Jill Amber Chafin , Shaken, in conversation with Mimi Herman

When Sally unexpectedly becomes a mother at twenty, she tries her best to build a stable life for her son, Morgan. But the sleepless nights, overwhelming isolation, and relentless cries wear her down until she breaks, and in a moment of desperation, she does the unthinkable: she shakes her baby. Consumed by guilt and fear, Sally buries her actions beneath a facade of normalcy, but the cracks are beginning to show.

Enter Alyssa, the teenage babysitter, who is left in charge the night after the incident. As Morgan’s condition deteriorates, Sally’s partner, Charles, grows increasingly concerned. A series of alarming doctors’ visits spiral into a nightmare when authorities are alerted and fingers start pointing at Alyssa. Will Sally come forward and risk losing everything, or will she try to maintain the illusion of being a perfect mother—even if it means someone else takes the blame?

Shaken explores the intense, often unspoken, struggles of new motherhood and the complexities of human fallibility, raising an unsettling question: Does one irreversible mistake define you forever?

Jill Amber Chafin‘s short-form work has appeared in The Personal Story Publishing Project and Motherfigure, and has been honored as a Finalist for the Penelope Niven Creative Nonfiction Award, Honorable Mention in the New Millennium Writing Awards, and Third Place winner in the anthology America’s Next Author. Shaken is her debut novel and has recently been selected as a finalist for The Wishing Shelf Book Awards. She lives with her husband and two children in Chapel Hill, North Carolina where she works as a freelance writer, editor, and circus arts teacher.

Mimi Herman is a Kennedy Center teaching artist and co-director of Writeaways writing workshops in France, Italy, Ireland and New Mexico. She serves as vice-chair of the Board of Directors for the Association of Writers & Writing Programs and has taught in the Masters of Education programs at Lesley University, served as the North Carolina Piedmont Laureate and been an associate editor for Teaching Artist Journal. Mimi holds a BA from the University of North Carolina and an MFA in Creative Writing from Warren Wilson. She is the author of The Kudzu Queen, A Field Guide to Human Emotions, Logophilia and The Art of Learning.