About

Writing Out Loud is a blog of a memoir-in-progress about motherhood/daughterhood. As it has evolved, I’ve changed what I’m doing several times. I no longer post first drafts, but the chapters up here aren’t totally polished either. In blogging a book as it’s written, I’m going against most advice and time-worn beliefs about creative writing. I’m doing it because I’ve become so accustomed in our Blog Era to instant sharing and sometimes instant feedback; I just couldn’t bear the isolation of the long-distance writer anymore. Consider this an experiment.

In addition to the memoir you’ll find process journals, poems, and essays relevant to the topic of mother/daughterhood. If you’d like to read my writing on a wider variety of topics, click over to my primary blog, Dirty Laundry.

A word about the journal posts: I learned the benefits of keeping a process journal from Louise DeSalvo’s book, Writing as a Way of Healing. My creative writing students kept them in tandem with class projects as per my instructions. It’s a place to put all the spillover emotions generated by the writing of a book. It includes material that may not end up in the book itself, but that demands some kind of expression.

I welcome comments and feedback! Please!