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Natalie Zett
ALLi Author Member
Location: United States of America (the)
Genres: LGBTQ+, Historical Fiction, History
Skills: Performance/Spoken Word, Press/Media Interview, Reading/Literary Event, Speaking Engagement/Lecture
"I am from nowhere"
I borrowed that line from the enigmatic Andy Warhol because it's true for me as well. My identity is tied up in my heritage, even though it is nearly impossible to categorize. The areas my grandparents immigrated from no longer exist—the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Prussia. The muddied waters of my heritage and DNA are further muddled by the fact that the ethnicity of all four of my grandparents is not easily pinned down.
You can be all things when you're from “nowhere,” because you end up being from everywhere.
I've been a writer, actor, photographer, and musician. I’ve worked as a freelance journalist for magazines and papers since I was in my late teens. My favorite writing job was working for an award-winning community newspaper in Saint Paul, the Park Bugle.
I’ve also taught others how to write for community newspapers at The Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis, MN. And, during the last few years, I became a family historian.
I'm drawn to misplaced and forgotten stories because they're more compelling than the world would let us believe.
Natalie Zett's books
Flower in the River
Martha Pfeiffer, age 19, was one of 844 persons who perished when a ship chartered for the Western Electric annual picnic capsized in Chicago in 1915. Martha’s surviving family members never recovered from their grief. The Eastland Disaster has been mostly overlooked in recent years.
In 1997, Pearl Pospisil, a retired Chicago writer, and third-generation Pfeiffer, composed a family history and delivered it to her niece, Zara Vrabel, in St. Paul, who was completely unfamiliar with its contents. Pearl had one request: “Do something with this.”
Zara, also a journalist, was cut off from her family and had no interest in genealogy. However, learning of her great-aunt’s death on the Eastland Disaster made Zara’s heart sink.
Zara’s life unravels as she becomes entangled in the plot and realizes that she and her great-aunt shared more than blood. After discovering that the accident was preventable, Zara initially seeks redress. And the release of another Titanic movie poured salt on a fresh wound. So why was the Eastland consigned to oblivion while the Titanic got all the glory?
Flower in the River interweaves the past and present of four generations of an Eastern-European immigrant family. It suggests that even an unknown trauma can affect a family for generations.