Ten Questions

“I had to learn through writing the book how to discipline my creativity so that I could write whenever and wherever I needed to.” —Stacy Jane Grover, author of Tar Hollow Trans

"I write as often and for as long as I can.” —Helen Schulman, author of Lucky Dogs

“Writing this book forced me to deal with, and face, some parts of my personality that haven’t served me.” —Kwame Alexander, author of Why Fathers Cry at Night: A Memoir in Love Poems, Recipes, Letters, and Remembrances

“You are going to read a book that will inspire you to write a book.” —Jennifer Lunden, author of American Breakdown: Our Ailing Nation, My Body's Revolt, and the Nineteenth-Century Woman Who Brought Me Back to Life

“You write one poem precisely so that you can write the next.” —Emily Lee Luan, author of 回 / Return

“Your voice is your voice. Your voice. No one else’s.” —Dean Rader, author of Before the Borderless: Dialogues With the Art of Cy Twombly

“My writer’s brain picks up little pieces here and there and puts them together.” —S. L. Wisenberg, author of The Wandering Womb: Essays in Search of Home

“Read more! Listen more! See more! Feel more! Take better notes!” —Laird Hunt, author of This Wide Terraqueous World

“I write when I want to say something to someone in particular—but can’t.” —Aurora Mattia author of The Fifth Wound 

“You will never get rid of the self-critical voice in your head.” —Colin Winnette, author of Users

“I think the hardest part was finding an ending, specifically working against my own desire for neat resolution.” —Maggie Millner, author of Couplets