Different people will find that different strategies work for them, so no writing advice can be one-size-fits-all. However, a writer must write, and that means setting time aside to take that action. For some, it’s early in the morning, for others, it’s lunch hour, for still others, it’s a week away on a retreat. Different strategies may work for you at different times in your life. Other strategies that have worked for me are to pay attention to my surroundings, my past, my thoughts; to read widely and share my drafts with other writers in a small, supportive group; to let drafts rest for a while and then revise them, sometimes many, many times.
—Michele Leavitt
Michele’s story, “Hidden in a Suitcase,” won the 43rd New Millennium Award for Nonfiction in 2017, winning $1,000, a certificate to mark the success, and publication online and in print.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michele Leavitt, a high school dropout, hepatitis C survivor, and former trial attorney, writes poetry and nonfiction. Her essays appear most recently in Guernica, Sycamore Review, Grist, Hippocampus and Catapult. She’s the author of the Kindle Singles memoir, Walk Away.