Pele’s Fire: Almost here!
From April 3-9th, I will be leading a retreat on the Big Island called Pele's Fire. (For those of you in Hawaii, and therefore on Hawaiian time, if you are interested in joining us for one day only, we have an Aloha Friday intensive that you can still register for...
Join us at the University of Hawaii at Hilo next Friday
Reading like a writer
Back in February, I was interviewed by The MFA Project, a tumblr created by Rebecca Wallwork as "an experiment in creating one's own MFA education via a dream team of teachers without the price tag of a degree. In other words, an MFA that is complete fiction."...
Home As Heart and Hearth
HOME AS HEART, AND HEARTH: STORIES AND IDEAS was a discussion on what exactly makes a home—how it’s built, how it’s found, and how it’s sustained - which was created and nurtured by BETH KEPHART, this year’s Beltran Teaching Award winner. On March 1, 6 PM, at the...
A Tale For All Times and Beings
Ruth Ozeki is a critically-acclaimed filmmaker and novelist, and a Zen Buddhist priest. Her first two novels, the Kiriyama Prize winner My Year of Meats and American Book Award winner All Over Creation, have been translated into eleven languages and published in...
This Day, in Infamy and History
Today is a day that was supposed to live in infamy. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and the U.S. response, kicked off a chain of events – including the internment and the atomic bombings – that still reverberate today. What do we know?...
Don’t Write?! (Your Best Writing Tip)
I’ve been thinking a lot about being a writer in this world. Not about the need to raise our diverse voices, or to break down the barriers that keep too many of us silent; not about the role of writers to expand our collective understanding of what it means to be...
Try Something New
We’ve all been there: stuck. The pages seem flat; we don’t know what comes next. And what’s worse, writing is a lonely business, so there’s no team, or department, not even any customers to get ideas from. Before a lack of inspiration becomes full-blown writers...
The Gifts of Retreat
It’s 94 degrees in Brooklyn, and I am writing in a pair of blue cashmere fingerless gloves. They are a gift from a dear friend – crafted from recycled goodness, and sent from Canada. They are also a shared talisman that connects me to my tribe: a group of women who...
Writing tips…
While writing a recent response letter to one of my students, I found myself offering her advice that was also meant for me: "Setting the scene, locating your character, revealing her motivations…that’s all discovery material just for you, the writer. Once you have...