LitFriends: What Didn't You Write Today?
Dear LitFriends,
I've been underground lately, figuratively speaking – hiding in my cave of blankets and comfort reads, nursing a heart, heavy with current events. Maybe you've been there too. The world has felt a bit too sharp, too loud, too everything.
But here's the thing about writers: we carry lanterns in our hands and stories in our souls. Even when we're hurting, especially when we're hurting, our words matter. They're not just escape routes – they're bridges, torches, and sometimes life rafts for others navigating their own dark waters.
Whether you're writing fierce protest poetry or garden memoirs, trauma memoirs, fierce fiction, or sharp social commentary – your voice matters. The world needs your perspective, your truth, your imagination now more than ever.
Join me? Let's write our way back to the light. We are not done. If you didn't write today, know that it's time to start. The world needs you.
Here's our concise email with three sections to bolster your lit life a few times each month.
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Announcements and Opportunities
Our Jack Walker Press call for submissions remains open. Surprisingly, we've had scant submissions to the call about writing about our Nation and the complexities and aspirations of the USA. Entries for the " Voices on the Gift of Aging" have been brisk. We are still accepting admissions for both. Entries are likely to close in December, but sometimes we have a special need for specific tone or subject to round out the anthology-so stay tuned. WHAT? You haven't submitted yet? Click Here. You'll be added to the list of writers and receive the submission email address.
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Jack Walker Press Courses
In this season, we stand at a crossroads: one path leads to meaningful sharing, the other to the consumer frenzy of holiday shopping. This year let's choose the former. Embrace the tangible and emotional richness of crafting gifts that carry the soul of your writing.
The beta pricing for the Write-A-Gift class ends on November 25. Save over a hundred dollars by beating the deadline
A Write-A-Gift student crafted a tribute name sign to honor the new baby in the family. The letters of the baby’s name are large. Each letter begins with a sentence of love and good wishes. This student also wrote 5 letters of love and wisdom and attached them to the back of the frame to be opened every five years until age 25. This gift will be a lasting embodiment of the truth that your writing matters.
Another student in her 70's is writing a family memoir to leave a legacy about her life and her parents who immigrated here from Israel.
In another labor of love, a student has collected stories of tribute about a family member who has passed and is assembling them with photos using Write-A-Gift instructions, samples, and templates.
There are hundreds of possibilities.
- The beta pricing for the Write-A-Gift class ends on November 25. Save over a hundred dollars by beating the deadline
- Stay tuned for the First of the Year reopening of our Complete Memoir Course. For now, it's full. LitFriends Subscribers will have access to a HUGE discount code in a December Newsletter. Stay tuned.
3.Changes to the LitFriends Newsletter
We have some feedback that our jammed pack newsletter offers a bit much for one reading, so we will be planning a few newsletters a month to let you know about new LitFriends resources as we post them. We won't bombard you- but we don't want a jam-packed newsletter to feel like homework.
New Articles
1.Your Voice Matters: WHY YOU SHOULD WRITE OPINION PIECES (includes a template for a Letter to the Editor) 
2.Award-Winning Nature Books
You May Have Missed
3.Make Lasting Meaning from Your 3.Write a Literary memoir 
Writer News
Subscribers can list their news on our FB page, or message us through our Contact Us form.
Carl Sciacchitano's graphic (comic style) memoir, The Heart That Fed: A Father, a Son, and the Long Shadow of War, has been named a top ten book of 2024 by Publishers Weekly.
Nikolas Chang Hoon Nadeau won the Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction for “Abandoned Supposings: A Letter to My Non-Father’s Silence.” He received $1,000, and their winning works will be published in the Fall/Winter 2025 issue of Bellingham Review. The annual awards are given for a poem, a short story, and a work of creative nonfiction. The next deadline is March 15, 2025. Explore the Submission Page.
End Notes
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