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I first learned about Vince Granata’s memoir Everything Is Fine through my friend who is friends with one of Vince’s friends, and when I hopped on the phone with Vince, we naturally figured out we had yet another friend in common. Even though Vince now lives in Texas, he spent his 20s in the Boston area, where I have lived most of my life. Everyone knows everyone through someone else in Massachusetts it seems. It’s a small world.

It’s a small enough world that even before I read Vince’s searing memoir about the murder of his mother at the hands of his schizophrenic brother, I remembered hearing about the news story. I’ve long been someone interested in reading about the darker aspects of life, and Vince’s memoir might just be one of the darkest books I have ever read. There is nothing easy or light about reading Vince’s family’s story. And yet, while Vince’s book does not shy away from some of the hardest – the hardest? – things a family can grapple with, his memoir is one of the most empathetic, kind, and human works I have ever read. There is also a history of schizophrenia in my own family, and Vince’s book provided the nuanced and thoughtful approach to a devastating mental illness that is absent in so many pop culture narratives. I was thrilled to get the chance to speak with Vince and ask him about what it took to write this remarkable work.

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Marcia Trahan is the author of Mercy: A Memoir of Medical Trauma and True Crime Obsession. She earned a bachelor of arts in psychology from the University of Vermont and a master of fine arts in writing and literature from Bennington College. Trahan’s essays and poetry have appeared in numerous publications, including the Brevity Blog, Fourth Genre, apt, Clare, Anderbo, Blood Orange Review, Connotation Press, Kansas City Voices, and the LaChance Publishing anthology Women Reinvented: True Stories of Empowerment and Change. “Bloodletting,” a post-cancer narrative, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her work has twice received honorable mention in the New Millennium Writing Awards. Trahan lives in South Burlington, Vermont, with her partner, Andy, and their crazed feline companion, Bela.

The post Non-Fiction by Non-Men: Marcia Trahan appeared first on E.B. Bartels.