Promise Not To Tell

About Jennifer Mcmahon

Jennifer McMahon was born in 1968 and grew up in her grandmother’s house in suburban Connecticut, where she was convinced a ghost named Virgil lived in the attic. Jennifer wrote her first short story in third grade. She graduated with a BA from Goddard College in 1991 and then studied poetry for a year in the MFA in Writing Program at Vermont College. A poem turned into a story, which turned into a novel, and she decided to take some time to think about whether she wanted to write poetry or fiction. After bouncing around the country, Jennifeer wound up back in Vermont, living in a cabin with no electricity, running water, or phone with her partner, Drea, while they built their own house. Over the years, She has been a house painter, farm worker, paste-up artist, Easter Bunny, pizza delivery person, homeless shelter staff member, and counselor for adults and kids with mental illness -- Jennifer quit her last real job in 2000 to work on writing full time. In 2004, she gave birth to her daughter, Zella. In 2005, they left the woods (for now), and moved to Barre, Vermont -- producer of one-third of all the granite gravestones and mausoleums in the US.