Hi writers,
How do you feel about summer?
PROS:
watermelon, corn on the cob, ripe peaches with vanilla ice cream, fireflies, maybe hearing the sound of the ocean waves crashing, if you’re very lucky
CONS:
too hot, I can never keep up with my sunglasses, everyone’s in town when I’m out of town — or vice versa, no summer vacation for adults (Who decided that adult don’t get summer vacation? I’d like to formally petition that all adults get summer vacation)
In case you missed it, I’m excited to share some summer publication news with all of you. Last week Brevity blog published my essay “Meet Me in the Middle,” and on Monday the essay was featured in
, curated by literary dynamo . It has brought some new subscribers my way — welcome! Thank you so much for being here. Don’t be afraid to say hello; one of my favorite things about Substack is connecting with other readers and writers.My essay “Loving the Alien” graces the pages of the summer issue of Under the Gum Tree, which should be available any day now. (Stay tuned!) I can’t wait to see it in print.
In July the Thursday Writers workshop will celebrate one year of workshopping together. Watching these 5 writers learn from each other has been an absolute joy. I get a front row seat to so much exploration, skill-building and growth, and it’s an honor.
And I just celebrated a year on Substack. As someone whose outside-the-norm body gets tired sometimes, I love that I can set my own pace on Substack. I love that it has introduced me to new writers. I love that I can scroll back to last June and see how I’ve grown as a writer and a person over this past year. I love that this platform enables me to support the labor of writers I admire. I love that it’s a way for others to support my writing and the literary landscape. But most of all, I love that it encourages me to find my voice.
This year I published some of my most meaningful essays on Substack:
Thanks for being here.
Each month, toward the middle of the month, I offer a writing prompt and a reading recommendation to my paid subscribers as gratitude for their support.
If you haven’t worked with a prompt before, writing prompts are sentences, phrases, questions, objects, colors, shapes or media that are chosen by me and meant to jump start creative thinking in your writing practice. Each month I offer a new prompt, and I also offer pre-writing tips to help guide you through this experience. These prompts are crafted with the idea that they will be used by writers of memoir and creative nonfiction, but they could prove useful to other kinds of artists too, particularly visual artists and dancers. When you’re working with these prompts, don’t worry too much about “finishing” a piece of work — instead, try to think of it as an opportunity to spend a few minutes with your creativity.
One of the best parts about an open-ended prompt is discovering the different directions that it can take, so, writers, I invite you to leave a paragraph or two or a sentence you’re proud of in the comments.
Reading Recommendation:
What’s the first piece of advice I give to someone who wants to be a more skilled or consistent writer? Read. It sounds so simple that some people roll their eyes, and a lot of people think it’s such simple and obvious advice that it can’t really be that helpful. But reading widely, especially in the genre you’re working in, is one of the best ways to learn about writing.
Read to see what you like about other memoirs and personal essays. Read to see what’s possible within this genre, how certain writers are breaking the rules or making new ones.
I offer these monthly reading recommendations in the hopes that they can guide creative nonfiction writers outside of the classroom toward books, essays and craft essays that can serve as touchstones on their writing journey.
I am thrilled that Brevity blog published my essay last week because I have subscribed to Brevity for years and I think it’s one of the best resources for creative nonfiction writers. Not only am I now contributing to the vast encyclopedia of knowledge about creative nonfiction and memoir, but my words live in the same place where Abigail Thomases’ words live.
Brevity blog has been in operation since 2007, and when you sift through it you’ll find a lot of gems. I want to highlight six Brevity essays that I return to again and again, and I also want to tell you why I think they’re useful for anyone writing creative nonfiction/memoir: