Gram & Me

by Terry Squire Stone, Alan Stone

It began with my grandmother’s early morning phone she wanted me to help her die. In 1977, Terry, a young woman of thirty, drives from L.A. to Las Vegas to see her grandmother. ‘Gram,’ is seventy, cranky, in failing health, and fed up living alone in a senior facility with just her fellow gossips and ‘vultures’ for company. She pleads for Terry’s help. Convinced this was just another cry for attention, Terry expected the trip would turn out like all the others; she’d fetch a few groceries—mostly beer and cigarettes—and listen to Gram’s complaints about her numerous illnesses. How wrong she was. Gram wanted to die, and this time, she was absolutely serious. Terry learned that Gram had ‘Plans.’ Terry was to invite the rest of the family, her mother, her step-sister, and a distant cousin, to a pre-Christmas party where, Gram said, “I have important things to tell you girls. Things you need to know before I die.” “Gram & Me” is a heart-wrenching, sometimes starkly humorous, story about mothers and daughters and their relationships with each other. Tracing events over seventy years, it tracks how the challenges and tragedies of one woman—and her fifty-year-old secret—impacted the lives of each successive generation. During that week with her grandmother, Terry not only learns the history of her grandmother’s life but how that inter-generational trauma ended up as her own.

364 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2022

About the author

Terry was born on a military base in Biloxi, Mississippi in 1947. Her abusive childhood was shared between a conservative, ex-Broadway dancer grandmother and a gorgeous, single, far-left, gadfly, bipolar mother.
She left home at 17 to marry a Greek man who eventually sent her to Greece to live with his family for 4 months. They divorced 3 years later.
As for most women of her generation, work choices were a potpourri of luck and need: cute receptionist, free-spirited freelance artist, cunning actor’s manager, a ditsy waitress for one day, hip album cover designer, confused radio archive manager (KPFK), pitiful advertising saleswoman, subservient office secretary, all-powerful deputy for a Los Angeles City Councilman, and talented movie extra, to name a few.
Terry’s passions include traveling, history, learning, creating, arguing, pushing limits, protesting (WTO and G8s), and being as singular as possible. But, above all else, singing and dancing will always remain at the top of her list.

Reviews

[Brandy Munroe · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unexpected page-turner. The story guides you through the emotional journey of four generations of women. The story is well written and kept me riveted. This is my first novel by Terry Stone.

[Miriam Sidanius · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book

An incredible life story. This book was so well written that I couldn't out of down. There is suspense and insight into the human condition