Susan Tweit has written eleven books, all of which draw on nature and the land (several have won awards); and hundreds of feature articles, essays, and columns for newspapers and magazines. She has taught dozens of workshops at colleges and universities from coast to coast (University of California - Riverside to Wofford College, South Carolina), as well as at conferences organized by groups like Story Circle Network. She has coached many of writers individually, by mail and online. You'll find her website here, with booklists, podcasts, and her blog. For more information, an interview may be found on the StoryCircleBookReviews website.
Susan is currently working on several writing projects and her mentoring time is limited. If you're interested in working with her, please email us with a brief paragraph about the project you would like help with. We'll contact Susan to see if she is available.
A Note from Susan:
I've written journals and poetry from childhood, most of which I would burn rather than make public. I didn't start taking my writing seriously until I began to chafe under the rules I learned as a professional scientist: eschewing the use of adjectives, adverbs, and of course, personal opinion. I found the cautious distance and the expert voice preferred in most science writing deeply unsatisfying. I wanted to speak for the landscapes I studied, to spin the stories of the community—both wild and human—that animates them. I yearned to convey the magic and mystery in the cycles of life on this extraordinary planet. But I was a woman making her way in the still-overwhelmingly male field of science and my intuitive, personal voice was not encouraged to put it mildly. So I left science for writing, figuring if I could untangle the web of interactive relationships between animals, plants, and landscapes that make up living ecosystems, surely learning to craft words and sentences into stories wouldn't be so hard. How wrong I was!
I taught myself how to write while working on my first book, Pieces of Light, a personal account of a year in the life of the wild species living in an urban landscape. I'm still learning. That's one reason that I love to teach and mentor writers: I figure all of those lessons I've struggled to understand are meant to be shared. And I'm still finding new aspects of my writing voice and being surprised by the words of my heart and spirit.
These days, I'm a full-time freelance writer, making my living playing with words. I write mostly non-fiction, ranging from feature articles and commentaries for national magazines and newspapers to personal essays and memoir, including my latest book, Walking Nature Home: A Life's Journey, forthcoming from University of Texas Press. I've also written for kids (two books, a handful of stories and articles, and several award-winning classroom curricula), and I'm working on a novel for adults, as well as a graphic novel for middle-graders and a memoir for young adults told entirely in free verse. I'm an omnivore in terms of what I read, and my writing reflects that. I simply love a great story well-told!
The writers whose words I return to again and again range from Barbara Kingsolver (Animal Dreams, The Bean Trees, and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle) to Barry Lopez (Arctic Dreams may rank as my all-time favorite book!) and Kathleen Dean Moore (Holdfast and Pine Island Paradox). When I have time to curl up on the couch and just lose myself in a story, I tend toward mystery writers like Margaret Maron and Marcia Muller. I have a special affection for kids' books as well, and my collection runs from Jon Muth's Zen Shorts to Walter the Farting Dog. One of the lovely things about writing for kids is that you get to remember what it's like to not be grown up!
I'm a methodical writer: I keep to a daily schedule of writing in the morning when my creative energy is highest. I begin with half an hour of free-writing in my journal to loosen up my writing muscles before settling into whatever deadline is uppermost on my calendar for that day or week or month—or year. I write and think and write and think until the words run dry, and then I take my laptop to the couch for the other business of writing: answering emails, tending to my blog and web site, returning calls, researching on the internet or in print, and such. There's nothing easy about writing, but for me, no other pursuit is so satisfying. One of my favorite parts of writing is editing: I read every draft of my work out loud multiple times to sound out the story, listen to the flow and rhythm, and to pick the exact words to make the work sing. Writing is seductive: when the words flow and the story sings, there's nothing I'd rather be doing.
I'm interested in working with writers who have a story burning to be told, and enough experience to know how much discipline writing requires. I'm more concerned with your passion for the work than whether you've ever taken a writing workshop or you've been published. I expect a commitment to regular work, an ability to string words into coherent sentences, an understanding of what you want to accomplish, and an ability to learn. In terms of specifics, I work best via email and through the internet, though I'll do phone consulting if necessary. I live in rural south-central Colorado, so if you want "face time" you've got to want to come to the mountains for a consultation.
Writing is my passion, and I bet it's yours. I believe we all carry within us stories worth telling, and I believe that we need every voice and every story in order to show our species how to be the the best we can be. I love helping writers find their words and their voices!
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