Julia Hannafin in conversation with Nirica Srinivasan about their debut novel Cascade

Julia Hannafin is a writer and artist from a two-mom family in Berkeley, California. Their first novel, Cascade, was published with Great Place Books in April 2024, an independent press founded by Alex Higley, Emily Adrian, and Monika Woods.

Cascade is a propulsive novel set on the Farallons—a rugged set of islands off the coast of San Francisco—about addiction, sex, gender, loss, and whether any of us can escape our biological inheritance. After her mother’s overdose, Lydia goes to work for her ex-boyfriend’s father, tagging and monitoring great white sharks. As rare and unforeseen interactions between species threaten her team’s research, so does Lydia’s growing infatuation with her boss. 

In this interview, Interlocutor Fiction Contributing Editor Nirica Srinivasan talks with Hannafin in detail about Cascade and its development.