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This Mama Is Lit!: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Literary Mama
Literary Mama's podcast featuring interviews with mama writers. literarymama.substack.com
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- 1 weeks ago31 min
Aga Maksimowska: Learning to Sit in the Chaos
Sam Field and Amanda Fields talk with Aga Maksimowska, author of Becalming, about drawing on the complexities of family life in fiction and revisiting characters through the lens of motherhood.Becalming tells the story of two people realizing that happily ever after is not something to be but something to continue to explore, through adversity and outrage, tragedy and inspiration, and love.Gosia, a high school chemistry teacher, travels to her native Poland to visit her estranged father. Back in Canada, meanwhile, her father-in-law — who has been more of a dad to her than her own — is dying of cancer. Away from her routine, Gosia questions everything in her life, including her long-term boyfriend, Peter. She feels stuck in the terrifying time of early adulthood, in her first grown-up job while managing student debt, monogamy, and existential dread. Is this really it, she wonders?Gosia’s time in Poland gives her the chance to examine her life, and she finds herself pulled homeward to Canada, where she faces the fact that Peter’s father — like her own — is far from perfect. Can she love despite betrayal? Can she find hope in her fiery, complex love for Peter? Is there something more to this life that she didn’t even realize she had?Aga Maksimowska is the author of Becalming (Rare Machines, 2026) and Giant (Pedlar Press, 2012), which was a finalist for the 2013 Toronto Book Award. Her writing has appeared in Brick, The New Quarterly, The Globe and Mail, and Today’s Parent and was longlisted for the CBC Short Story Prize. She grew up in Gdańsk and Toronto.Links:WebsiteInstagramBecalming 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
- 3 weeks ago27 min
Suzi Q. Smith: Writing Your Own Gospel
Sam Field and Tiffanie Drayton chat with Suzi Q. Smith, author of A Gospel of Bones, about finding beauty in difficult experiences, creating your own gospel, and the revealing power of poetry.Suzi Q. Smith is an award-winning multihyphenate artist, educator, and organizer who lives in Denver, Colorado. She is the author of two poetry collections, Poems for the End of the World and A Gospel of Bones (winner of the 2019 Electric Press Award), and the chapbook Thirteen Descansos. She is also the coeditor of two anthologies, Tell It Slant: An Anthology of Creative Nonfiction by Writers from Colorado’s Prisons and All the Lives We Ever Lived, Volume I, both finalists for the Colorado Book Award. A Pushcart-nominated essayist, Smith holds an MFA in creative writing from Randolph College.The recipient of the 2023 Beacon Award for Excellence in Teaching, Smith is a faculty member at Lighthouse Writers Workshop and Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design and serves as writing director at Château d’Orquevaux in France. She received the 2024 Social Impact Artist Award from the Bonfils-Stanton Foundation and Denver Arts & Venues, as well as the 2018 Denver Foundation Swanee Hunt Leadership Award. She has worked with arts and cultural organizations in Denver and around the United States for nearly three decades.LinksWebsiteA Gospel of BonesInstagramSubstack 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
- Oct 1, 202627 min
Mac Crane: Embracing the Chaos of Perversion We All Have
Sam Field and Tiffanie Drayton chat with Mac Crane, author of Perverts, about challenging the definition of perversion, finding connection, and exploring how parenthood affects the creative process.Nothing is off limits for Mac Crane as they rework classic stories of rejection, isolation, and connection to suggest that the so-called pervert, by existing in the margins of society, may be the one who sees the world most clearly. Crane brings their keen eye for the unsavory to 17 transgressive stories that are as tantalizing and addictive as the characters’ experiences. A provocative and uproarious collection about pleasure, performance, and pain, Perverts is an exaltation of the awesome depravity of queer modernity.Mac (Marisa) Crane is a jock, sweatpants enthusiast, and the author of I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, Indie Next pick, and winner of a LAMBDA Literary Award, and A Sharp Endless Need. They have received fellowships from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, American Short Fiction, and Vermont Studio Center, and their short work has appeared in Literary Hub, The Sun, TriQuarterly, Prairie Schooner, Joyland, and elsewhere. Originally from Allentown, Pennsylvania, they currently live in San Diego with their wife and two kids. Perverts is their debut short story collection.Links:InstagramSubstackPerverts 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
- Sep 17, 202628 min
Leila Farjami: Healing the Mother Wound
Amanda Fields and Holly Rizzuto Palker chat with Leila Farjami, author of Daughter of Salt, about breaking the chain of familial obligations and healing from being a child of war.Daughter of Salt is a poetry collection focused on a speaker who fiercely engages with and questions her mother, her father, ancestors, and herself. Across the poems, patriarchy, intergenerational trauma, and displacement swirl together, colored by the frustration at being expected to hold it all together for everyone else; as Farjami writes, “A daughter made of salt-a dead sea to keep bodies afloat.” Throughout, the daughter vacillates between rebellion, acceptance, and empathy, searching for healing from a childhood marked by war and violence. This collection moves the reader into remembrance and healing; the preservation and renewal of the self that occurs when grace is given to others and ourselves, when we allow ourselves to keep close the memories we share with those we have lost, and use them to build a foundation for a better future.Leila Farjami is an Iranian-American poet and trauma-focused psychotherapist. Her debut, Daughter of Salt, received the Editors’ Selection for Poetry by Trio House Press. Recipient of a Pushcart Prize, The Iowa Review Award in Poetry, the Cincinnati Review’s Robert and Adele Schiff Award, and a 2025 PEN America Emerging Voices Fellowship, her poems appear in Ploughshares, AGNI, The Iowa Review, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles.Links:WebsitePre-order Daughter of SaltLeila Farjami 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
- Sep 3, 202629 min
Chital Mehta: Stretching Cultural Boundaries in Motherhood
Amanda Fields and Holly Rizzuto Palker chat with Chital Mehta, author of Have You Seen Romit?, about raising children across cultures, stretching marital boundaries, and the weight of writing rejection.When her adopted son disappears into the forests of southern India, Usha defies her husband, leaves the rest of her family, and goes to find him—alone. Have You Seen Romit? is the story of a middle-aged Indian woman who sets out to find her son and discovers, in the search, the full force of who she is.Chital Mehta is a South Asian writer whose stories center on motherhood, family dynamics, and immigration. Her short stories have appeared in The Pinch, Oyez Review, SLAB Magazine, and elsewhere. Her novel, Have You Seen Romit?, was the winner of the 2025 James Alan McPherson Prize for the Novel, judged by R. O. Kwon. She holds an MFA from Lindenwood University and lives in Delaware with her husband and children.Links:BookSubstackInstagramWebsite 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
- Aug 20, 202633 min
Jackie Hoermann-Elliott and Jenna Morton-Aiken: Parenting as Graduate Students
Amanda Fields and Caroline Grant chat with Jackie Hoermann-Elliott and Jenna Morton-Aiken, co-editors of the anthology Parenting While PhDing, about raising children in a restrictive academic system.This episode includes guest co-host, Caroline Grant. Grant served on the editorial board of Literary Mama for 10 years, including 5 as editor-in-chief, and is the author of the forthcoming essay collection Make Yourself Useful: remembering a life in essential tools and unexpected foods. Grant has co-edited two anthologies: Mama, PhD and The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage. She is co-director of the Sustainable Arts Foundation (SAF), which worked for nearly 15 years to support writers and artists with children. SAF was recently sunsetted, returning its funds to Indigenous communities. Grant lives in San Francisco with her family.Jackie Hoermann-Elliott and Jenna Morton-Aiken are the co-editors of the anthology Parenting While PhDing: Surviving and Improving the Working Conditions of Graduate Student Parents. Featuring contributions from graduate students about raising children, the anthology includes personal stories and advice for student parents. The book also offers tips for program administrators about creating more inclusive, family-friendly environments for students.Hoermann-Elliott is an associate professor of English at Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas, where she also serves as the co-director of the university’s first-year experience program. She is deeply passionate about supporting student parents and foster-care alumni. She’s also a mom of four kids, ages three to fifteen.Morton-Aiken is the senior associate director of writing and English language support at Brown University’s Harriet W. Sheridan Center for Teaching and Learning, where she also teaches in the English department. She began teaching writing because she believed in the power of language to make the world a better place, a goal she’s still working toward as she also completes a leadership coaching certification. She’s devoted to facilitating the growth of humans, and relies on good books, Korean dramas, and snuggling with her husband, two cats, and two children to keep her going.Links:Parenting While PhDing: Surviving and Improving the Working Conditions of Graduate Student ParentsJackie Hoermann-ElliottInstagramWebsiteJenna Morton-AikenXBrown UniversityCaroline GrantWebsiteInstagramFacebookSubstack 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
- Aug 6, 202629 min
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.LinksBuy When We Were FeralWebsiteInstagram 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
- Jul 23, 202625 min
Rebecca Morrison: Disordered Eating and Representing Iranian Culture
Tiffanie Drayton and Amanda Fields chat with Rebecca Morrison, author of The Blue Dress, about adapting her memoir into a young adult novel, opening dialogue for teens to talk about disordered eating, and representing Iranian culture in the media.The Blue Dress is based on Rebecca Morrison’s childhood as an Iranian immigrant trying to fit into her homeland and conform to her family’s expectations of beauty.Morrison is a writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Newsweek, The Independent, and HuffPost. After spending nearly three decades practicing law, she left the profession in 2020 to pursue her lifelong dream of becoming a writer. Her debut novel, The Blue Dress, published in March 2026, draws on her experiences growing up as an Iranian immigrant navigating the competing expectations of her family and her American homeland.In addition to writing The Blue Dress, Morrison has also hosted The Second Half, a podcast exploring the struggles, heartbreaks, reinventions, and joys that shape the later chapters of life.Links:Order The Blue DressWebsiteInstagramFacebookXYouTubeTikTokSubstack 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
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Literary Mama's podcast featuring interviews with mama writers. literarymama.substack.com
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