Shasta Grant: Absent Mothers & Teenaged Girls

Amanda Fields and Tiffanie Drayton chat with Shasta Grant, author of When We Were Feral, about absent mothers, growing up in the ’90s, and raising a teenage son in today’s patriarchal landscape. When We Were Feral is a coming-of-age story set in the early 1990s. The novel is about friendship and the terrain between girlhood and adulthood. At the center is thirteen-year-old Maggie, who lives in a trailer on the edge of a rural New Hampshire town and is living with the grief of her mother’s disappearance. Maggie finds comfort with her best friend Sarah’s seemingly perfect family, and they’re soon joined by Erin, who has lost both her sister and mother. Compelled by a need to understand what makes mothers vanish, Maggie convinces her friends to search for answers. Shasta Grant grew up in New Hampshire and lives in Indianapolis. An Aspen Words Emerging Writer Fellow, Kenyon Review Short Fiction Contest winner, and recipient of writing residencies from Hedgebrook and The Kerouac Project, she holds an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. She is the author of Gather Us Up and Bring Us Home, and her stories and essays have appeared in cream city review, Epiphany, wigleaf, and elsewhere. Links Buy When We Were Feral Website Instagram This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit literarymama.substack.com