what if one person’s wish renders another’s impossible? What happens then?

Closer Than Rust is an interactive novel told through journal entries, video vignettes, photo diaries and social media feeds. When internet connection is lost, social media feeds become private journal entries. When connectivity returns, so does the unavoidable stamp of time: It’s July, 2015. Same sex marriage becomes legal in the U.S. only one week after nine parishioners are killed in a historically Black church. America is full of progress and struggle, and each character is a tiny mirror of this larger picture. They must make choices to manifest their dreams. But choices are hard to make, and when they become too hard for the characters, they are given over to you – the audience – in classic Choose-Your-Own-Adventure style.