How Do You Write

Kim Werker is a writer and freelance editor who tries to make something – anything – every day. Many of those things are awful; some are not. She runs a project called Mighty Ugly, leading workshops and lecture-conversations to help people embrace the hard parts of creativity so they can have more fun making stuff and trying new things. Her latest book is Make It Mighty Ugly: Exercises and Advice for Getting Creative Even When It Ain't Pretty. She has written six crochet books and recently helped a client start a clarinet magazine. Originally from Brooklyn, NY, Kim lives in Vancouver, BC, with her partner, their son and their mutt. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Morgan Jerkins discusses her writing process. She lives and writes in New York.  She graduated from Princeton University with an AB in Comparative Literature, specializing in nineteenth century Russian literature and postwar modern Japanese literature, and she has an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. She speaks six languages. Currently, she’s a contributing editor at Catapult and a Book of the Month judge. On the freelance side, her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Vogue, The New York Times, The Atlantic, ELLE, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, andBuzzFeed, among many others. Her debut essay collection, THIS WILL BE MY UNDOING, is forthcoming from Harper Perennial. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Dr. Raina J. León was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and was introduced to poetry by her mother from a young age. She holds multiple degrees, and she’s been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her work has appeared in over 50 literary magazines and journals, and her published poetry collections include: Canticle of Idols (2008) and Boogeyman Dawn (2013) which was was a finalist for the Naomi Long Madgett Prize. Her third book, sombra : (dis)locate, will be published this year. León is a Cave Canem Fellow, as well as the recipient of other fellowships and residencies, and the cofounder of The Acentos Review (2008). She is currently an Assistant Professor at St. Mary's College of California. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Nayomi Munaweera's debut novel, Island of a Thousand Mirrors was long-listed for the Man Asia Prize and won the Commonwealth Regional Prize for Asia . It was short-listed for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature and the Northern California Book Prize. The New York Times called the book "luminous" and Publisher's Weekly has compared her voice to that of Michael Ondatjee and Jhumpa Lahiri. Nayomi’s second novel, What Lies Between Us has been one of the most anticipated releases of 2016, having been featured on both Buzzfeed and Elle Magazines Best of 2016 lists. She lives in Oakland, California and is working on her third novel. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This episode: ARISA WHITE is a Cave Canem fellow, Sarah Lawrence College alumna, an MFA graduate from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and author of the poetry chapbooks Disposition for Shininess, Post Pardon, and Black Pearl. She was selected by the San Francisco Bay Guardian for the 2010 Hot Pink List and is a member of the PlayGround writers’ pool; her play Frigidare was staged for the 15th Annual Best of PlayGround Festival. A native New Yorker, living in Oakland, California, Arisa is a faculty advisor at Goddard College and was a visiting scholar at San Francisco State University’s The Poetry Center, where she developed a special collections on Black Women Poets in the Poetry Archives. Published by Virtual Artists Collective, her debut collection, Hurrah’s Nest, was a finalist for the 2013 Wheatley Book Awards, 82nd California Book Awards, and nominated for a 44th NAACP Image Awards. Her second collection, A Penny Saved, inspired by the true-life story of Polly Mitchell, was published by Willow

Wendy C. Ortiz is a Los Angeles native. She is the author of Excavation: A Memoir (Future Tense Books, 2014), Hollywood Notebook (Writ Large Press, 2015), and the forthcoming Bruja (Civil Coping Mechanisms, Oct. 31, 2016). Her work has been profiled or featured in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Review of Books, The Rumpus, and the National Book Critics Circle Small Press Spotlight blog. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Hazlitt, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Nervous Breakdown, Fanzine, and a year-long series appeared at McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Esmé Weijun Wang is an award-winning author and advocate. At esmewang.com, she provides resources that assist aspiring and working writers in developing resilience on the path to building a creative legacy. Wang’s emphasis on resilience originates from her own experiences as a writer, having learned the importance of adapting to difficult times from living with schizoaffective disorder and late-stage Lyme disease. She studied creative writing and psychology at Yale and Stanford, and received her MFA from the top-tier Creative Writing program at the University of Michigan. The author of THE BORDER OF PARADISE (Unnamed Press, 2016), as well as the chapbook LIGHT GETS IN, Wang has written for Catapult, Hazlitt, Lit Hub, Salon, and Lenny, and been written about in the New Yorker Online, Fusion, and the New York Times. She delights in organizational tools, handwritten letters, and her home base of San Francisco. Find her e-letter, as well as the complimentary Creative Legacy Check-In, at esmewang.com/e-letter. See

Adrienne Celt was born in Seattle, WA and has lived in a great many places since then. (A non-exhaustive list: Iowa, California, Chicago, and St. Petersburg, Russia.) Currently, she resides in Tucson, AZ where she welcomes the summer rainstorms as distractions from the fact that there is no ocean for hundreds of miles. Her debut novel The Daughters (W.W. Norton/Liveright 2015) won the 2015 PEN Southwest Book Award and was named a Best Book of the Year by NPR. Her writing has also been recognized by the PEN/O. Henry Prize, a Glenna Luschei award, and residencies at Ragdale and the Willapa Bay AiR. She’s published fiction in Esquire, The Kenyon Review, Epoch,Prairie Schooner, and Ecotone, among other places, and her comics and essays can be found in The Rumpus, The Toast, The Millions, the Tin House Open Bar, and elsewhere. She publishes a webcomic (most) every Wednesday atloveamongthelampreys.com. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Adrienne Martini, author of Sweater Quest and Hillbilly Gothic (Free Press), talks to Rachael about her writing process.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Cari Luna, author of The Revolution of Every Day and winner of the Oregon Book Award for Fiction, tells us about her process.  See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

In this inaugural episode, Rachael Herron presents the format for upcoming shows by interviewing herself about her own process. How do you write a book? She tells you how she writes hers, and gives some tips and tricks about how she gets the work done. This is a weekly, short podcast for writers about the process of writing, so settle in and enjoy the first show.   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.