Category: Contemporary Women Writers
Dresses—Reinvented
When I was the Chief Brand Officer of ELLE Décor and Metropolitan Home, there was a showroom-event-a-minute and a trade show every month. It was a role that demanded that I look the part—stylish, sophisticated, and decked out in designer clothes. The first two I had reasonably down, but any funds for a high-end brand wardrobe were limited. […]
Your Books Are Not Your Babies
Your Books Are Not Your Babies – And Why Thinking They Are Can Hurt Your Chances Of Success One of the biggest challenges I have faced since becoming a published author is distancing myself emotionally from my books. Don’t get me wrong; I am extremely proud of all of my novels – five and counting! […]
Failure Is Impossible
My book, Women Who Launch: Women Who Shattered Glass Ceilings, provides a well-deserved shout-out to the intrepid women who chafed against the established paradigm that the fairer sex was only meant to be their husband’s eye candy. These fabulous femmes left their imprints on society and thereby made great strides in levelling the gender field. […]
After the Book Launch: Afterglow or Aftermath? Part One
After the Book Launch: Afterglow or Aftermath? Are we strengthened or rendered vulnerable by putting our truth into the hands of strangers? By Cathy Park Kelly As writers, we are always being advised to show up naked on the page. This, we are told, leads to powerful writing, words that come alive on the page. […]
Collecting and Editing Our Short Works for a Book-Length Manuscript
Collecting and Editing Our Short Works for a Book-Length Manuscript When I decided to pitch and publish a book-length collection of personal essays, I thought that it would be an extended word processing project. I would go to my digital essay folder, download all my previously published essays—including the one published here in When Women Waken. Then, […]
The No-Process Process
Ah, the writing process. It’s one of those things shrouded in mystery, like the meaning of life or whether we’re supposed to tuck our pant legs into our boots. It’s also one of the questions I’m most frequently asked by readers at signing events, right after “Where do you get your ideas?” and “Didn’t you […]
Meet The Author: Clare Empson
What was the inspiration behind HIM? Eleven years ago we moved from South London to the country. We were renting on this picturesque country estate and it was almost absurdly idyllic – day old lambs gambolling on the drive and a parkland full of deer. Friends would arrive with gifts of freshly laid eggs […]
How to Write About a Marriage Crisis and Keep the Marriage
The Buddha Sat Right Here chronicles the year I tore off my Supermom cape, shuttered the house, and took my husband and young daughters on an eight month odyssey through India and Nepal. Why did I do that, you ask? I had become too stressed-out by working motherhood to appreciate the precious beauty of my […]
How a Teenage Fantasy Became a Wartime Novel
As a steamy adolescent growing up in rural Herefordshire, I was gripped by the story of Franz von Werra, the only German POW to escape from British captivity during the Second World War. My fascination with the story had great deal to do with the German actor who played von Werra in the film The […]
When Tourists Come Home
Children do not get to pick the cities they are brought up in. They arrive as strangers and are responsible for making themselves at home. But what makes a city home? In the late 1980s my family returned to Lahore, Pakistan from Saudi Arabia and our status changed from that of summer tourists simply looking […]
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