Notes from The Writer's Corner

This week, we talked about how to keep a sense of joy around your writing. Next week, join us for an interactive discussion on book banning. Hope to see you soon!

If you missed this week …

Thank you to our guest this week Julie Maloney, who discussed Why Your Writing Life Deserves Happiness. If you missed the live session, here is a link to the recording (Passcode: 5pCE6#e0).

What’s coming up next week …

Next week in The Writer's Corner, we will be joined by Pulitzer Prize-nominated author Claudia Johnson for a live discussion on Book Banning. Claudia is a nationally recognized advocate for free speech and social justice. In 1993, she was honored with the inaugural PEN/Newman’s Own First Amendment Award, presented by Paul Newman, for her “extraordinary efforts to restore banned literary classics to Florida classrooms”—and again in the 2022 “PEN America at 100: A Century of Defending the Written Word” exhibition at the New York Historical Society. She continues to fight book banning, helping to reinstate banned books. Her memoir Stifled Laughter: One Woman’s Story About Fighting Censorship was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize when first published by Fulcrum Publishing in 1994. In March 2023, Fulcrum released a new edition because the book “is even more relevant today.”

In the 2023-2024 school year, PEN America found 10,000+ instances of book bans in the United States—more than double the previous year. Just a few of the most frequently challenged books are:
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, The Bluest Eye and Beloved by Toni Morrison, Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, The Kite Runner by Khaled Husseini, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, The Handmaids Tale by Margaret Atwood, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, The Giver by Lois Lowry, Ann Frank: Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, and many more. To view a larger list, click here.

Mark your calendar for these upcoming sessions you won’t want to miss …

November 4 at 1 p.m. EST/10 a.m. PST - Celeste Fisher on How to Keep Going
Disillusioned writers never get published. How to keep going in the extremely competitive publishing industry (even when you are stuck). Celeste Fisher graduated from Stanford University’s novel writing program. She spent the summer between those two years at the Iowa Writers Workshop. She has been published in the Chicago Tribune and Zibby Magazine. Celeste is also a certified Domestic Violence Advocate and  board member for JDRF Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. She lives in the Chicago area.

November 11 at 1 p.m. EST/10 a.m. PST - Sherry Sidoti on Regulating the Writer Within: Memoir Writing as a Sacred + Healing Practice
Sherry Sidoti is an author and yoga teacher. She is the founder of FLY Yoga, a yoga teacher training program and non-profit that offers yoga and meditation for trauma resilience on Martha’s Vineyard, MA. She leads embodied memoir writing courses, somatic healing workshops, and yoga + writing retreats globally. Her musings, infused by 20-plus years of practicing and teaching yoga, healing arts, and mysticism have been published in Heart & Soul Magazine, Anthropology and Humanism Quarterly, Mystic Magazine, among others. Sidoti’s debut memoir, A Smoke and a Song received the 2024 Gold Medal for Non-Fiction/Inspirational with Readers’ Favorite Book Award, the 2023 Gold Medal for Inspirational Memoir with Living Now Book Award, the 2024 Grand Prize Winner Honorable Mention with Eric Hoffer Book Awards, Finalist for the da Vinci Eye Prize, and 2024 Finalist for National Indie Excellence Award.

November 18 at 1 p.m. EST/10 a.m. - Kathy Curto
Kathy Curto teaches at Sarah Lawrence College/The Writing Institute and Montclair State University as well as several nonprofit organizations and writing centers. She is the author of Not for Nothing-Glimpses into a Jersey Girlhood. Her work has been featured in The New York Times, on NPR, in the anthology Listen to Your Mother:  What She Said Then, What We’re Saying Now, and in Barrelhouse, The Inquisitive Eater, Memoir Magazine, Oh Reader, The Mom Egg Review, Drift and Talking Writing among others. Kathy’s piece, “Still Cooking Side by Side” considered a “Modern Love in miniature” by The New York Times, was included in The Best of Tiny Love Stories in August 2021. She is co-founder of Key to the Castle Workshop and serves on the board of the Italian American Writers Association.

December 2 at 1 p.m. EST/10 a.m. - Steve Almond
Steve Almond is the author of 12 books of fiction and nonfiction, including TRUTH IS THE ARROW, MERCY IS THE BOW and the New York Times bestsellers Candyfreak and Against Football. His recent books include the novel All the Secrets of the World, which has been optioned for television by 20th Century Fox, and William Stoner and the Battle for the Inner Life. For four years, Steve hosted the New York Times Dear Sugars podcast with his pal Cheryl Strayed. He is the recipient of a 2022 NEA grant in fiction, and his short stories have been anthologized in the Best American Short Stories, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Erotica, and Best American Mysteries series. He also publishes crazy, DIY books.