Mattea Kramer


Mattea Kramer is an American writer. She writes about drugs, power and powerlessness, and the voice in your head. She's been published in The Guardian, The Nation, Mother Jones, Guernica, and The Washington Post, and she has appeared on MSNBC and on radio stations across the country. Her first novel The Untended will be published in May 2025.


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Mattea Kramer

The Untended Book Cover Meme 4

The Untended by Mattea Kramer is a novel about drugs and love in small-town New England. It will be published on May 6, 2025.Casch Abbey is a waitress, single mom, and recreational boxer who falls in love twice: first with a veteran who secretly grows pot on a rich man’s land in Vermont’s Green Mountains, and then with a painkiller that eases her long-buried pain.After her foot is crushed under the wheel of a station wagon, Casch loses her waitressing gig and goes broke — and the meds for her foot are her only source of relief. But when the drug is recalled due to outcries of widespread addiction, Casch’s dependence imperils her already tenuous life.Intimate and exhilarating, The Untended will upend your every assumption about who is a hero and who is worthy of love.Early praise for The Untended:"Addictive."
– Tom Engelhardt, author of Shadow Government
"I couldn't look away."
– Liz Harmer, author of Strange Loops and The Amateurs
"An intense, crisply told story of resilience in small-town New England, with characters dragged into a mire of emotional and financial hopelessness, with the drug industry about to turn the final screws. Or maybe not? Kramer knows how to draw you in so you feel the journey is your own."
– Jude Berman, author of The Die and winner of the 2024 International Book Award for Cross-Genre Fiction
"Mattea Kramer’s The Untended is as unflinching and memorable as its protagonist — a single mother and boxer who is strong enough to get off the mat even when life throws her a haymaker. Don't miss this book."
– Jesse Donaldson, author of The More They Disappear
"A life-affirming story of gumption, resourcefulness, and ferocious attachment."
– Nancy D. Campbell, author of The Narcotic Farm
read the first chapterPublicist: Crystal Patriarche (480) 650-1688, crystal [at] booksparkspr [dot] com

Mattea Kramer

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Mattea Kramer

Mattea Kramer has been an independent writer since 2014.She previously served as senior research analyst and then research director of National Priorities Project, a federal budget think tank, in which capacity she was the lead author of the book
A People’s Guide to the Federal Budget.
For a decade Mattea has been a regular contributor to TomDispatch, which publishes a range of thinkers and experts on American empire, and she has been a recipient of a Carnegie-Knight News21 journalism fellowship from Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy. Since 2017 Mattea has been writing about drugs in America.Born and raised in Greenfield, Massachusetts, Mattea holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Amherst College and a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard. When she read Eleanor Flexner’s obituary in the “Overlooked” series in The New York Times, describing Flexner as alternating between writing and activism, Mattea was pleased to see such an historical precedent for her job description.When not working, she can be found around 42.69507, -72.88799 carrying a backpack with a notebook and a card to identify the footprints of other species.

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Mattea Kramer

Collaborate

Mattea Kramer writes books and major reports for select individuals and organizations working for social change.Currently Mattea is writing and conducting research on behalf of the Pennsylvania-based firm Elevyst, which works for humane drug policy; and she is assisting the international public health organization Vital Strategies, a partner of Bloomberg Philanthropies. In 2023, on behalf of the African Heritage Reparation Assembly of Amherst, Massachusetts, Mattea wrote a report to inform one of the first municipal reparations programs in the nation, as covered by the Associated Press. In the movement for reparations, much work remains.Mattea was previously a private ghostwriter, in which capacity she ghostwrote seven published nonfiction books; one became an Amazon business bestseller. Clients included a former Fortune 15 CEO and a New York Times business blogger.


Testimonials

“Mattea Kramer is a gifted writer with an exceptional ability to make complex and even daunting information not only accessible, but inviting and exciting. Mattea’s intellectual rigor is matched only by her giant heart and painstaking creative process. She holds to an economy of language that is breathtaking and decisive.”
– Massachusetts State Senator Jo Comerford

“Mattea Kramer has a decided gift for inquiry, research, and writing. Yet her greatest gift lies in the nexus of her brilliance and generous spirit.”
– Maria Millard, Maine Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation

“Mattea asks the right questions, provides critical thought partnership and data analysis, and then produces absolutely top-caliber written materials. The analysis that she contributes is truly vital, because she helps us slow down and evaluate, allowing us to do even more powerful work in the future.”
– Uyen Doan, Managing Director, re:power

Mattea Kramer

As I’ve built my writing career, I’ve always wanted help.

I wanted help from someone who had experienced the frustration of many drafts and rejections, but had gone on to build a financially sustainable life around their writing and creativity.I rarely found the help I wanted, however. So I vowed to help others as soon as possible.

"Mattea's insightful suggestions and constructive feedback have enhanced my work and strengthened the overall coherence of my ideas. Apart from being a great editor with an eye to refine the details and enhance any writing, Mattea is a compassionate human being with a kind heart who does everything in her capability to help others."
- Safina Nabi, independent journalist and Pulitzer Center grantee

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