Posted by Sue Leonard on Wednesday 16th November 2016
Brought up a Mormon, Shawn left the faith on leaving home. He always planned to be a teacher, but, after dropping out of university, he began working for a local, weekly newspaper.
“I just loved it,” he says. “I moved to another town, and worked on the paper there. I had planned to earn enough money to go back to college, but that never happened.”
He continued in journalism, eventually moving to Washington State. He currently reports, and writes a column for the Spokesman Review in Spokane.
Throughout this time, Shawn was toying with fiction, writing short stories.
“I tried, for 20 years, to get my stories published, but I had no luck. Then, finally, I did! They appeared in various journals.”
Shawn has published a book of short stories, Godforsaken Idaho. He started exploring the longer form during his MFA programme.
Who is Shawn Vestal
Date of birth: January 1966, in Southern Idaho.
Education: Gooing High School, Idaho; University of Idaho for 3 years, but didn’t finish his degree. Eastern Washington University; MFA in Creative writing. “I now teach there a little bit.”
Home: Spokane, Washington State.
Family: Wife Amy, and son Cole, 9.
The Day Job: Reporting and writing three days a week for the Spokesman Review; occasional teaching.
Interests: Skiing with his son; baking bread; getting together with friends to drink and read Shakespeare.
Favourite Writers: Donald Barthelme; Don Delillo; William Faulkner; Vladimir Nabokov; Thomas Bernhard.
Second Novel: It’s underway.
Top Tip: Read a lot, write a lot, and work really hard.
Web: www.Shawnvestal.com Twitter: @vestal13
The Debut: Daredevils. One: € 8.99.
It’s the seventies in Arizona, and 15 year old Loretta is defying her parents. A Mormon, she’s meeting a gentile boy, and her horrified parents force her to marry Dean; a fundamentalist Mormon, who already has a wife and family. Fast forward to Idaho – and she falls in love with Jason, Dean’s nephew. He is mad about Evel Knievel, and feels suffocated by the Mormon community. The two make a bid for escape, and so follows a dizzying tale.
“My background was a little like Jason’s – although my family was not fundamentalist.”
The Verdict: Fast moving, yet heartfelt. Vestal shows real understanding for the emotions of the young girl.
Published in The Irish Examiner on 12th November.
© Sue Leonard. 2016.