Tag: memoir

an odyssey through politically-fraught family moments: book event in western massachusetts

Reuniting with deeply-admired colleagues is always a joy. Reuniting with colleagues who leave you feeling like a rock star is utterly fabulous.

Such was my feeling after Suzanne Strempek Shea — my former newspaper colleague, writing mentor and fellow MFA creative nonfiction writing instructor — interviewed me for a book talk about my novel, Louie on the Rocks, at the Odyssey Bookshop in South Hadley. Suzanne has an uncanny ability of asking incisive questions that frequently give me pause and make me wonder why I’ve never thought of that particular angle before.

Our back-and-forth, as well as the questions from attendees, focused a great deal on the subjects of my vacillating between different writing genres, and how I rendered on the page an authentic depiction of people who hold different political beliefs than I hold. That’s a question I’m getting a lot. It’s no secret that I’m adamantly opposed to all things MAGA and what’s happening under the Trump administration, but when I was developing the character of Louie Francis, I placed my personal politics inside a box and shoved aside. My charge was to create a fully-developed character and figure out how he thought. Additionally, I wanted to illustrate that, in spite of our currently polarized climate, Louie wasn’t and shouldn’t be perceived as just one thing, as just a MAGA dude. He was a good and supportive husband, a loving son-in-law, a reliable employee, and a respected volunteer in his community. Writing Louie required me to think more fulsomely about the layers and texture of his life, not simply through the lens of his politics.

Afterward during the book signing portion, I had the chance to chat with folks and was thrilled to see my very first friend in my hometown of West Springfield there in attendance — Gina! — as well as two pals from my UMass-Amherst days. And the support from the Bay Path University MFA in Creative Nonfiction community, wow, it made me feel blessed. In addition to Suzanne, there was her husband Tommy Shea (who mentored me when I was a young newspaper reporter), former MFA director Leanna James Blackwell, and Anne Pinkerton, with whom I had classes when I earned my own MFA from Bay Path.

two new books in 2025

While I’ve already announced the upcoming February release of my second novel — Louie on the Rocks, a dark comedy set in central Massachusetts about a dysfunctional family influenced by Trump era politics, circa 2019 — I can now proudly announce my second 2025 book.

Uncomfortably Numb 2: An Anthology for Newly-Diagnosed MS Patients is slated for publication in May 2025 by Wyatt-MacKenzie, which published my 2020 medical memoir, Uncomfortably Numb, about the life-altering impact of my MS diagnosis.

This nonfiction book will feature the stories of MS patients at varying stages of the incurable autoimmune disease of the brain and spinal cord, and of MS advocates who work to better the world for multiple sclerosis patients. Additionally, I share new stories about how I have morphed from being a stunned, newly-diagnosed patient to an MS Activist who lobbies state and federal lawmakers on behalf of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

It’ll be quite the tonal shift to move from promoting a dark comedy about an alcoholic MAGA dad squaring off against his progressive, bookseller daughter just weeks after the presidential inauguration, to discussing the experiences of MS patients. I hope you’ll join me on what promises to be one bizarre ride.

umass journalism hosts memoirists

The UMass Journalism Department graciously invited my former UMass/Massachusetts Daily Collegian pal, the award-winning writer Felice Cohen, and me to talk about our experiences writing memoir.

In late April, Felice told attendees that her family read early drafts of her UMass-based memoir, Half In — which reveals her 1990s love affair with a much older woman — and said they were supportive of her relating the truth of her experience. She said she heavily relied on the journals she kept during that time to refresh her memory about specific events and conversations, which, in the book, are very detailed. Felice is currently working on what she called a “reverse memoir” using letters she’s received throughout her life.

I, meanwhile, totally put my husband Scott on the spot and asked him what he thought about being portrayed and quoted in my memoir, Uncomfortably Numb, which traces the first several years of my life with multiple sclerosis. His reply? He trusts me (!) to tell my “truth” since I’ve been writing about my life –and, consequently, him — ever since we met when we were undergrads.

It was wild to look around the state-of-the-art Journalism Hub and to later visit the freakishly clean Collegian offices — which, years ago, moved out of its original location in the windowless Campus Center basement. Gone were the days of that smelly, lumpy sofa in the Journalism Department and of messy student newspaper offices with stacks of papers and all manner of wires snaking up the walls and across floors like out-of-control ivy.

Another major difference on the Amherst campus? The dining hall. Not necessarily the halls themselves, but the food within them which is now top notch, a far cry from when the chicken cutlet sandwiches were referred to as “chicken pucks” and the highlight of the week was when fried French toast sticks were on the menu. It’s no wonder why, when I asked my younger son who graduated last year, where we should go out to eat and he said, “The dining hall.”

audiobook for ms memoir on sale through may 31

Audiobooks.com is putting my MS memoir, Uncomfortably Numb, on sale for the month of May.

Narrated by Erin deWard, the audiobook traces the two years it took me to finally get diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (after being told my symptoms were psychosomatic), and then the three years it took me to reach an uneasy peace with the ways in which the incurable, neurological disease changed my life.

If you click on this link, you can listen to a sample of deWard reading my words aloud (something that still feels surreal, someone else giving voice to my experiences).

Image credit: Audiobook.com.

uncomfortably numb’s now an audiobook: get 50% off!

Uncomfortably Numb — my medical memoir about the life-altering impact of a multiple sclerosis diagnosis — has been transformed into an audiobook.

I can’t tell you how odd it is to have this intensely personal story about my health and ultimate MS diagnosis, which occurred months after my 65-year-old mother died from a fast-moving cancer, read aloud by somebody else.

When I was first approached about having the memoir professionally narrated, I was excited but also concerned. How could anyone possibly use the emphasis I intended, the specific tone of voice that was in my head when I wrote those words, I wondered.

Well, in the trusted hands of narrator Erin deWard, I fret no longer.

While the audiobook is available on Amazon, it is also on sale for half price at Audiobooks.com until the end of January.

I’m thrilled to have Uncomfortably Numb now available to those who prefer audible formats. Let me know what you think!

Image credit: Audiobooks.com.

talking memoir writing at bay path university

I recently had the pleasure of participating in the Friends of the Hatch Library author series at Bay Path University in Longmeadow, Mass. — where I teach in the MFA in creative nonfiction program, a program from which I graduated in 2017.

I discussed my medical memoir, Uncomfortably Numb, read an excerpt that took place in Martha’s Vineyard aloud, as well as fielded myriad questions about writing, research, and inspiration.

Thank you Bay Path for inviting me.

new: buy copies of meredith’s books via tatnuck online

The Westborough, Mass. independent bookstore where I’ve held book events and which sells signed copies of my books, has now created a local authors page.

What does this mean?

You can purchase copies of Meredith’s books online AND support an independent bookstore to boot.

When you buy Mr. Clark’s Big Band for your teacher or music friend, when you grab a copy of a medical memoir — Uncomfortably Numb — about what happens when one’s life is involuntarily upended by illness, or you are seeking a darkly humorous novel — Mortified — about a thirtysomething mommy blogger who reveals TMI about her family and lands into hot water, you can feel good about supporting an independent publisher (Wyatt-MacKenzie), and an indie bookshop.

Meredith outside of Tatnuck

talking women & health with authors & poets

Author Christina Chiu — who wrote the powerful Beauty (do yourself a favor and read it!) — invited three writers to tackle the topic of women & health, while she also shared candid stories of her own illness, as well as her son’s experiences with food allergies.

Among her guests:

Sandra Beasley, the author of the memoir, Don’t Kill the Birthday Girl: Tales from an Allergic Life, and more recently, Made to Explode: Poems, spoke about her food allergies and how she has embraced her disability as a part of her identity.

Poet Julie E. Bloemeke — whose collection of poems, Slide to Unlock, “investigates how modern technology redirects our erotic and familial lives” — discussed not only how she dealt with depression, but how it and various therapies for it influenced her writing.

I, meanwhile, read aloud a section of my multiple sclerosis-centric memoir Uncomfortably Numb where the neurologist who first examined me — after an MRI showed a lesion on my brainstem — suggested that my symptoms of numbness were likely “psychosomatic.”

I hope the discussion helps give people with illnesses and/or disabilities some sense that they are not alone.

catch me talking writing & childhood reporting aspirations on ‘the downtown writers jam’ podcast

I had a blast chatting with Brad King on his Downtown Writers Jam podcast about writing and journalism, my medical memoir, and my childhood days of pretending to be a reporter when I’d read newspaper (for which I’d eventually become a reporter) out loud while recording myself with my mother’s old, gray tape recorder back when I lived in western Massachusetts.

Please take a listen. I’d love to hear what you think!