Podcasts about The Iowa Review

Margaret Anne Mary Moore joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about her realization at an early age that she wanted to be a nonfiction writer and memoirist, facing severe discrimination as a child with disabilities, how she wrote about her disability experience on a granular level, using a communication device, taking breaks to work on other aspects of a project when the writing process grows tiresome, devoting chapters to a single theme, striving to make characterizations rich in detail, looking at rejection juxtaposed against life circumstances, how traumatic memories get seared into our memory, compassion and acceptance, and her memoir Bold, Brave, and Breathless: Reveling in Childhood's Splendiferous Glories While Facing Disability and Loss.   Margaret's Brevity blog article link: https://brevity.wordpress.com/2024/12/23/who-gets-a-spot-on-the-river/   Also in this episode: -hermit crab forms -writing sharp scenes -embodied writing   Books mentioned in this episode: The Mindful Writer by Dinty W. Moore The Shell Game by Kim Adrian Congratulations, Who Are You Again? by Harrison Scott Key   Margaret Anne Mary Moore is the author of the bestselling disability memoir Bold, Brave, and Breathless: Reveling in Childhood's Splendiferous Glories While Facing Disability and Loss (Woodhall Press, 2023) and is currently writing the sequel. She is a summer 2022 graduate of Fairfield University's Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program, where she earned a degree in creative nonfiction and poetry. Margaret is an editor and the marketing coordinator at Woodhall Press and an ambassador for PRC-Saltillo. A featured book on the AWP Bookshelf, Bold, Brave, and Breathless is her debut book. She is a contributor to Gina Barreca's book Fast Famous Women: 75 Essays of Flash Nonfiction (Woodhall Press, 2025). Her writing has appeared in America Magazine, Brevity's Nonfiction Blog, and Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy, Independent Catholic News among other publications.    Connect with Margaret: Website: margaretannemarymoore.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/margaretannemarymooreauthor/ X: https://x.com/mooreofawriter Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/margaretannemarymoore_author LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/margaret-moore-m-f-a-86835312a/ Good Reads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/29567595.Margaret_Anne_Mary_Moore Book: https://a.co/d/b0VZ8Mk   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Frontier: A Memoir and a Ghost Story (Barrelhouse Inc., 2025) is a genre-bending expedition into childbirth. Seamlessly blending memoir, fiction, and research into the fraught history of birth—from midwives to Victorian-era sedation through the Natural Childbirth Movement and modern L&D suites—Frontier lays bare visceral truths that are too often glossed over, and offers an incisive look at the momentous and terrifying transformations of motherhood. As she prepared to give birth to her first child, Erica Stern envisioned the idyllic experience promised by prenatal classes and diaper commercials. But when unexpected complications arose during labor, she found herself at the threshold of life and death, a liminal space that connected her to generations of mothers before her. From the chaos of the delivery room, Frontier opens into a parallel narrative: a Wild West ghost story. There, a mother who didn't survive the ordeal of childbirth roams her old homestead, tethered to the family she left behind. In this otherworldly hybrid memoir, Stern careens between this haunted past and the present horror of the hospital as she waits for her own son to wake up in the NICU. Erica Stern's work has been published in The Iowa Review, Mississippi Review, Denver Quarterly, and elsewhere. She has received support for her writing from the Vermont Studio Center and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. A New Orleans native, she lives with her family in Evanston, Illinois. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literature

Diana Raab joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about connecting with ancestors and tuning into their guidance, books that need to be written, when publisher requests don't resonate with us, adding prompts for readers, unwanted daughters and intergenerational trauma, how books we don't like help us, adding prompts for readers, tapping into authentic voice, and her new book Hummingbird: Messages from My Ancestors.   Also in this episode:  -reading broadly  -surviving cancer multiple times -how trauma manifests later in life   Book mentioned in this episode: This Boys Life by Tobias Wolff Paula by Isabel Allende Fierce Attachments by Vivian Gornick  Crazy Brave by Joy Harjo  Poet Warrior by Joy Harjo   Diana Raab, MFA, PhD, is a poet, memoirist, workshop leader, thought-leader and award-winning author of fourteen books. Her work has been widely published and anthologized. Her poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net. She frequently speaks and writes on writing for healing and transformation. Her 14th and newest book is Hummingbird: Messages from My Ancestors, A memoir with reflection and writing prompts (2024).Raab writes for Psychology Today, The Good Men Project, Sixty and Me, Thrive Global, and is a guest writer for many others.    Connect with Diana: Website: https://www.dianaraab.com Forthcoming poetry anthology: https://gunpowderpress.com/product/women-in-a-golden-state/  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dianaraab/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/diana-raab-phd-a1850911/ Facebook (Author): https://www.facebook.com/DianaRaab.Author/ Facebook (Diana M Raab): https://www.facebook.com/diana.m.raab/ Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/512931.Diana_Raab YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/dianaraab1 Diana's monthly newsletter: https://dianaraab.com/signup/ – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Frontier: A Memoir and a Ghost Story (Barrelhouse Inc., 2025) is a genre-bending expedition into childbirth. Seamlessly blending memoir, fiction, and research into the fraught history of birth—from midwives to Victorian-era sedation through the Natural Childbirth Movement and modern L&D suites—Frontier lays bare visceral truths that are too often glossed over, and offers an incisive look at the momentous and terrifying transformations of motherhood. As she prepared to give birth to her first child, Erica Stern envisioned the idyllic experience promised by prenatal classes and diaper commercials. But when unexpected complications arose during labor, she found herself at the threshold of life and death, a liminal space that connected her to generations of mothers before her. From the chaos of the delivery room, Frontier opens into a parallel narrative: a Wild West ghost story. There, a mother who didn't survive the ordeal of childbirth roams her old homestead, tethered to the family she left behind. In this otherworldly hybrid memoir, Stern careens between this haunted past and the present horror of the hospital as she waits for her own son to wake up in the NICU. Erica Stern's work has been published in The Iowa Review, Mississippi Review, Denver Quarterly, and elsewhere. She has received support for her writing from the Vermont Studio Center and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. A New Orleans native, she lives with her family in Evanston, Illinois. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Frontier: A Memoir and a Ghost Story (Barrelhouse Inc., 2025) is a genre-bending expedition into childbirth. Seamlessly blending memoir, fiction, and research into the fraught history of birth—from midwives to Victorian-era sedation through the Natural Childbirth Movement and modern L&D suites—Frontier lays bare visceral truths that are too often glossed over, and offers an incisive look at the momentous and terrifying transformations of motherhood. As she prepared to give birth to her first child, Erica Stern envisioned the idyllic experience promised by prenatal classes and diaper commercials. But when unexpected complications arose during labor, she found herself at the threshold of life and death, a liminal space that connected her to generations of mothers before her. From the chaos of the delivery room, Frontier opens into a parallel narrative: a Wild West ghost story. There, a mother who didn't survive the ordeal of childbirth roams her old homestead, tethered to the family she left behind. In this otherworldly hybrid memoir, Stern careens between this haunted past and the present horror of the hospital as she waits for her own son to wake up in the NICU. Erica Stern's work has been published in The Iowa Review, Mississippi Review, Denver Quarterly, and elsewhere. She has received support for her writing from the Vermont Studio Center and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts. A New Orleans native, she lives with her family in Evanston, Illinois. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/biography

Dr. T and Truth Fairy welcome Greg Wrenn, a former Alabama state representative and long-time health policy advocate, who shares insights into how he became interested in the therapeutic use of psychedelics through personal research and professional exposure. Greg recently wrote a book called “Mothership” about coral reef research, ecological crisis, and his personal PTSD healing journey with ayahuasca. He discusses portions of the book and his experiences with Truth and Dr. T.  Greg explores the growing interest in psychedelic-assisted therapy, particularly its potential to help individuals who struggle with mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, and PTSD. He addresses the shift from viewing psychedelics as taboo to recognizing their potential under controlled, clinical settings. His personal stories, alongside those shared by Truth, highlight the positive impact psychedelic therapy can have and how his passion for the issue has been fueled. Truth Fairy, Dr. T, and Greg share concerns about the challenges of implementing beneficial psychedelic healing sessions, and they celebrate Greg's integration of tribal and liberating dance into the ayahuasca ceremony. They talk about the importance of regulation, ethical safeguards, and integration of Indigenous practices, and caution against the risks of commercialization. The episode is both vulnerable and informative, painting a hopeful picture of potential healing even in the face of difficult times.“You know, I'm no psychedelic evangelist. I don't think everyone should drink ayahuasca or work with psychedelics. I know I should, I know I need to. And so this is really important for my mission, which is to, I guess, spread a message of love and spread a message of the possibility of planetary healing, because planetary healing happens, at least with humanity, one brain at a time.” - Greg Wrenn__About Greg Wrenn:A former Stegner Fellow and Jones Lecturer at Stanford University, GREG WRENN is the author of the ayahuasca eco-memoir Mothership: A Memoir of Wonder and Crisis, an evidence-based account of his turning to coral reefs and psychedelic plants to heal from childhood trauma, and Centaur (U of Wisconsin Press 2013), which National Book Award-winning poet Terrance Hayes awarded the Brittingham Prize. ​Greg's work has appeared or is forthcoming in HuffPost, The New Republic, Al Jazeera, The Rumpus, LitHub, Writer's Digest, Kenyon Review, New England Review, The Iowa Review, and elsewhere. He has received awards and fellowships from the James Merrill House, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Vermont Studio Center, the Poetry Society of America, the Hermitage Artist Retreat, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Spiro Arts Center. On his Mothership book tour, he spoke to audiences around the world, including at Yale School of Medicine, the University of Utah School of Medicine, Vancouver Island University, and the University of Virginia School of Nursing. Greg has also been on numerous podcasts, including Levi Chambers's PRIDE, and was recently interviewed by Emmy Award-winning journalist Elizabeth Vargas on NewsNation​ and by Jane Garvey on Times Radio (UK). ​As an associate English professor at James Madison University, he teaches creative nonfiction, poetry, and environmental literature and directs the JMU Creative Writing Minor. He also teaches in the Memoir Certificate Program at Stanford Continuing Studies. He was educated at Harvard University and Washington University in St. Louis.Greg is currently at work on a follow-up book to Mothership and sending out Homesick, his second poetry collection. A student of ayahuasca since 2019, he is a trained yoga teacher and a PADI Advanced Open Water diver, having explored coral reefs around the world for over 25 years. He and his husband divide their time between the mountains of Virginia and Atlantic Beach, Florida.Website: GregWrenn.comBook: “Mothership: A Memoir of Wonder and Crisis” by Greg Wrenn__Contact Punk Therapy:Patreon: Patreon.com/PunkTherapyWebsite: PunkTherapy.comEmail: info@punktherapy.com Contact Truth Fairy: Email: Truth@PunkTherapy.com

Rebe Huntman joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about who are we as women and what holds us together as a culture, following questions to their conclusions and changing in the process, running away from grief,  magical thinking, reinventing ourselves, Afro-Cuban traditions and relationships to the dead, hungering for answers, permission to be more than one thing, losing mothers and finding them again through memoir, spiritual mothers and keeping the dead close, and her new memoir My Mother in Havana: A Memoir of Magic & Miracle. Also in this episode: -getting a do over -trusting the writing process -including the beautiful and the terrible Books mentioned in this episode: When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern Poetry by Richard Blanco Poetry by Aracelis Girmay REBE HUNTMAN is the author of My Mother in Havana: A Memoir of Magic & Miracle (February 2025, Monkfish Books), a memoir that traces her search to connect with her mother—thirty years after her death—among the gods and saints of Cuba. A former professional Latin and Afro-Cuban dancer and choreographer, for over a decade Rebe directed Chicago's award-winning Danza Viva Center for World Dance, Art & Music and its resident dance company, One World Dance Theater. She collaborates with native artists in Cuba and South America, and has been featured in LATINA Magazine, Chicago Magazine, and the Chicago Tribune, and on Fox and ABC. Rebe's essays, stories, and poems appear or are forthcoming in such places as The Southern Review, The Missouri Review, Parabola, Ninth Letter, The Cincinnati Review, and the PINCH, and have earned her an Ohio Individual Excellence Award as well as fellowships from the Macondo Writers' Conference, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Ragdale Foundation, PLAYA Residency, Hambidge Center, and Brush Creek Foundation. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from The Ohio State University and lives in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and Delaware, Ohio. Both e's in her name are long. Find her at www. rebehuntman.com and on Instagram at @rebehuntman. Connect with Rebe: Website: www.rebehuntman.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rebehuntman Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rebehuntmanauthor Links to purchase the book at www.rebehuntman.com/mymotherinhavana   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

The queens dish this year's AWP Conference!Please Support Breaking Form!Review the show on Apple Podcasts here.Aaron's STOP LYING is available from the Pitt Poetry Series.James's ROMANTIC COMEDY is available from Four Way Books. Notes: The Association of Writers and Writing Programs can be found online at www.awpwriter.org Marcela Fuentes is the author of the award-winning novel Malas and you can find her online at https://www.marcelafuentes.comCheck out the exhibit Flesh World at Central Server Works, showcasing paintings by Monica Berger and Sofia Heftersmith.Julie Marie Wade's The Mary Yearsis a novella which won The 2023 Clay Reynolds Novella Prize, selected by Michael Martone.Purchase a copy of the Maureen Seaton tribute book When I Was StraightCheck out "From the Motel-By-the-Hour" (originally in The Iowa Review) from Nancy K. Pearson's book Two Minutes of Light from Perugia here.Claire J. Bateman's book is The Pillow Museum, available from the University of Alabama PressJen Jabaily-Blackburn's Girl in a Bear Suit won the Elixir Press Award. Buy it from her on her website: https://www.jenjabailyblackburn.comEmily Lee Luan won the Nightboat Poetry Prize for Return. Visit her website here.More information about the Civitella Ranieri Foundation can be found here.  James's Best American Poetry 2025 selection is called "Inheritance at Corresponding Periods of Life, at Corresponding Seasons of the Year, as Limited by Sex" originally published in Adroit Journal.

Bridgett M. Davis joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the effect of trauma and weathering on Black lives, the unique bond between sisters, showing relationships in action and dialogue, homing in on a throughline, giving our books and writing the space they need,finding patterns and switching lenses, exploring varying lived experiences within family structures, shedding light on Lupus, the physiological effects of systemic racism, Black maternal mortality, moments of heartbreak, asking important narrative questions early on, the letters her sister wrote to her, and her new memoir Love, Rita.   Also in this episode: -birth order -getting a book optioned or film -shifting points of view   Books mentioned in this episode: -The Situations and the Story by Vivian Gornick -Inventing the Truth by William Zisner -The Yellow House by Sarah  -Memorial Drive by Natasha Tretheway -The Invisible Kingdom by Megan O'Rourke -Fairy Land by Alisha Abbott -Gather Me by Glory Adams   Bridgett M. Davis (pronounced Brih-jet) is the author of the memoir, Love, Rita, published by Harper Books in spring 2025.Her first memoir, The World According To Fannie Davis: My Mother's Life In The Detroit Numbers, was a New York Times Editors' Choice, a 2020 Michigan Notable Book, named a Best Book of 2019 by Kirkus Reviews, BuzzFeed, NBC News and Parade Magazine, and featured as a clue on the quiz show Jeopardy! The upcoming film adaptation will be produced by Plan B Entertainment and released by Searchlight Pictures. She is author of two novels, Into the Go-Slow, named a Best Book of 2014 by The San Francisco Chronicle, and Shifting Through Neutral, shortlisted for the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Legacy Award. Davis is also writer/director of the 1996 award-winning feature film Naked Acts, newly restored and released to critical acclaim, screening in theaters across the US and globally and now available on DVD, Blu Ray and select streaming services. Davis is Professor Emerita in the journalism department at Baruch College and the CUNY Graduate Center, where she has taught creative, narrative and film writing. Her essays have appeared most recently in The New York Times, the LA Times and The Washington Post, among other publications. A graduate of Spelman College and Columbia Journalism School, she lives in Brooklyn with her family. Visit her website at www.bridgettdavis.com. Connect with Bridgett: Website: bridgettdavis.com Facebook: bridgettdavis Bluesky: bridgettmdavis.bsky.social IG: https://www.instagram.com/bridgett_d substack: bridgettmdavis.substack.com Links for book purchase: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/love-rita-bridgett-m-davis?variant=43263953174562 Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/p/books/love-rita-a-sister-s-story-bridgett-m-davis/21696108   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Megan Williams joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about being a new mother while training at the police academy, looking for validation, resisting the urge to punish ourselves, pushing back against the voice of patriarchal culture, writing to our past self, going too far and not going far enough, the loneliness of motherhood, setting boundaries in memoir, testing ourselves, what motherhood feels like now, moving elegantly through time in memoir, surrounding yourself with talented writers, frontloading a manuscript, and her memoir One Bad Mother: A Mother's Search for Meaning in the Police Academy. Also in this episode: -thinking as a form of writing -writing community -writing conferences     Books mentioned in this episode: Crossing the River by Carol Smith  Starry Field by Margaret Juhae Lee Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy Alliosn You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith A Well-Trained Wife by Tia Levings   Megan Williams is the author of One Bad Mother: A Mother's Search for Meaning in the Police Academy. After graduating from Haverford College, Megan received her Ph.D. in English from Temple University and taught at Lafayette College and Santa Clara University. She has moved across the country—never landing in the middle—three times in twenty years. She now lives in Bellingham with her husband, who runs Blue Dog Bakery and keeps their teenage twins, rescued cat, horse, and mastiff full of treats. Connect with Megan Williams: Website: www.meganwilliamsauthor.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1347114175 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ottoisking/ Tiktok: @one.bad.mother LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/megan-williams-6585844a/ Get the book: https://bookshop.org/p/books/one-bad-mother-a-woman-s-search-for-meaning-in-motherhood-and-the-philadelphia-police-academy-megan-williams/20964845?ean=9781960573858   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Paul Lisicky joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about how his appreciation for Joni Mitchell  and love of her work shaped his life as a musician and a writer, vulnerability and uncertainty on the page, falling outside the containers of what's expected, the singular and universal in our work, vulnerability and uncertainty in our creative process, corralling ourselves back to our 5 senses, feeling structure in our bodies, writing for the reader, developing ourselves as artists, being tenacious in pursuing our vision, writing about our idols, and his new book Song So Wild and Blue.   Also in this episode: -image-based writing -writing a proposal for the first time -how structure can help liberate our work   Books/Authors mentioned in this episode: Sigrid Nunez Elizabeth McCracken Sarah Manguso Mary Gaitskill  Joy Williams Barry Lopez Annie Liontis E.J. Koh All Fours by Miranda July   Paul Lisicky is the author of seven books including Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell, Later: My Life at the Edge of the World, The Narrow Door: A Memoir of Friendship. A recipient of Fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the NEA, he is a professor of English in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Rutgers University-Camden. He lives in Brooklyn. Website: http://www.paullisicky.net/ Connect with Paul: https://bsky.app/profile/paullisicky.bsky.social Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paul_lisicky/ Get the book: https://bookshop.org/p/books/song-so-wild-and-blue-a-life-with-the-music-of-joni-mitchell-paul-lisicky/21517908?ean=9780063280373 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Maggie Smith returns to Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about letting imposter syndrome go, fiercely guarding your interior life, getting back to the core place where creativity thrives, rewriting a book from scratch, how writing feels in the body, swerving out of your creative lane, battling the sophomore slump, what it feels like to be watched, when ego gets in the way, fears of paralyzing failure, playing the long game, the best advice she ever got, staying agile and awake in the creative process, and her new book Dear Writer: Pep Talks & Practical Advice for the Creative Life.   Ronit's first interview with Maggie Smith: https://ronitplank.com/2023/04/11/lets-talk-memoir-episode-38-ft-maggie-smith/   Also in this episode: -the inner critic -assembling a book freestyle -tenacity and grit     Books mentioned in this episode: Meander, Spiral, Explode by Jane Allison The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr Truth is the Arrow, Mercy is the Bow by Steve Almond Greywolf Press series “The Art of…” books   Maggie Smith is the New York Times bestselling author of eight books of poetry and prose, including You Could Make This Place Beautiful: A Memoir (One Signal/Atria, 2023); My Thoughts Have Wings, illustrated by Leanne Hatch (Balzer+Bray/Harperkids, 2024); Goldenrod: Poems (One Signal/Atria, 2021); Keep Moving: Notes on Loss, Creativity, and Change (One Signal/Atria, 2020); and Good Bones (Tupelo Press, 2017). Smith's next book is Dear Writer: Pep Talks & Practical Advice for the Creative Life, forthcoming from One Signal/Atria in April 2025. Her poems and essays have appeared in the New York Times, The New Yorker, Poetry, The Nation, The Best American Poetry, The Paris Review, The Atlantic, AGNI, Ploughshares, Image, the Washington Post, Virginia Quarterly Review, American Poetry Review, The Southern Review, and many other journals and anthologies. In 2016 her poem "Good Bones" went viral internationally; since then it has been translated into nearly a dozen languages and featured on the CBS primetime drama Madam Secretary. Smith has received fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Academy of American Poets, the Ohio Arts Council, the Sustainable Arts Foundation, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Karen Kirsten joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the messy complexity of family, asking the right questions, writing about a time in history when you weren't present in that history, utilizing and incorporating primary research, recorded interviews, archived documents, diaries, film, and photographs into memoir, writing fact-based vivid scenes, working with historians to accurately depict world-altering events, being honest with the reader and grappling with conflicting information on the page, changing the central question of your memoir, being a detective and being dogged, having a care plan and a nurturing creative community, writing about transgenerational trauma, inserting yourself into the narrative as a character, and her new memoir Irina's Gift.   Also in this episode: -structural changes late in the process -delaying reveals to add suspense -using image systems to address transgenerational trauma   Books mentioned in this episode:    The Fact of a Body by Alex Marzano-Lesnevich The Most Dangerous Book by Kevin Birmingham The Sinner and the Saint by Kevin Birmingham Fairyland by Alysia Abbott The Postcard by Anne Berest The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel WIlkers The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante Leviathan by Paul Auster Question 7 by Richard Flanagan Swimming in Paris: A Life in Three Stories by Colombe Schneck Who I Always Was by Theresa Okokon Karen Kirsten is the author of Irena's Gift, a National Jewish Book Award finalist for Autobiography & Memoir, winner of Zibby Awards for Best Family Drama & Best Story of Overcoming, and an Australian Jewish Book Award finalist. Irena's Gift is also The Australian newspaper's'notable book', and described by Pulitzer prize winning author Geraldine Brooks as ”a disturbing investigation into the power of secrets to harm and to haunt.”   Karen is an Australian-American writer and Holocaust educator who speaks around the world on the topics of hate and reconciliation. Karen's essay “Searching for the Nazi Who Saved My Mother's Life” was selected by Narratively as one of their Best Ever stories and nominated for The Best American Essays. Karen's writing has also appeared in Salon.com, The Week, The Jerusalem Post, Huffington Post*, Boston's National Public Radio station, The Boston Herald, The Sydney Morning Herald, and more.    Connect with Karen: Website: https://www.karenkirsten.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/findingbabcie/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/karen.kirsten Book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/747811/irenas-gift-by-karen-kirsten/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Paula Delgado-Kling joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about how her research and reporting on child soldiers, drug trafficking, and the revolutionary armed forces of Columbia (FARC) led her to tell the story of one woman and her family, the relationships we forge with whom we write about, allowing memoir to answer our questions, negotiating language barriers and class differences, coming to truth and understanding, grounding ourselves, hitting upon the structure a book needs, searching for humanity amidst ongoing violence, and her new book Leonor: The Story of a Lost Childhood.   Also in this episode: -working as a journalist -becoming embedded in the story we're covering  -negotiating dangerous environments to gather information   Books mentioned in this episode: Tastes Like War by Grace M. Cho It can take a really long time but that doesn't mean it isn't important or good.   Paula Delgado-Kling holds degrees in comparative literature/French civilizations, international affairs, and creative writing from Brown University, Columbia University, and The New School, respectively. Leonor, for which she received two grants from the Canadian Council for the Arts, is her first book. Excerpts of this book have appeared in Narrative, The Literary Review, Pacifica Literary Review, and Happano.org in Japan. Her work for the Mexican monthly news magazine Gatopardo was nominated for the Simon Bolivar Award, Colombia's top journalism prize, and anthologized in Las Mejores Crónicas de Gatopardo (Random House Mondadori, 2006). Born in Bogota, Colombia and raised in Toronto, Canada, Delgado-Kling now splits her time between Boca Raton, FL and New York City. To learn more, please visit PaulaDelgadoKling.com or follow her on Instagram @PaulaDelgadoKling. Connect with Paula Website: http://pauladelgadokling.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100091961238236 Twitter: https://twitter.com/ColombiaTalk Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pauladelgadokling/ Get the book: https://www.amazon.com/Leonor-Story-Childhood-Paula-Delgado-Kling/dp/1682194477?crid=1M4ML48WOEEV7&keywords=leonor&qid=1683308327&s=books&sprefix=leonor,stripbooks,97&sr=1-1&linkCode=sl1&tag=ongoicom-20&linkId=986106192c06afd126c43cfe6d22043d&language=en_US&ref_=as_li_ss_tl   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Diane Vonglis Parnell joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about growing up with 9 siblings on an isolated farm under the tyranny of her abusive father and living in constant fear, homing in on the story we are called to tell, steering clear of portraying ourselves as victim or hero, not having closure, yearning for a mother, emotional absence, self-nurturing, trusting readers, the toll of secrets, changing names of family members, sharing manuscripts with siblings, writing about abusers, taking power back, and her new memoir The Taste of Anger.   Also in this episode: -the importance of therapy to memoirists -opting for a child narrator -writing about emotional neglect and depression   Books mentioned in this episode: The Liar's Club by Mary Karr The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealey Creep by Myriam Gurba   Diane Vonglis Parnell grew up on a remote farm in Western New York with nine siblings. Her essay Blame the Milkman was a winner in the Fish Publishing short memoir contest, and included in the Fish Anthology 2022. Vonglis Parnell is a Scrabble enthusiast, and a lover of progressive rock music. She serves as a CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) volunteer for abused children in her community, and lives a minimalist's life in a 200-square-foot cottage in San Luis Obispo, California.  Connect with Diane: Facebook.com/dianevonglisparnell Instagram: @dianevonglisparnell – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Martha S. Jones joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about being Black, white, and other in America, the origins of her family in slavery and sexual violence, anti-miscegenation laws, passing, who we call kin and why, taking up space, avoiding the Black-White binary, discovering family stories, writing in a full-throated way, leaving complexity in our work, being patient with our material, chasing threads, the duty we have to the people we write about, grappling with contradictions, leaving readers room to decide, writing and rewriting to get someplace new, the courage it takes to confront the past, and her new book The Trouble of Color: An American Family Memoir. Also mentioned in this episode: -false starts -feeling ready to be read -taking care of ourselves when writing   Books mentioned in this episode: Heavy by Kiese Laymon Memorial Drive by Natasha Tretheway Black is the Body by Emily Bernard Thick by Tracy McMillan Cotton Inventing the Truth by William Zissner    Martha S. Jones is the Society of Black Alumni Presidential Professor, professor of history, and a professor at the SNF Agora Institute at the Johns Hopkins University. A prizewinning author and editor of four books, her forthcoming The Trouble of Color: An American Family Memoir, confronts the limits of the historian's craft in this powerful memoir of family, color, and being Black, white, and other in America. She is past copresident of the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians and has contributed to the New York Times, Atlantic, and many other publications. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland. Connect with Martha: Website: www.marthasjones.com X: https://x.com/marthasjones_ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marthasjones Book: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/martha-s-jones/the-trouble-of-color/9781541601000/?lens=basic-books – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Nicole Graev Lipson joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about our culture's fascination with reducing women to readymade templates and archetypes, performing fictional versions of ourselves, finding our way back to who we are, the essay as a place where writers can grapple with confusion, working sentence by sentence, finding the most precise microscopic truth, embracing our particularities, focusing on we're enthralled with, what it means to be a woman today, writing about children, attention as a loving act, drawing from the mess, writing as our own form of protest, how writing can be a shame eraser, and her new book Mothers and Other Fictional Characters. Also in this episode: -finding your genre -the architecture of the sentence -finding community with other writers   Books mentioned this episode:  The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp If You Want to Write by Brenda Ueland Any Person is the Only Self by Elisa Gabbert Spilt Milk by Courtney Zoffness The Leaving Season by Kelly McMasters “The Seam of the Snail” essay by Cynthia Ozick    NICOLE GRAEV LIPSON is the author of the memoir-in-essays Mothers and Other Fictional Characters (Chronicle Books, March 2025). Her writing has been awarded a Pushcart Prize, selected for The Best American Essays anthology, and nominated for a National Magazine Award. Her work has appeared publications such as The Sun, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Gettysburg Review, LA Review of Books, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and more. Born and raised in New York City, she lives outside of Boston with her husband and children.  Connect with Nicole: Website: www.nicolegraevlipson.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nglipson X: http://x.com/@NicoleGLipson Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nicole.g.lipson   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Sarah Jaffe joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about allowing ourselves to be known on the page, learning how to pivot from journalism to the very personal, processing experiences through writing, being upended by grief, taking care of ourselves when writing about violence and terror, witnessing and giving voice to other people's hardships with integrity and respect, becoming undone on the page, how we are haunted by the losses we live through, sculpting material down during revision, and her new book From the Ashes: Grief and Revolution in a World on Fire.   Also mentioned in this episode: -documenting activism and organizing -climate change -the cognitive dissonance of social media   Books mentioned in this episode: -Ghostly Matters by Avery Gordon -Love and Borders by Anna Lukas Miller -Who Cares by Emily Kenway   Sarah Jaffe is the author of Work Won't Love You Back: How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted and Alone, which Jane McAlevey called “a multiplex in still life; a stunning critique of capitalism, a collective conversation on the meaning of life and work, and a definite contribution to the we-won't-settle-for-less demands of the future society everyone deserves,” and of Necessary Trouble: Americans in Revolt, both from Bold Type Books.   She is a Type Media Center reporting fellow and an independent journalist covering the politics of power, from the workplace to the streets. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Nation, the Guardian, the Washington Post, The New Republic, the Atlantic, and many other publications. She is the co-host, with Michelle Chen, of Dissent magazine's Belabored podcast, as well as a columnist at The Progressive and New Labor Forum.   Sarah was formerly a staff writer at In These Times and the labor editor at AlterNet. She was a contributing editor on The 99%: How the Occupy Wall Street Movement is Changing America, from AlterNet books, as well as a contributor to the anthologies At the Tea Party and Tales of Two Cities, both from OR Books, and Nasty Women: Feminism, Resistance, and Revolution in Trump's America, from Picador. She was also the web director at GRITtv with Laura Flanders.   She was one of the first reporters to cover Occupy and the Fight for $15, has appeared on numerous radio and television programs to discuss topics ranging from electoral politics to Superstorm Sandy, from punk rock to public-sector unions.   She has a master's degree in journalism from Temple University in Philadelphia and a bachelor's degree in English from Loyola University New Orleans. Sarah was born and raised in Massachusetts and has also lived in South Carolina, Louisiana, Colorado, New York and Pennsylvania.   Connect with Sarah: Website: https://sarahljaffe.com/ X: https://x.com/sarahljaffe Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sarahljaffe/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sarahjaffetrouble   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Susan Lieu joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about realizing you're an artist later in life, becoming a multi-hyphinate storyteller, being a mother when you never knew your own, piecing together a family story, feeling plagued by structure, sticking to the throughline, writing residencies, writing down goals, deciding to stop searching for approval from loved ones and getting it for and from ourselves, accepting loved ones as they are, grief journeys, storytelling as closure, and her new memoir The Manicurist's Daughter.   Also in this episode: -using a book doctor -mental health stigma and older generations -body acceptance   Books mentioned in this episode:  -Ma and Me by Putsata Reang    SUSAN LIEU is a Vietnamese-American author, playwright, and performer who tells stories that refuse to be forgotten. She took her award-winning autobiographical solo show 140 LBS: How Beauty Killed My Mother on a ten-city national tour, with sold-out premieres and accolades from the Los Angeles Times, NPR, and American Theatre. Her debut memoir, The Manicurist's Daughter, is an Apple Book of the Month, Apple Book Must Listen of the Month, and has been featured on The New York Times, NPR Books, Elle Magazine, LA Times, and The Washington Post. Creator of The Vagina Monologues, V (formerly Eve Ensler) calls The Manicurist's Daughter “a stunning, raw, brave memoir that wouldn't let me go.” She is a proud alumnae of Harvard College, Yale School of Management, Coro, Hedgebrook, and Vashon Artist Residency. She is also the cofounder of Socola Chocolatier, an artisanal chocolate company based in San Francisco. Susan lives with her husband and son in Seattle, where they enjoy mushroom hunting, croissants, and big family gatherings. The Manicurist's Daughter is her first book. Connect with Susan: Website: https://www.susanlieu.me/ Model Minority Moms Podcast: https://modelminoritymoms.com/ Instagram: @susanlieu, @celadonbooks  facebook: https://www.facebook.com/susanlieuofficial TikTok: @susanlieuofficial LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/susanlieu/ – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Barrie Miskin joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the rare dissociative disorder she experienced while pregnant and her experience navigating the maternal and mental health care system, the guilt and shame so often connected to motherhood and womanhood, the sweet spot of writing a year into her full recovery, balancing memoir writing with privacy and community, owning who we are and what we need to write, helping people feel seen, protection within the writing process, letting loved ones read our work before publication, writing a memoir in three months, and her new memoir Hell Gate Bridge.   Also in this episode: -maternal mental health crises -cognitive behavioral therapy -writing fast   Books mentioned in this episode  -Inferno: A Memoir of Motherhood and Madness by Catherine Cho -Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan -After the Eclipse: A Mother's Murder, a Daughter's Search by Sarah Perry -Between Two Kingdoms by Suleika Jaouad    Barrie Miskin's writing has appeared in Hobart, Narratively, Expat Press and elsewhere. Her interviews can be found in Write or Die magazine, where she is a regular contributor. Barrie is also a teacher in Astoria, New York, where she lives with her husband and daughter. Hell Gate Bridge is her first book. Connect with Barrie: Website: barriemiskin.com Instagram: @barrie_m X: @bmcintyre1000 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Kanya D'Almeida joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about how her life changed when a manuscript by Russell "Maroon" Shoatz, a former member of the Black Panther Party and soldier in the Black Liberation Army showed up in an envelope on her doorstep in 2011, the decades he spent in the Pennsylvania prison system, how their experiences with political violence and civil war intersected, becoming his biographer and building comradeship across the bars, Sri Lanka's history of conflict, channeling complicated feelings into dedication for writing a book, violence as the only language America knows how to speak, and her new book I Am Maroon: The True Story of an American Political Prisoner.    Ronit's upcoming memoir course: https://www.pce.uw.edu/courses/memoir-writing-finding-your-story    Also in this episode: -being a diasporic writer  -being a multi-genre author -the role of self-criticism   Books mentioned in this episode: On a Move by Mike Africa Jr. Assata: An Autobiography by Assata Shakur    Russell "Maroon" Shoatz was a dedicated community activist, founding member of the Black Unity Council, former member of the Black Panther Party, and soldier in the Black Liberation Army. Kanya D'Almeida won the 2021 Commonwealth Short Story Prize, becoming the first Sri Lankan and only the second Asian writer to hold the honor. She was awarded the Society of Authors' annual short story award in 2022. Her journalism has appeared in Al Jazeera, TruthOut, and The Margins, and her fiction has appeared in Granta. She holds an MFA from Columbia University, where she studied under Victor LaValle.   Connect with Kanya: https://twitter.com/kanyadalmeida https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/russell-shoatz/i-am-maroon/9781645030492/?lens=bold-type-books   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.   More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Sari Botton joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about editing the magazines Adventures in Journalism, Memoir Land, and Oldster, her experience publishing on Substack, editing vs. generating material, putting ourselves in our story, wrestling with what to share, creating safe boundaries, growing into the truest version of ourselves, vomit drafts, leaving the perfectionist out of the room, turning death on its head, shedding false identities, being our own best champion, and her mid-life coming of age memoir in episodes And You May Find Yourself...Confessions of a Late-Blooming Gen-X Weirdo.   Also in this episode:  -lowering standards for an early draft -finding time for our own writing -giving ourselves downtime to switch gears   Books mentioned in this episode: -Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott -Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott -Bodywork by Melissa Febos -The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr -All books by Abigail Thomas   Sari's audibook is available here: https://www.audible.com/pd/And-You-May-Find-Yourself-Audiobook/B0DVMR3V2M   Sari Botton's memoir in essays, And You May Find Yourself...Confessions of a Late-Blooming Gen-X Weirdo, was chosen by Poets & Writers magazine for the 2022 edition of its annual "5 Over 50" feature. An essay from it received notable mention in The Best American Essays 2023, edited by Vivian Gornick. For five years, she was the Essays Editor at Longreads. She edited the bestselling anthologies Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving NewYork and Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for New York. She publishes Oldster Magazine, Memoir Land, and Adventures in Journalism. She was the Writer in Residence in the creative writing department at SUNY New Paltz for Spring, 2023.    Connect with Sari: http://saribotton.com https://www.facebook.com/sari.botton/ https://www.instagram.com/saribotton/ https://bsky.app/profile/saribotton.bsky.social http://oldster.substack.com http://memoirland.substack.com http://adventuresinjournalism.substack.com https://www.audible.com/pd/And-You-May-Find-Yourself-Audiobook/B0DVMR3V2M https://bookshop.org/p/books/and-you-may-find-yourself-sari-botton/18519104 https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/sari-botton/goodbye-to-all-that-revised-edition/9781541675681/?lens=seal-press https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Never-Can-Say-Goodbye/Sari-Botton/9781476784403 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.   More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Eleanor Vincent joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about trying to save her challenging high conflict marriage, autism in adults and Cassandra Syndrome, what to leave out of a book, self-revelation and honest grappling, the toll of masking autism, emotional abuse, careful framing of those we write about, using a sensitivity reader, support groups for neurodiverse spouses, our narrating personas, writing fearless first drafts, disguising identities and biographical details to protect those we write about, and her new memoir Disconnected.    Ronit's upcoming memoir course: https://www.pce.uw.edu/courses/memoir-writing-finding-your-story   Also in this episode: -complex trauma -hyperfocus -reading unceasingly   Books mentioned in this episode: -The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick -Blow Your House Down by Gina Frangello -You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith -This American Ex-Wife by Liz Lenz -Liars by Sarah Manguso -Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset  -22 Things a Woman Must Know If She Loves a Man with Asperger's Syndrome by Rudy Simone  -Books by Anne Patchett   Eleanor Vincent's new memoir Disconnected: Portrait of a Neurodiverse Marriage is forthcoming from Vine Leaves Press. It tells the story of her gradual discovery that her husband was on the autism spectrum, and of how she tried to save a challenging high-conflict marriage. Her previous memoir, Swimming with Maya: A Mother's Story (Dream of Things, 2013) has twice been on the New York Times bestseller list and was nominated for the Independent Publisher of the Year award. Her essays have appeared in anthologies by Creative Nonfiction and This I Believe, the literary magazines 580 Split and Dorothy Parker's Ashes, as well as shorter pieces in the San Francisco Chronicle, the Sacramento Bee, and Generations Today. She has an MFA in creative writing from Mills College and is a member of the San Francisco Writers Grotto, Left Margin Lit, and the Author's Guild. She has taught creative nonfiction seminars at Mills College as a visiting writer and been awarded residencies at Hedgebrook, the Vermont Studio Center, and Writing Between the Vines. She lives in Walnut Creek, California. Connect with Eleanor: Website: https://www.eleanorvincent.com/ Book: https://vineleavespress.myshopify.com/products/disconnected-portrait-of-a-neurodiverse-marriage-by-eleanor-vincent X: https://x.com/eleanorpvincent Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eleanor.vincent/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eleanor.vincent/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/eleanorpvincent/ Writing the real world Substack: https://eleanorvincent.substack.com/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Minelle Mahtani joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the grief, love, loss, and repair in losing her mother while finding her voice, noncolonial ways of thinking about stories, writing about her Indian, Iranian, and Canadian identities, what the sound of our voice is worth, paying attention to what we pay attention to, permission to be ourselves, having fun while trying to write precisely about grief, emotional trauma commonalities, her Canadian radio show Sense of Place, how kind we can bear to be to ourselves, listening as a political act, and her new memoir  May it Have a Happy Ending.    Ronit's upcoming 10-week online memoir course: https://www.pce.uw.edu/courses/memoir-writing-finding-your-story   Also in this episode: -sibling approaches to grief and losing parents -cocooning -feminist geography   Books mentioned in this episode: Code Noir by Canisia Lubrin  The Story Game by Shze-Hui Tjoa Books by Julietta Singh   Minelle Mahtani is a Muslim Iranian/Indian/Canadian writer, former TV producer and radio host who teaches at University of British Columbia. Her memoir, “May It Have a Happy Ending” has been called a “magnificent and stunning debut…a gorgeous prism of stories.” She has been nominated for two national magazine awards and won a gold medal for best personal essay in th Digital Publishing Awards. She is the author of the book “Mixed Race Amnesia: Resisting the Romanticization of Multiraciality.” Her work has appeared in Geist, Maisonneuve and is forthcoming in Southeast Review.    Connect with Minelle: Website: www.minellemahtani.com X: https://x.com/mminelle Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/minellewrites Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/minelle.mahtani/ – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Jarod K. Anderson joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about changing our definition of what victory is based on what we can and can't control, understanding our own minds and contextualizing ourselves in the world, his experience with chronic major depression, the stigma around mental illness, the pain of abstraction and the concrete world, his podcast The Cryptonaturalist, privileging enthusiasm over fact, internal landscapes, the paradox of choice, large social media followings, the magic of the natural world around us, limitation as the engine for creativity, and his new memoir Something in the Woods Loves You.   Also in this episode: -fantastical nature -toxic masculinity -a sense of service   More about Ronit's UW Writing Class, MEMOIR WRITING: FINDING YOUR STORY: https://www.pce.uw.edu/courses/memoir-writing-finding-your-story   Books mentioned in this episode: On Writing by Stephen King Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer Area X by Jeff VanderMeer   JAROD K. ANDERSON is a writer, poet, and creator of The CryptoNaturalist podcast -a scripted show about real adoration for fictional wildlife. HIs new book is: SOMETHING IN THE WOODS LOVES YOU. He has built a large audience of social media followers and podcast listeners with his vibrant appreciations of nature. His previous 3 books are all best-sellers: Field Guide to the Haunted Forest, Love Notes from the Hollow Tree, and Leaf Litter. He lives in Ohio between a forest and a cemetery.  Connect with Jarod: https://www.jarodkanderson.com/ https://www.instagram.com/cryptonaturalist/ https://x.com/CryptoNature https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBXHP2Yy5cJwg0tR9VfP8Xw https://www.facebook.com/JarodKAnderson/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Sarah Gormley joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about unpacking the baggage of self-doubt and imposter syndrome and moving toward self-love, shaping our memoirs into answers to the questions we have about our life, prioritizing pieces and elements of our story that help show readers transformation, the messiness of mother-daughter relationships, including partners and family in our memoir narratives, cutting big chunks of our manuscripts out, themes as blueprints for our structure, trusting our body when we land somewhere right, realizing what our book is actually about, and her new memoir The Order of Things.   Also in this episode: -enjoying the magic of the written word  -writing as a reader -including scenes from therapy in our memoirs   Books mentioned in this episode:  While You Were Out by Meg Kissinger Group by Christie Tate A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by David Eggers The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer   Sarah Gormley is a writer and art gallery owner living in Columbus, Ohio. Her undergraduate degree from DePauw University reinforced an early love for literature and writing, while the heavy sprinkling of liberal-arts fairy dust taught her how to analyze and articulate a clear point of view. She rounded out this foundation with concentrations in marketing and operations from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. Her marketing career included work with several global brands, including IMAX, Martha Stewart, Girl Scouts of the USA, and Adobe. Gormley was honored as one of 2015's Forty Women to Watch over 40, and she has been featured in Forbes and the CMO Club. In June 2019, she was invited to deliver the class address at her DePauw University class reunion and regrets not having her hair blown out. Today, Gormley owns a contemporary art gallery, Sarah Gormley Gallery (SGG), in downtown Columbus, Ohio.    Connect with Sarah: Website: www.sarahgormley.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/scgormley/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sarah.gormley.3726/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gormleysarah/ – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Paula Whyman joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about getting out of our comfort zone,  her attempt to restore native meadows in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, becoming obsessed with subjects and deep diving, writing about science and nature, controlling and selecting details for impact, being attentive to what readers need, writing tangentially, the need for deadlines, when your editor calls you a meanderer, leaning into exploration and not shutting ourselves down, allowing our writing to reflect the way our minds work, and her new memoir Bad Naturalist.   Also in this episode: -jumping from fiction to nonfiction -talking with experts -reading work aloud   Books mentioned in this episode: The Leaving Season by Kelly McMasters H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald Late Migrations by Margaret Renkl A Buzz in the Meadow by Dave Goulson The Boys of My Youth by Jo Ann Beard The Sweet Life in Paris by David Lebovitz The Cost of Living by Deborah Levy  Things I Don't Want to Know by Deborah Levy  Real Estate by Deborah Levy    Paula Whyman's new book, Bad Naturalist: One Woman's Ecological Education on a Wild Virginia Mountaintop, is forthcoming from Timber Press/Hachette Book Group in January 2025. It's a blend of memoir, natural history, and conservation science, a chronicle of her attempts to restore retired farmland to natural habitat and what she discovered along the way. Her first book, the linked short story collection You May See a Stranger, won praise from The New Yorker and a starred review in Publishers Weekly, and won the Towson Prize for Literature. Her stories have appeared in journals including McSweeney's Quarterly, Virginia Quarterly Review, Ploughshares, The Hudson Review, and The Southampton Review. Her fiction was selected for the anthology Writes of Passage: Coming-of-Age Stories and Memoirs from The Hudson Review. Her nonfiction has been featured on NPR, and in the Washington Post, The American Scholar, and The Rumpus. She is co-founder and editor in chief of the literary journal Scoundrel Time.   Whyman has taught in writers-in-schools programs through the Pen/Faulkner Foundation in Washington, DC, and the Hudson Review in Harlem and the Bronx, New York. Her fiction is part of the curriculum at The Young Women's Leadership School in Harlem.   Whyman's work has been supported by fellowships from MacDowell, Yaddo, The Studios of Key West, and VCCA. She was a Tennessee Williams Scholar in Fiction at the Sewanee Writers Conference. She served two terms as Vice President of the MacDowell Fellows Executive Committee.   Whyman is the recipient of grants from the Maryland State Arts Council (MSAC) and the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County. She was awarded an MSAC Creativity Grant and 2023 and 2024 Oak Spring Garden Foundation residencies and grants to support her work on Bad Naturalist.  Connect with Paula: Website: paulawhyman.com Instagram: @paulawhymanauthor Bluesky: @paulawhym  Mastodon: @paulawhyman@writing.exchange  – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Eiren Caffall joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about her generational experience of loss, coming out of the shadows about having an ill body, how polycystic kidney disease (PKD) has shaped her and her family's life, writing about the collapse of ecosystems in the Atlantic ocean, seamlessly weaving in narrative, historical, lyrical, scientific, and metaphorical threads, allowing our children to weigh in on stories that involve them, feeling all the places we're still wounded, depicting mother-daughter relationships with complexity, the umpteenth draft, form as key, holding two things in mind at once, reframing and understanding family dynamics, and her new memoir The Mourner's Bestiary.   Also in this episode: -remembering wonder and beauty in the face of destruction  -idosyncratic craft structures  -where we are in our stories   Books mentioned in this episode: -Shapes of Native Nonfiction Edited by Elissa Washuta and Theresa Warbuton -Meander Spiral Explode: Design and Pattern in Narrative by Jane Allison -Landmarks by Robert Mcfarlane   Eiren Caffall is a writer and musician. Her award-winning memoir, The Mourner's Bestiary, will be published by Row House Publishing in October 2024. Her novel, All the Water in the World will be published by Saint Martin's Press in 2025. An excerpt of her memoir will appear in Elementals: Volume IV. Fire forthcoming in 2024 from The Center for Humans and Nature. Her work on loss and nature, oceans and extinction has appeared in Guernica, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Literary Hub, Al Jazeera, The Rumpus, and three record albums. She received a Whiting Foundation Creative Nonfiction Grant in 2023 for The Mourner's Bestiary, a Social Justice News Nexus fellowship in environmental journalism at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, and a Frontline: Environmental Reportage residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts. She has been awarded residencies at Millay Colony for the Arts, MacDowell Colony (waitlisted), Hedgebrook, and Ragdale. She has guest lectured at UCLA, University of Chicago, and other universities across America, taught creative writing for The Chicago Humanities Festival, taught a memoir body and place week-long masterclass for Story Studio in Chicago, and mentored graduate students at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her work has been adapted into the award-winning short film Becoming Ocean, which screened at film festivals across the United States and in Amsterdam and Morocco.   Connect with Eiren: Website: www.eirencaffall.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eirencaffall/ X: www.x.com/eirencaffall Substack: https://eirencaffall.substack.com Ronit's Upcoming Online 10-week Memoir Course with the University of Washington: https://www.pce.uw.edu/courses/memoir-writing-finding-your-story   Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories.  She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Nadia Colburn joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about by tuning into our bodies to discover what we need to say, creating different cultural conversations about surviving trauma, tapping into our subconscious, coming out of secrets, how poetry can help us access material, not needing to share work until we're ready, what we learn from being in community with other writers, and her signature online course Align Your Story for Women.   Also in this episode: -mitigating shame  -how our bodies remember -meditation and dreamwork    Books mentioned in this episode: -The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank -The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk  -Trauma and Recovery by Judith Lewis Herman -Educated by Tara Westover -Nothing Holds Back the Night by Delphine de Vigan  -The work of Annie Ernaux   Nadia Colburn is the author of the poetry books "I Say the Sky" and "The High Shelf", and her poetry and prose have appeared in more than eighty publications, including The New Yorker, American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, Spirituality & Health, Lion's Roar, Los Angeles Review of Books, and The Yale Review. She holds a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University, is a yoga teacher and serious student of Thich Nhat Hanh and is the founder of Align Your Story Writing School, which brings traditional literary and creative writing studies together with mindfulness, embodied practices, and social and environmental engagement. The school has a community of over 30,000 mindful writers. Nadia is passionate about helping her students reclaim their stories, come out of secrets, listen to their bodies, and embrace and step into their full creative voices, on and off the page. Nadia lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with her husband and two children. She is currently at work on a full-length memoir on pregnancy and early motherhood. Find her at nadiacolburn.com, where she offers meditations and free resources for writers. Connect with Nadia: Website: https://nadiacolburn.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alignyourstory Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nadia.colburn/ Free 5-Day Meditation & Writing Challenge: https://nadiacolburn.com/free-mindful-writing-challenge/ Free Resource Library for Writers: https://nadiacolburn.com/free-resources/ "I Say the Sky" on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Say-Sky-Poems-Contemporary-Poetry/dp/081319864X "I Say the Sky" from Kentucky Press: https://www.kentuckypress.com/9780813198637/i-say-the-sky/ 7-Day "I Say the Sky" Companion Meditation and Writing Challenge (free with book order -- just input book order number): https://nadiacolburn.com/7-day-new-year-practice/ Align Your Story for Women (Nadia's signature online course): https://nadiacolburn.com/align-your-story/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Kristen Van Nest joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about how discovered who she was on a global stage and her addiction to travel, loving the growth phase of new projects, how improv and stand up improves our writing, writing funny and the architecture of a joke, having a love-hate relationship with social media and publishing, keeping your ideal reader in mind, marketing our work ourselves and hustling to get our book in front of people, hammering in the theme in our manuscripts, publishing in literary reviews, establishing publishing proofpoints, cold pitching 150 agents, selling on proposal, and her memoir Where to Nest: A Global Search for Love, Cheap Wine and a Place to Belong.    Also mentioned in this episode: -ghost cities -bad roommates -feeling culturally confused   Books mentioned in this episode: What I Was Doing While You Were Breeding by Kristen Newman Wild by Cheryl Strayed Books by David Sedaris   In her debut travel memoir Where to Nest (April 2, 2024, Rising Action Publishing Co.) Kristen Van Nest weaves an entertaining story for anyone who needs a good laugh, travel ideas, and inspiration for ways to add more joy into their lives.   After college getting her dream job in New York City, Kristen thought she had everything a modern Millennial was supposed to want: a sexy zip code, a boyfriend, and a corporate job.    But instead of feeling content, she soon realized she had no idea who she was and what made her happy. Naturally, she did what any sane person would do: hopped on a plane and spent the rest of her twenties living abroad and traveling the world in search of love, adventure, and new and exciting places to eat bread.   By stripping away the cultural norms and expectations she grew up with in the US, she rebuilt from scratch a new identity, sense of self, and life purpose that ultimately led her to move to Los Angeles to pursue comedy. Through living in Luxembourg on a Fulbright Scholarship and then in China for three years working for a wine importer, Where to Nest takes us across the globe–including nearly being murdered by a lover while skiing in Switzerland, navigating Greece during a banking crisis, and visiting Thailand during a government coup–as a woman struggles to find belonging.    Connect with Kristen: Website: www.kristenvannest.com On all channels @KristenVanNest Link Order: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1990253571 YouTube channel on how to work smarter to live better: https://www.youtube.com/c/KristenVanNest   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Jennifer Lang joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about asking the right questions, understanding what home means and where it is, being sure to put your story in the narrative you're sharing, her sense of self on and off the yoga mat, answers to mid-life questions, learning to write flash prose, putting manuscripts away for a while, being a Jewish writer living in Israel, leaning into experimental and playful prose, coping with imminent empty nests, and her new book Landed: A Yogi's Memoir in Pieces & Poses.   Also mentioned in this episode  -self-doubt and self censoring -reading our work aloud -honing skills as an editor   Books mentioned in this episode: -Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg -Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by  Amy Krass Rosenthal    Jennifer Lang is a San Francisco Bay Area transplant in Tel Aviv. Last September, she gave birth to her first book, Places We Left Behind: a memoir-in-miniature; in October2024, she welcomes Landed: A yogi's memoir in pieces & poses into the world. A graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts, Jennifer was an Assistant Editor at Brevity. Her prize-winning essays appear in Baltimore Review, Under the Sun, Midway Journal, and elsewhere. A longtime yoga instructor, she teaches YogaProse. Findable at www.israelwriterstudio.com  Connect with Jennifer: Website: https://israelwriterstudio.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jenlangwrites Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jenlangwrites/ Ger her book: https://vineleavespress.myshopify.com/products/landed-a-yogi-s-memoir-in-pieces-poses-by-jennifer-lang BookShop: https://bookshop.org/p/books/landed-a-yogi-s-memoir-in-pieces-poses-jennifer-lang/21684650?ean=9783988320872 Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Landed-yogis-memoir-pieces-poses/dp/3988320870/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&dib_tag=se&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.bd8lRm7rAOuV3k1usbF7vA.M-X19uPxbllhxbajEHxpKmH_KgcTpjocnI07C8iCSdA&qid=1723456516&sr=1-1   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Anne Cheng joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about pivoting from writing scholarly works on race and gender to writing in first person and quite personally, teaching herself how to say the things that had remained unspoken in her life, her cancer diagnosis and treatment, the rise in anti-Asian violence during the pandemic, the ways Chinese femininity dovetails with Southern femininity, what we don't know about those closest to us, sharing work about our partner with our partner, the cumulative effect of an essay collection, allowing our voice to come through in our writing, and her new book Ordinary Disasters: How I stopped Being a Model Minority.    Also in this episode:  -feeling braver in writing than in person -thorny mother-daughter relationships  -father loss   Books mentioned in this episode: Minor Feelings by Cathy Park Hong Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino  Stay True by Hua Hsu Docile by Hyeseung Song   Anne Anlin Cheng was born in Taiwan, grew up in the American South, and is author of three books on American racial politics and aesthetics. Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. She is professor of English and former director of American Studies at Princeton University and lives in Princeton. She is currently Scholar-in-Residence at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.  Connect with Anne: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anneanlincheng Facebook: Anne A. Cheng Website: https://english.princeton.edu/people/anne-cheng   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Join our poetry Salon and Open Mic: https://parallax-media-network.mn.co/share/5hSLvQW7bNszFGEo?utm_source=manual A finalist for the UNO Press Lab Prize and Pushcart Nominee, O.G. Rose's creative works appear at The Write Launch, Allegory Ridge, Ponder Review, Iowa Review online, The William and Mary Review, Assure Press, Toho Journal online, O:JA&L, West Trade Review, Broken Pencil, Burningword, and Poydras Review. While at the University of Virginia, O.G. Rose worked collaboratively with other artists at Eunoia, a creative community Rose helped develop. Rose now lives on a farm with three children, manages a venue named Mead Lake Lodge, and teaches piano using visuals from the DLG Pattern Method. Their published books include The Conflict of Mind (2021), Thoughts (2022), and Belonging Again: Part 1 (2023)

David Tereshchuk joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about being drawn to journalism to help him cure the matter of unanswered questions in his own life, his early years living in the rural borderlands of Scotland, how he turned to alcohol at a very early age, going from from tea and copy boy to anchorman of a nightly news program, becoming sober in his forties, his pursuit of ironclad truth, the place uncertainty holds in our lives, and his resolution to be open-hearted and honest about his life when writing his new memoir A Question of Paternity. Also in this episode: -the place uncertainty holds in our lives -his work in media -the paradox in his life and work   Books: The Liar's Club by Mary Karr Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt Born a Crime by Trevor Noah   DAVID TERESHCHUK is a journalist working mainly in broadcast media but also for magazines and newspapers (New York Times, The Guardian, New Statesman). He spent two decades with British commercial television, reporting, producing, and making documentaries, before moving to the US, where he worked for ABC, CBS, CNN, Discovery, A&E and The History Channel. His earliest work included coverage of the guerrilla war in Northern Ireland, and then extended into international issues, especially in the Third World. Since 2012 he has been a producer and correspondent for PBS, concentrating on ethical issues. He broadcasts a weekly public radio dispatch of media criticism, The Media Beat, and writes an online column by the same name. A graduate of Oxford University, he has been a US citizen since 2002 and lives in New York City and Ireland. His memoir, A Question of Paternity: My Life as an Unaffiliated Reporter, was published by Envelope Books on September 19th.   Connect with David: Website: https://www.themediabeat.us/david-tereshchuk/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidtereshchuk X: https://x.com/dtereshchuk Facebook: facebook.com/david.tereshchuk Get the book: https://www.amazon.com/Question-Paternity-Life-Unaffiliated-Reporter/dp/1915023157   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Season 5 is coming to an end but season 6 is almost here, along with some more memoir resources and links.     Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/ronitplank.bsky.social Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com/   Let's Talk Memoir is a podcast for memoir lovers, readers and writers, featuring interviews with memoirists about their writing process, their challenges, and what they've learned about sharing the most personal of narratives. Hosted by writer, editor, and memoirist Ronit Plank, each episode of this limited series highlights different aspects of the memoir writing experience, writing tips, and inspiration. Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Rachel Zimmerman joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about rebuilding her family's life after her husband's death by suicide, the physical toll of grief, feeling like a doomed family, finding joy and pleasure after terrible loss, how her career in journalism informed her writing process, not tying things up in a bow, our children getting veto power about what we include in our books, when family remembers differently, getting the wise narrator present on the page to transform our experience into a story, and her memoir, Us, After: A Memoir of Love and Suicide.    Also in this episode:  -how her memoir's title changed -taking writing classes -feeling like a loss freak   Books mentioned in this episode:  The Light of the World by Elizabeth Alexander  The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion Blue Nights by Joan Didion The Long Goodbye by Megan O'Rourke Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward   Rachel Zimmerman is the author of Us, After: A Memoir of Love and Suicide. An award-winning journalist, Zimmerman has written about health and medicine for more than two decades. She currently contributes stories on mental health to The Washington Post and previously worked as a staff writer for The Wall Street Journal and a health reporter for WBUR, Boston's public radio station. Her essays and reporting have been published in The New York Times; Vogue; The Cut; O, The Oprah Magazine; The Atlantic; Slate; The Huffington Post; and Brevity, among others.    Zimmerman is co-author of The Healing Power of Storytelling; and The Doula Guide to Birth. She's been awarded residencies at Millay Arts and the Turkeyland Cove Foundation and currently lives with her family in Cambridge, Mass. Connect with Rachel: Website: https://www.rachelzimmerman.net/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rachel.zimmerman13 FB: https://www.facebook.com/rachel.zimmerman.77 X: https://x.com/@zimmerman082 Get her book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1951631358/ref=sr_1_1?crid=X9DA82X3A2SP&keywords=us+after%3A+a+memoir+of+love+and+suicide&qid=1697209495&s=books&sprefix=us+after+a+memoir+of+love+and+suicide%2Cstripbooks%2C166&sr=1-1   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches and edits memoir and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Subscribe to Ronit's Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Sarah LaBrie joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the year her mom was diagnosed with schizophrenia and the legacy of mental illness in her family, rethinking ambitions in light of tragedy and grief, releasing emotional pressure with writing, when fiction doesn't cut it, finding company for our mental illness stories, knowing why you want to write a memoir, learning to stop punishing ourselves, being a workaholic, processing our stories through writing, and her new memoir No One Gets to Fall Apart.   Also in this episode: -contemplating our parents' backstory -reading as much as you can -ketamine therapy   Books mentioned in this episode: Beautiful Days by Zack Williams Heartberries by Terese Marie Mailhot The Book of Eels by Patrik Svensson Memorial Drive by Natasha Tretheway Braiding Sweetgrass and all books by Robin Wall Kimmerer   Sarah LaBrie is from Houston, TX and is the author of the memoir No One Gets to Fall Apart (HarperCollins, October 2024). She is a TV writer, memoirist, and librettist. Sarah was most recently a producer on the HBO and Starz television show, Minx. She has also written on Blindspotting (Starz), Made for Love (MAX), and Love, Victor (Hulu/Disney). Her libretti have been performed at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Her fiction also appears in Electric Literature's Recommended Reading, Guernica, The Literary Review, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. She has held residencies at Yaddo, UCross and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She holds an MFA from New York University, where she was a Writers in the Schools Fellow. Connect with Sarah: Website: https://www.sarahlabrielivesinlosangeles.com/ Get her book: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/no-one-gets-to-fall-apart-sarah-labrie?variant=41476933419042 IG: @itsmesarahlabrie twitter: @sarah_labrie tiktok: sarahlabrie62 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Steve Hoffman joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about not getting sidetracked from the story you want to tell, the difference between accuracy and truth, coming to terms with who you are, how screenwriting classes improved his memoir, leaning into weaknesses and what we haven't done well, writing sensorily about food and wine, learning how to tell a story, beyond beautiful prose, vulnerability and the process of changing, expanding our linguistic palates, immersing the reader vs. drowning them in description, embracing what is weird and singular about your life and sharing that on the page, new ways of seeing the same thing, mid-life self-acceptance, and his memoir A Season for That: Lost and Found in the  Other Southern France.   Also in this episode: -accepting our flaws and frailties -keeping forward propulsion in mind -deep reading   Books mentioned in this episode: My Father's Glory by Marcel Pagnol Right Ho, Jeeves by P.G Wodehouse The Shipping News by Annie Proulx The Dead and the Living by Sharon Olds   Steve Hoffman is a Minnesota tax preparer and food writer. His writing has won multiple national awards, including the 2019 James Beard M.F.K. Fisher Distinguished Writing Award. He has been published in Food & Wine, The Washington Post, and The Minneapolis Star Tribune, among others. He shares one acre on Turtle Lake, in Shoreview, Minnesota, with his wife, Mary Jo, their elderly and entitled puggle, and roughly 80,000 honeybees. Connect with Steve: Website: https://www.sjrhoffman.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sjrhoffman/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sjrhoffmanwriter/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steve-hoffman-6761112/ Book Purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Season-That-Found-Southern-France/dp/0593240286 Press Kit with copy of book: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ziwgi8owbwaoxnvb7wctk/AJS8Fwk5NKHILGum6nnQ4t0?rlkey=xdhrgfmzqd4smh4ct3kxpen2l&st=0nmf301u&dl=0 Photos from our time in France: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ztxem7efsu10eggtxltv7/AAkjbYta2Svt7tSC7C_np24?rlkey=oglczi4nys1qi1ufb86j4szu4&st=srofkk02&dl=0 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Seth Lorinczi joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about going from a state of deep hiding to deep sharing, untangling the scars of the Holocaust and world wars through psychedelics, how ancestral trauma can warp relationships with the people we love, when your spouse is a character in your book, writing the truth and the fear of family betrayal, peeling back everything in his life and putting vulnerability into action, and his memoir Death Trip: A Post-Holocaust Psychedelic Memoir.   Also in this episode: -attunement -putting stories in context -protecting people who don't want to be in our memoirs   Books mentioned in this episode: Scattered Ghosts Nick Farley Barley Fatherland by Burkhard Bilger Young Heroes of the Soviet Union by Alex Halberstadt   Seth Lorinczi's writing appears in The Guardian, DoubleBlind, Narratively, Portland Monthly and other print anthologies and periodicals. "Death Trip: A Post-Holocaust Psychedelic Memoir" is his first book. In addition, he was a co-founder of “Judaism & The Psychedelic Renaissance,” a first-of-its-kind live event in Portland. Connect with Seth: Website: https://www.sethlorinczi.com/ www.spiralpathcollective.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sethlorinczi/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/seth.lorinczi/ Link to Ronit's Writer's Digest article mentioned in this episode: https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-nonfiction/how-to-approach-friends-and-family-about-your-memoir   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Naomi Cohn joins Let's Talk Memoir becoming legally blind in mid-life and how that changed her writing process, going from poetry to lyric essay, falling in love with Braille, being sure something is done and also realizing there's more, reading our work aloud, privacy and what's ours to tell, the perceptual richness of having altered sight, tapping into our senses, Liz Lerman's Critical Response Process, nonlinear logic, writing in small chunks, being curious, trusted readers, and her new book The Braille Encyclopedia. Also in this episode: -prose poems  -tapping into the nonlinear -ableism   Books mentioned in this episode: What It Is by Lynda Barry Pain Woman Takes Your Keys by Sonya Huber Safekeeping by Abigail Thomas In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado The Periodic Table by Primo Levi   Naomi Cohn, author of the debut memoir THE BRAILLE ENCYCLOPEDIA, is a writer and teaching artist who works with older adults and people living with disabilities. Her past includes a childhood among Chicago academics; art-making: editing Disclosure, a national publication on community organizing; involvement in a guerrilla feminist art collective; and work as an encyclopedia copy editor, community organizer, fundraiser, nonprofit consultant, and therapist. Red Dragonfly Press published her chapbook, Between Nectar & Eternity, in 2013. Her poetry and essays have also appeared in Baltimore Review, Hippocampus, Nimrod, Poetry and, Terrain, among other places. She makes her home in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Connect with Naomi: https://naomi-cohn.com/ Order Naomi's Book: https://rosemetalpress.com/books/the-braille-encyclopedia/ Attend Naomi's Reading Events: https://rosemetalpress.com/readings-events/ – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Anne Pinkerton joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about processing the loss of her older brother David, how brothers and sisters get short shrift when it comes to grief in our culture, her Writing Through Loss workshops, disenfranchised grief, when family members are private people, owning our story, taking breaks, giving ourselves grace, and learning how to take care of ourselves when writing about grief, treating our characters with love and care, when family doesn't read our memoirs, feeling protective of our own experience, and her memoir Were You Close? A Sister's Quest to Know the Brother She Lost.   Also in this episode: -bereavement writing group -how grief messes with our executive function -providing consolation for other grieving siblings   Books mentioned in this episode: The Empty Room by Elizabeth Davida Rayburn Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion Wild by Cheryl Strayed  Into Thin Air by John Krakauer History of a Suicide by Jill Invisible Sisters Jessica Handler 100 Tricks Any Boy Can Do by Kim Stafford   Anne Pinkerton is the author of Were You Close? a sister's quest to know the brother she lost (Vine Leaves Press, 2023). Her essays and poems have appeared in the Boston Globe, Hippocampus Magazine, Modern Loss, “Beautiful Things” at River Teeth Journal, and Sunlight Press, among other publications, as well as the anthologies The Pandemic Midlife Crisis: Gen X Women on the Brink and Nothing Divine Dies: A Poetry Anthology About Nature. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from Bay Path University and pays the bills as a marketing communications professional.  Connect with Anne: Website: https://annepinkertonwriter.com/ Were You Close? https://annepinkertonwriter.com/the-book/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AnnePinkertonWriter Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/annepinkertonwriter TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@annepinkertonwriter   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Dorothy and Rachel Leland join Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about Rachel's battle with Lyme disease beginning at 13 years old, controversial medical diagnoses, advocating for treatment, living with chronic illness, keeping a journal, collaborating on a story, writing a memoir as a mother-daughter team and honoring both of those perspectives, taking care of ourselves when working on physically charged material, and their memoir Finding Resilience: A Teens Journey Through Lyme Disease.   Also in this episode: -Lyme politics -keeping a journal -using photographs to generate material   Books mentioned in this episode: When Your Child Has Lyme Disease by Dorothy Leland Educated by Tara Westover The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank Rachel became severely disabled by Lyme disease at age 13. It took years, but she's now a strong and healthy adult woman. She lives in Washington state and works in a school as a speech therapy assistant. In addition, she films and edits videos, which she posts on social media to help inspire and educate others about chronic illness. As President of LymeDisease.org, Dorothy advocates nationally for improved diagnosis and medical treatment for Lyme disease. She has co-authored two books about Lyme disease and writes the blog "Touched by Lyme."   Connect with Dorothy and Rachel: Website: https://resilientlyrachel.com/book/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/resilientlyrachel/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dorothy.leland/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/2LymeDisease.org/ Get the book: https://amzn.to/3HDqmmA – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Gina Troisi joins Lets Talk Memoir for a conversation about searching for home and belonging, writing difficult stories and releasing them into the world, feeling too close to our manuscripts and taking breaks, why memoir is sometimes misunderstood, when material feels too difficult, thinking of ourselves as a character, reckoning with self-abandonment and hurting others, writing memoir as fiction first, moving from stand-alone essays to book length work, staying true to our creative vision and her memoir The Angle of Flickering Light.   Also in this episode: -unpacking honest emotions -self-destructive cycles -winning writing awards Books mentioned in this episode: -The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yuknavitch -Wild by Cheryl Strayed  -The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion -Lovesick by Sue William Silverman -Abandon Me by Melissa Febos -Memoirs by Abigail Thomas   Gina Troisi is the author of the memoir, The Angle of Flickering Light (Vine Leaves Press, 2021), which was a finalist for the 2022 Maine Literary Awards. The Angle of Flickering Light won first place for the 2021 Royal Dragonfly Book Award for Memoir, received a Silver Medal for the 2022 Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY), a Silver Medal for the 2021 Reader's Favorite Book Award, and has placed in several other contests, including but not limited to the 2021 New England Book Festival Award for Non-fiction, the 2021 Paris Book Festival Award for Memoir, and the 2021 Southern California Book Festival Award for Memoir. Gina's novel-in-stories, After the Rush, was the First Place Winner for the 2023 Book Pipeline Unpublished Contest For Literary Fiction, a Semi-Finalist for Ohio State University's 2023 Non/Fiction Collection Prize, and a Finalist for the 2023 Acacia Prize for Fiction.   Gina received an MFA in creative nonfiction from The University of Maine's Stonecoast MFA Program in 2009. Her essays and stories have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including Fourth Genre, The Gettysburg Review, Fugue, Under the Sun, Flyway: Journal of Writing and Environment, and elsewhere. She teaches writing at Southern New Hampshire University, and is a mentor in the Masters of Fine Arts Creative & Professional Writing Program at Western Connecticut State University. She also offers academic tutoring as well as one-on-one coaching for creative writers. Connect with Gina: Website: https://gina-troisi.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gina.troisi.7/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ginatroisiwriter/ X: https://x.com/troisi_gina   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Jennifer Selig joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about how our narratives are both unique and universal, archetypical strategies to connect with readers, writing ourselves into meaning, assuaging the fear the world might not need our memoir, following our memories and trusting order will come later, the many different structures a memoir can embody including segmented, blended, and researched, the interplay of memory, imagination, and truth, avoiding gimmicks, the memoirist as archaeologist, and her new book Deep Memoir: An Archetypal Approach to Deepen Your Story and Broaden Its Appeal.   Also in this episode:  -the vagaries of memory's tricks and confusions -the idea of comparative suffering -our story as dynamic, organic, and authentic  Books mentioned in this episode: Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford Eva and Eve by JulieMetz The Recovering by Leslie Jamison Untamed by Glennon Doyle You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith Write-Minded Podcast   Jennifer Leigh Selig's writing and teaching career spans four decades. She's the author of dozens of newspaper articles, book reviews, essays, journal articles, short stories, screenplays, and books including in this decade "The Writer's Block Workbook: A Psychologist's Guide to Working With and Through Writer's Block," and the Nautilus Gold award-winning book "Deep Creativity: Seven Ways to Spark Your Creative Spirit. "Jennifer earned her PhD in Jungian and Archetypal Studies at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara, California, and went on to teach there for a dozen years. It was at Pacifica where she first began teaching memoir in a popular 9-month certificate program called “Writing Down the Soul” with her colleague Maureen Murdock. She gathered all the content she created and published it in her latest book, "Deep Memoir: An Archetypal Approach to Deepen Your Story and Broaden Its Appeal." Jennifer lives in the Bay Area in California, and owns a publishing company, Mandorla Books, where she also publishes memoir. Connect with Jennifer: Website: www.jenniferleighselig.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jennifer.selig.1/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jenniferselig/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferleighselig/ Links for courses: https://www.jenniferleighselig.com/deep-dive-courses.html Link to her book publishing company: www.mandorlabooks.com – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank   Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Jay Baron Nicorvo joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about his mother's violent rape and how that event coincided with his sexual abuse at the hands of his babysitter, the pervasiveness of sexual abuse for boys and men, how crucial scenes are in memoir and also how difficult to render, exposition to give the reader and ourselves breaks from difficult material, being a multi-genre writer, on not becoming an art monster, why it's hard to read the publishing market, leaving an agent, outlasting crushing rejection and so many no's, exploring and thinking deeply about our obsessions, traumatic memories and the way memoir affects them, how lies work, the experience vs. writing the experience, the impact of desertion on children and his new memoir Best Copy Available.   Also in this episode: -writing in the second person -needing and reaching for support -allowing ourselves to be surprised by our material Books mentioned in this episode:   The Natural History of Love by Diane Ackerman My Dark Places by James Ellroy The Red Parts by Maggie Nelson   JAY BARON NICORVO's true-crime memoir, BEST COPY AVAILABLE, won the AWP Award selected by Geoff Dyer. His novel, THE STANDARD GRAND, landed at #8 on the Indie Next List, and his poetry collection, DEADBEAT, debuted on the Poetry Foundation bestseller list.   Connect with Jay: Website: https://www.nicorvo.net Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jbnicorvo Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jay.baronnicorvo x: https://x.com/jbnicorvo Get the book: https://bookshop.org/p/books/best-copy-available-a-true-crime-memoir-jay-baron-nicorvo/21321293?ean=9780820367361 – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Lilly Dancyger joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the challenges of existing in the world as a woman, approaching the writing process with a sense of exploration and curiosity, discovering what's really essential and what can we let go of, the nitty-gritty of writing an essay, getting clarity on our material, finding the container to write about what we need to write, articulating the connections we're making, girlhood, going off the rails as a teenager, how grief and art can be inextricably linked, the tug to write about close relationships with women, living in community and caring for each other, and her book First Love: A Collection of Essays on Friendship.   Also in this episode: -sad girls -tending to friendships -being open to not knowing where the story is going to go   Books mentioned in this episode: In Cold Blood by Truman Capote Helter Skelter by Vincent Bugliosio The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule I'll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara The Heart and Other Monsters by Rose Anderson Memorial Drive by Natasha Tretheway Stay True by Hua Hsu Girlhood by Melissa Febos White Magic by Elissa Washuta The Clean Life by CJ Hauser Easy Beauty by Chloe Cooper Jones Love is a Burning Thing by Nina St. Pierre   Lilly Dancyger is the author of First Love: Essays on Friendship (The Dial Press, 2024), and Negative Space (SFWP, 2021). She lives in New York City, and is a 2023 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in nonfiction from The New York Foundation for the Arts. Her writing has been published by Guernica, Literary Hub, The Rumpus, Longreads, Off Assignment, The Washington Post, Playboy, Rolling Stone, and more. She teaches creative nonfiction in MFA programs at Columbia University and Randolph College. Find her on Instagram at @lillydancyger and Substack at The Word Cave.   Connect with Lilly: Website: https://www.lillydancyger.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lillydancyger/ X: https://twitter.com/lillydancyger Substack: https://lillydancyger.substack.com/ Get her book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/714347/first-love-by-lilly-dancyger/ Learn more about her classes: https://www.lillydancyger.com/classes   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Brooke Champagne joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about rejecting and accepting identity, growing up in New Orleans and feeling bifurcated by race, language, and class, knowing you're a writer, humor on the page, selecting work for a collection, why we write, watching ourselves continue to make the same mistakes, deciding what stories are ours, how much permission we ask, preparing for editorial work on our projects, keeping the bigger picture in mind, the many different versions of ourselves, seeing yourself as a persona, and her new book Nola Face: A Latina's Life in the Big Easy.   Also in this episode: -writing about trauma -Proust -the nature of art and truth   Books mentioned in this episode: The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick The Lifespan of a Fact by John Degoda Hell if We Don't Change Our Ways by Brittany Means   Brooke Champagne is the author of Nola Face: A Latina's Life in the Big Easy, published with the Crux Series in Literary Nonfiction at the University of Georgia Press. Nola Face has received starred reviews from Kirkus and Independent Book Review. Champagne's work has been selected as Notable in several editions of the Best American Essays anthology series, and she is the recipient of the 2023-2024 Alabama State Council on the Arts Literary Fellowship in Prose. She lives with her husband and children in Tuscaloosa, where she is Assistant Professor of Creative Writing in the MFA Program at the University of Alabama.   Connect with Brooke: Website: https://www.brookechampagne.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BuggyGirl Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/champagne_brooke/ x: https://x.com/brchampagne Get Nola Face: https://ugapress.org/book/9780820366531/nola-face/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Deborah Kasdan joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about her older sister's schizophrenia diagnosis, the decision to commit a child, family dynamics and epigenetics, what it is to be marginalized and hidden away, writing expressively, thematic and chronological decisions, digging further and digging deeper, the conflict alive inside us, landing on a book cover, finishing her sister's story, guilt about our loved ones and giving them a voice in our work, and her memoir Roll Back the World.   Also mentioned in this episode: -sibling reaction to our memoirs -experimenting and trying again -writing the scenes that press themselves upon us   Books mentioned in this episode: -Is There No Place for Me by Susan Sheehan -The Eden Express by Mark Vonnegut -The Center Cannot Hold by Elyn R. Saks -The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok -The Soloist by Steve Lopez   Chosen as one of Kirkus Reviews' Best Indie books of 2023, and a Foreword Reviews finalist, Deborah Kasdan's memoir shows the impact of serious mental illness on her late sister Rachel, as well as on herself and their entire family. It also reveals the healing power of writing. Kasdan had a 35-year career writing about business and technology before retiring from corporate work and uncovering her creative side. Kasdan grew up in the Midwest and now lives in Norwalk, Connecticut with her husband. In addition to writing and making family history come alive, her times of greatest joy occur when she is reading, swimming or visiting with her four grandchildren. Connect with Deborah: Website: www.deborahkasdan.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/debkasdan Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/debkasdan X: https://x.com/debkasdan   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Katya Cengel joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about the three months she spent as a child in a psychosomatic ward, her career in journalism, institutionalization and treating kids with mental illness, working with case files, using the journalist persona, growing up being scapegoated, balancing the child and adult voice, reliving painful events, turning the focus on ourselves, family response to memoir, and her memoir Straitjackets and Lunch Money.   Also in this episode: -family dynamics -taking care of our mental health when writing memoir -preadolescent eating disorders   Books mentioned in this episode: -It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini -Girl Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen -Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan -The Great Pretender by Susannah Cahalan   Katya Cengel is the author of four non-fiction books, including most recently Straitjackets and Lunch Money, which the San Francisco Chronicle called “incredibly affecting” and Kirkus Reviews called “harrowing but engrossing”. Cengel's earlier titles cover everything from minor league baseball in Bluegrass Baseball to falling in love at Chernobyl in From Chernobyl with Love. She has received an Eric Hoffer Academic Press award, an Independent Publisher Book Award (IPPY), and a Foreword INDIES.   As a journalist Cengel has written for New York Times Magazine, Smithsonian Magazine and Atavist Magazine among others. Her writing has taken her to Utah to search for Bigfoot (she didn't find him) and to Mongolia to write about female street artists. Her stories have received a Society of Professional Journalists Green Eyeshade Award and a Society for Features Journalism Excellence-in-Features Award. Connect with Katya: Website: www.katyacengel.com X (Twitter): https://x.com/kcengel Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katyacengel Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katya.cengel/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katya-cengel-7b7b4214/ Get the book: https://www.woodhallpress.com/product-page/strait-jackets-and-lunch-money https://bookshop.org/p/books/straitjackets-and-lunch-money-a-10-year-old-in-a-psychosomatic-ward-katya-cengal/19786290?ean=9781954907683 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1954907680/ref=x_gr_bb_amazon?ie=UTF8&tag=x_gr_bb_amazon-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1954907680&SubscriptionId=1MGPYB6YW3HWK55XCGG2   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers

Margaret Juhae Lee joins Let's Talk Memoir for a conversation about searching for her family's lost history, growing up as a first generation Korean American living in Houston, archival work and interviewing relatives, capturing family voice, why we search to understand painful things, knowing ourselves as writers, finding structure later, the time to digest material, reading historical fiction with a critical eye, generative writing workshops, curbing self-editing tendencies, what home means, not giving up, and her memoir Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History.   Also in this episode: -conveying immediacy through present tense -investigative journalism -writing in community   Books mentioned in this episode: -The Situation and the Story by Vivan Gornick -All other books by Vivian Gornick   Margaret Juhae Lee is the author of Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History (Melville House). A former editor at The Nation magazine, she received a Bunting Fellowship from Harvard University and a Korean Studies Fellowship from the Korea Foundation. Her articles have been published in The Nation, Newsday, Elle, ARTnews, The Rumpus and Writer's Digest. She lives in Oakland with her family and Brownie, a rescue dog from Korea.  Connect with Margaret: Website: www.margaretjuhaelee.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mjuhae X: https://x.com/margaretjuhae Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/margaret.lee.790 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/margaret-juhae-lee-2b95905/ Starry Field: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/741044/starry-field-by-margaret-juhae-lee/   – Ronit's writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer's Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts' 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book. More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com   Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank Newsletter sign-up: https://ronitplank.com/#signup   Follow Ronit: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/ https://twitter.com/RonitPlank https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll's Fingers