Meet the Speakers
Jessica Abel
How to Finish Big Projects Even Without Deadlines: The 3 Cs Framework
Jessica Abel is a graphic novelist, author, business coach for creatives, and the founder of Autonomous Creative. She specializes in supporting mid-career creative professionals to build thriving careers without compromising their artistic integrity.
Bonus! Capacity Audit
Get your free guide to conducting a Capacity Audit, so that you can base your decisions about where to focus on your current reality!
Dani Abernathy
Break Through Writer’s Block
Dani Abernathy is an Enneagram teacher and Author Accelerator book coach who helps deep thinkers and feelers write the stories they need to tell so their readers can feel seen and can see others. Specializing in fantasy, soft sci-fi, and YA, Dani merges how story works with how people work, creating books that help readers have more empathy for themselves and others. Through her Rooted Writers Mentorship, she helps novelists embrace, plan, and write books they're proud of. Dani is an Enneagram Type 4, Capricorn, INFJ, and Manifesting Generator who believes that stories can change the world, one reader at a time.
Bonus! Break Through Writer’s Block Workbook
Get a comprehensive guide that walks you through the three kinds of writer's block, helps you assess your blocks, and provides reflection questions so you can discover what you need to get unstuck and get back to writing.
Parul Bavishi
London Writer’s Hour
Parul Bavishi is the co-founder of the London Writers' Salon, a creator of the webby-nominated Writers' Hour daily writing sessions, and host of the London Writers' Salon podcast.
Bonus! Lifetime Access to Writers’ Hour
What could you get done if you had a consistent writing practice? We'll help keep you accountable in our 4x daily Writers' Hours. Join us for free! Sign up for the free trial, then use the code WRITERFRIEND for free lifetime access once the trial expires.
Sue Campbell
Author Mindset Coaching
Sue has helped hundreds of writers, from newbies to bestsellers, transform their inhibitive mindset around marketing and realize their full potential as authors. Her clients have exponentially increased their email lists and book sales, landed articles in prestigious publications such as The New York Times, done guest spots on popular podcasts and more.
Candace Coakley
A Mindful Approach to Writing: Settle Your Mind, Sharpen Your Story
Candace Coakley is a writer, certified book coach, and mindfulness instructor dedicated to helping writers embrace the creative process and share their wisdom. Specializing in memoir, Candace brings over 25 years of writing and teaching experience to her work. She founded Candace Coakley Editorial Solutions to support writers in achieving their writing and publishing goals.
Her lifelong meditation practice is the secret to her sanity and a skill she loves to share. As a trauma-sensitive mindfulness coach, Candace guides writers in deepening their stories with compassion. She graduated from Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach’s Mindfulness Mentor Training and holds Transcendental Meditation (TM) and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) certifications. As a Reiki master, she integrates the power of energy healing into all aspects of her life.
Candace lives north of Boston, MA, with her husband, three adult children, and beloved rescue dog, Hope
Bonus! Memoir & Mindfulness Resource Guide
Settle Your Mind, Sharpen Your Story: Memoir & Mindfulness Resource Guide is a curated list of resources, including memoir craft books, mindfulness and meditation books, podcasts, and memoir recommendations to deepen your writing and enhance your life.
Sage Cohen
Define Your Why: Powering Your Writing Life with Purpose
Sage Cohen is the author of Fierce on the Page, The Productive Writer, and Writing the Life Poetic, all from Writer’s Digest Books, and the poetry collection Like the Heart, the World. Passionate about the alchemy we create in community, Sage founded the We Write community and serves as poetry editor of Certain Age magazine. As a coach, editor, and instructor, she has helped thousands of writers craft and publish their best work.
Bonus! Productivity Power Tools
Get this free interactive workbook that will be your guide to discovering, then creating, what you want in your writing life. 15 fun exercises and templates help you create success on your own terms.
Laura Davis
The Power of Writing in Community
Laura Davis is the author of The Courage to Heal, The Burning Light of Two Stars, and five other groundbreaking books. In addition to writing books that inspire, the work of Laura’s heart is to teach. For more than 25 years, she’s helped people find their voices, tell their stories, and hone their craft.
Laura has been published in Publisher's Weekly, Writer's Digest, CrimeReads, Brevity, and The New York Times, featured in Los Angeles Review of Books, and on QWERTY, Write-Minded, The Only One in the Room, and dozens of other podcasts. She's been a featured speaker for The National Association of Memoir Writers and an acclaimed teacher at The San Miguel Writer's Conference and at Esalen in Big Sur.
She teaches online classes and leads workshops and international writing adventures—including a creative sailing adventure in Turkey next spring.
Bonus! Extras from Laura
Laura is offering two bonuses to everyone who attends the Write Anyway Summit:
a copy of the letter she wrote to her family to inform them about the publication of The Burning Light of Two Stars
the opportunity to read the first five chapters of her memoir for free so you can how she chose to portray her family members. (People say it’s a page turner, so it should be easy to read!)
Susan DeFreitas
Add Depth and Meaning to Your Work: Intersecting with Social Issues and Avoiding Harmful Stereotypes
An American with roots in the Caribbean and the upper Midwest, Susan DeFreitas is the author of the novel Hot Season, which won a Gold IPPY Award, the editor of Dispatches from Anarres: Tales in Tribute to Ursula K. Le Guin, and the creator of Workshops Against Empire—the alternative MFA program for writers who want to change the world. Her work has been featured, or is upcoming, in the Writer’s Chronicle, LitHub, Story, StoryQuarterly, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Daily Science Fiction, and elsewhere. An independent editor and book coach, she lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Bonus! Take a Quiz
Is your novel ready to rock the world? Take the quiz and find out!
Jen Dohr
Let the Ink Find the Way
Jen Dohr is an award-winning educator and a writer who guides people to meet themselves on the page and in their life by picking up a pen and writing the worst junk in all the world. Through workshops, retreats, and private sessions, Jennifer teaches her simple, but not easy, process of tapping into the subconscious to anyone ready to unearth the stories where their authenticity resides. She incorporates sensory-based prompts, music, sketching, and poetry into her approach in order to access inner knowing, clarity, and acknowledgement of our full, lived experience.
Bonus! List It Out Exercise
Get one of Jen’s favorite Authentic Voice exercises. You'll receive ten of Jen’s most effective list prompts, along with instructions for how to get started.
Sara Gentry
Writing While Juggling All the Things
Sara Gentry is a math PhD turned Author Accelerator-certified book coach. As a lifelong problem solver, she knows the power of finding the right solution. As a book coach, she provides writers with strategic next steps and straightforward feedback so they can achieve their book-writing goals while maximizing their most precious resource — time.
Bonus! Writing While Juggling All the Things Workbook
Get the workbook that accompanies Sara’s presentation.
Savannah Gilbo
How to Overcome the Five Types of Imposter Syndrome
Savannah Gilbo is a certified developmental editor and book coach who helps fiction authors write, edit, and publish stories that work. She’s also the host of the top-rated Fiction Writing Made Easy Podcast, where she delivers weekly episodes full of simple, actionable, and step-by-step strategies that you can implement in your writing right away. When she’s not busy crafting her own stories, you can find Savannah curled up with a good book, a cozy blanket, and her three perfect puppies.
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Anne Hawley
Next Steps for your Novel or Memoir
Get Your Story Unstuck
Anne Hawley is a third-generation native Oregonian, a graduate of Portland State University. When she's not editing stories, she's writing them, reading them, researching them, or analyzing them on The Editor Roundtable Podcast. She specializes in helping writers discover the heart of the story they’re trying to tell so that they can tell it more beautifully. She can often be seen riding her Dutch bike Eleanor around Portland. She's the author of Restraint, a love story set in 19th Century London.
Gay Hendricks
Exploring Your Genius Zone
Gay Hendricks has served for more than 30 years as one of the major contributors to the fields of relationship transformation and bodymind therapies. Along with his wife, Dr. Kathlyn Hendricks, Gay is the author of many bestsellers, including Conscious Loving, At the Speed of Life, The Big Leap, the New York Times bestseller Five Wishes, and the recently released Your Big Leap Year.
Dr. Hendricks received his PhD in counseling psychology from Stanford in 1974. After a 21-year career as a professor at University of Colorado, he founded The Hendricks Institute, and later co-founded its charitable organization, Foundation for Conscious Living. He was also the founder of a virtual learning center for transformation and a publishing company and was a co-founder of a conscious entertainment company.
Throughout his career he has done executive coaching with more than 800 executives, including the top management at such firms as Dell Computer, Hewlett Packard, Motorola and KLM. His book, The Corporate Mystic, is used widely to train management in combining business skills and personal development tools.
Gay is also a mystery novelist, with a series of five books featuring the Tibetan-Buddhist private detective, Tenzing Norbu. In recent years he has co-created a popular podcast called The Big Leap with Mike Koenigs. He has appeared on more than 500 radio and television shows, including Oprah, CNN, CNBC, 48 Hours and others.
Anne Janzer
Find and Use Your Voice: How to Stretch Beyond Self-Imposed Constraints
Anne Janzer is a nonfiction book coach and the author of multiple award-winning books on writing, including The Writer’s Process, Writing to Be Understood, and The Writer’s Voice. Her books have been translated into multiple languages and adapted for college writing courses. She is always experimenting with ways of better serving her readers.
Bonus! Intentional Incubation
In this 20-minute course, you'll explore three powerful strategies to integrate Intentional Incubation into your writing routine. These techniques are designed to unlock your creative potential—providing you with good ideas and getting you past dry spells and blocks.
Bill Kenower
Everyone Has What It Takes: Ending Self-Doubt and Unlocking Your Genius
William Kenower is the author of Everyone Has What It Takes: A Writer’s Guide to the End of Self-Doubt, Fearless Writing: How to Create Boldly and Write With Confidence, and Write Within Yourself: An Author’s Companion, and is the editor-in-chief of Author magazine. In addition to his books, he’s been published in The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, Edible Seattle, Parent Map, and has been a featured blogger for Huffington Post. He also hosts the popular podcasts Author2Author, and Fearless Writing With Bill Kenower.
Patricia Marshall
Demystifying Self-Publishing
Patricia Marshall is the owner of Luminare Press, which she started 2010 to help authors with the process of independent publishing. She has a thorough knowledge of the bookmaking process and a passion for non-fiction book editing, as well as a strong desire to help authors produce a polished, professional book.
Bonus! Publishing Timeline
Get a free dynamic timeline and metadata sheet that help you plan your project, organize your information, and track your steps toward publication.
Hayley Milliman
Editing with Technology
Hayley Milliman is the director of community for ProWritingAid.
Bonus! ProWritingAid Discount
Get a 15% discount on annual plans through the end of October with the code WRITEANYWAY15.
Josh Mohr
Nerding Out on Character Psychology
Joshua Mohr is the author of the memoirs Model Citizen and Sirens, as well as five novels including Damascus, which The New York Times called "Beat-poet cool." He’s also written Fight Song and Some Things that Meant the World to Me, one of O Magazine’s Top 10 reads of 2009 and a San Francisco Chronicle best-seller, as well as Termite Parade, an Editors’ Choice in The New York Times. His novel All This Life won the Northern California Book Award. He has taught at the MFA program at the University of San Francisco and St. Mary’s College, and currently teaches at Stanford.
Laura Munson
The Wild Why: On Creativity and Wonder
Laura Munson is the New York Times, USA Today, and international bestselling author of the novel Willa’s Grove and the memoir This Is Not The Story You Think It Is. Her next book, The Wild Why: Stories and Teachings to Uncover Your Wonder, is coming out in April 2025.
She has been published in nine countries and has been featured in Vanity Fair, Elle, Redbook, Time, Newsweek, Washington Post, Publisher’s Weekly and published in the New York Times ‘Modern Love’ Column, the New York Times Magazine ‘Lives’ Column, O. Magazine, and many others.
Laura is the founder of the acclaimed Haven Writing Retreats, speaks at women’s conferences and literary events, and has appeared on Good Morning America, The Early Show, NPR, and media outlets across the globe. She lives in Montana.
Bonus! Journal Practice
Laura’s So Now What journal writing practice will help you use writing to shed old, unhelpful ways of thinking, so that you can move forward in your writing and your life. All it takes is 27 minutes...to finally say what you really need to say.
Jennie Nash
The Surprising Power of Asking for Help
Jennie Nash is the founder and CEO of Author Accelerator, a company on a mission to lead the emerging book coaching industry with rigorous training, high standards for certification, and support for coaches while they launch and build their businesses. Author Accelerator has certified more than 260 book coaches, who are working to help writers of all kinds do their best work. Jennie’s own clients have landed top agents, six-figure book deals, and spots on the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller lists. Jennie is the author of 12 books in three genres, including her Blueprint for a Book series for fiction, nonfiction, and memoir.
Bonus! The Writer’s Universe of Support
In this guide, Jennie Nash will show you how to build a strong team to support you on your path to publication.
Gabriela Pereira
Writing With Neurodivergence and Mental Health
Gabriela Pereira is an author, speaker, and entrepreneur who wants to challenge the status quo of higher education. As the founder and instigator of DIYMFA.com, her mission is to empower writers, artists and other creatives to take an entrepreneurial approach to their education and professional growth.
Gabriela earned her MFA in writing from The New School and speaks at college campuses and national conferences. She is also the host of DIY MFA Radio, a popular podcast where she has interviewed bestselling authors and book industry professionals, and author of the book DIY MFA: Write with Focus, Read with Purpose, Build Your Community.
Bonus! DIY MFA Starter Kit
This two-week mini-course delivered via email will help you DIY your MFA and get the "knowledge without the college."
Paulette Perhach
Organizing the ADHD Writer Life
Paulette Perhach’s writing has been published in the New York Times, Vox, Elle, The Washington Post, Slate, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Marie Claire, Yoga Journal, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Hobart, and Vice. She’s the author of two million-reader viral essays. Her book, Welcome to the Writer's Life, was published in 2018 by Sasquatch Books, part of the Penguin Random House publishing family, and was selected as one of Poets & Writers' Best Books for Writers. She blogs about a writer’s craft, business, personal finance, and joy at welcometothewriterslife.com and leads meditation and writing sessions through A Very Important Meeting. She serves writers as a coach, helping them figure out how to make a life and career out of being a writer while making the money work (as she figures it all out herself.) She's also a speaker on the topics of creativity, writing, and business.
Bonus! Submission Track & Story Idea Organizer
Get a free submission tracker and story idea organizer from Paulette Perhach! Sign up for a free Writer’s Mission Control Center account to get started.
Sandra Postma
How to Be a Writer When You Have a Chronic Illness
Sandra Postma is a former journalist who switched from fact to fiction after discovering her own writing held the power for change. Founding Your Story Mentor in 2021, Sandra is now a writer of fiction and nonfiction, and a certified book coach. In her work as a book coach, Sandra helps writers who don’t fit the usual writer mold due to their physical or mental health status. She helps people embrace their unique voice and develop their story ideas into novels.
As a woman with multiple chronic illnesses herself, she knows what it is like to feel invisible to society and misunderstood by many. Making her writers feel seen and making them realize how important their individual voices and stories are has become the main goal in her work. She helps people find their voice, write and thrive!
CONNECT:
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Bonus! How to Be a Writer When You Have a Chronic Illness
This guide contains practical and mindset tips to help you write while you deal with your health issues. You will discover the value of your spoonie voice and find out which type of spoonie writer you are.
Rachelle Ramirez
Next Steps for your Novel or Memoir
Get Your Story Unstuck
Rachelle is a developmental editor, master's level counselor, certified ADHD coach, one of the world’s foremost experts on Story Types, and co-host of The Happily Ever Author Club and the Write Anyway Summit. She co-wrote The Pages and Platforms Guide to Story and numerous online masterclasses for writers with fellow developmental editor, Anne Hawley. Rachelle's forthcoming book is The ADHD Writer: From Frustrated to Focused to Finished.
Kerry Savage
Bring Order to Creative Chaos: Project Management for Writers
A voracious reader of all kinds of fiction, Kerry Savage (she/her) is an Author Accelerator-certified book coach who works with novelists from the planning stages through revision, helping writers get their best book ready for the world. With Samantha Skal, she is the co-founder of Shadows and Secrets Retreats, the writing retreat for mystery, thriller, and suspense authors. She is also a J-school grad and recovering project manager, as well as being hard at work on her second novel. She serves as a volunteer mentor for the Women’s Fiction Writers Association and Sisters in Crime. She loves good wine, cheese, and trying to keep her succulents alive.
CONNECT:
INSTAGRAM
Bonus! Writing Practice Success Stories Workbook
There is no one "right" way to write a book — use the tools, skills, and tips in this workbook to design a writing practice that works for you!
Dr. Karen Shue
Bridging Neuroscience and Tarot: A No-"Woo" Approach to Divination for Writers
Dr Karen Shue practiced for over 30 years as a neuropsychologist working with all sorts of brains and their humans. Her interest and expertise is in how brains function — not so much their anatomy and chemistry, but rather in their networks of connections and the Dance of those networks as they reveal us to ourselves. She is open to the use of alternative “technologies” such as divination, dreams and other ways of accessing information we are not necessarily paying attention to or even could be aware of. She sees these as tools for generating actual writing content, but especially for discovering our writing identities and patterns of thought about ourselves as writers.
CONNECT:
SUBSTACK
Bonus! Session Tools+ Brain Connections Subscription
Get a free one-year subscription to the Brain Conversations Substack. You’ll also get a short overview of some of the concepts discussed in the presentation plus tips and links to mind-mapping resources.
Samantha Skal
Writer’s Block & Doubt Demons
A fan of the scary, mysterious, and suspenseful, Samantha Skal (she/her) is the director of ThrillerFest, the co-founder of Shadows & Secrets Writing Retreats (a series of thriller/mystery focused writing retreats; 2024’s is in Salem, MA’s most haunted hotel), and an Author Accelerator-certified book coach who specializes in coaching mystery, thriller and suspense authors from novel planning through the delightful hell that is revision. An enthusiast of homemade sourdough and cheese of all kinds, Sam writes stories that keep her up at night and lives in the beautiful Pacific Northwest.
Bonus! 17 Thriller Twist Ideas
This list of 17 ideas for twists in your thriller will inspire, unblock, and/or unlock your story.
Josee Smith
Rediscovering Creativity After Motherhood
Josee Smith is an indie author and book coach for working moms who want to finish the novel of their dreams. She achieved her childhood dream of finishing a novel and publishing it in 2021, and now she supports other writers with the same dream. As a new mom with a busy job, she understands the challenges of managing it all, and she also believes strongly that writing and creativity can help women feel like themselves again after the chaos of motherhood. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband, young son, anxious dog, and semi-feral cat.
CONNECT:
INSTAGRAM
Bonus! Virtual Writing Retreat
Join Josee Smith for a virtual mini writing retreat for working moms where you can prioritize your writing! Space is limited to 100 attendees.
Marion Roach Smith
Navigating Obstacles: On Writing Against All Odds
Marion Roach Smith is the author of four books including The Memoir Project: A Thoroughly Non-Standardized Text for Writing & Life. A former staffer at The New York Times, she has been a commentator on NPR’s All Things Considered and a talk show host on Sirius Satellite Radio. She currently runs a writing lab called The Memoir Project and teaches memoir worldwide.
CONNECT:
INSTAGRAM
Bonus! The Memoir Writing Formula
The Memoir Formula is a free ebook from author and former New York Times staff member Marion Roach Smith that will teach you the foundational secret of good memoir writing. Come discover how to start writing a book you can be truly proud of.
Laura Stanfill
Six Ways to Publicize Your Book
Laura Stanfill is the publisher of Forest Avenue Press and the founder of the DIY Book Publicity cohort project. She lives in Portland, Oregon.
Isabel Sterling
Beat Writer Burnout: Insights from a Life Coach and Author
Isabel Sterling is a master certified life coach, the founder of The Confident Author Academy, and the host of The Author Burnout Cure podcast. An alum of Purchase College and Syracuse University, Isabel spent a decade working in higher education and LGBTQ non-profits before striking out on her own to write and coach full-time. Isabel lives with their spouse and fur-babies in Central New York, where the winters are frigid, the summers are too hot, and autumn is perfect. Isabel is the author of These Witches Don’t Burn, This Coven Won’t Break, and The Coldest Touch.
CONNECT:
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Bonus! Burnout-Free Writing Worksheet
This worksheet will allow you to:
Plan doable goals for your writing session
Identify the spark of joy you want to bring to the page
Celebrate after you write to build momentum
Matt Trinetti
London Writer’s Hour
Matt Trinetti is the co-founder of the London Writers' Salon, a creator of the webby-nominated Writers' Hour daily writing sessions, and host of the London Writers' Salon podcast.
Bonus! Lifetime Access to Writers’ Hour
What could you get done if you had a consistent writing practice? We'll help keep you accountable in our 4x daily Writers' Hours. Join us for free! Sign up for the free trial, then use the code WRITERFRIEND for free lifetime access once the trial expires.
Edward Vilga
The Joy of Accountability
A thought leader on wellness and transformation, Edward Vilga is the author of 18 bestselling books, DVDs, and courses. Over 70,000 students are enrolled in his online programs. His work has been featured in The New York Times, People, and Oprah Magazine; TV shows such as Live! with Kelly Ripa, CBS’ Early Show, Entertainment Tonight, and over 100 other media outlets.
He has created events for progressive companies including NBC-TV / Bravo, Disney, AOL, the law firm of Mayer | Brown, Exhale Mind Body Spa, e.l.f. cosmetic, W Hotels, and dozens more. Edward’s wellness videos have been viewed over 1 million times.
Edward Vilga is a Yale graduate. In 2022, he earned an Executive MBA. His chief occupation, however, is raising his rescue puppy, Vladimir.
Bonus! Meditations & More
Get free monthly guided meditations from Edward Vilga (plus his latest adventures with his rescue dog Vlad).
Nick Walker
The Art of Unique Voices: Lessons from the Editor of Autonomous Press
Nick Walker is a noted queer futurist and an author of both speculative fiction and nonfiction, including the influential essay collection Neuroqueer Heresies. She is co-creator and primary writer of the urban fantasy webcomic Weird Luck.
Dr. Walker serves as managing editor for the worker-owned indie publishing house Autonomous Press, and has co-edited multiple volumes of the annual genre-bending story anthology Spoon Knife.
She also teaches psychology at California Institute of Integral Studies, teaches aikido at the Aiki Arts Center in Berkeley, California, and studies the intersections of consciousness, embodiment, neurodiversity, and creativity.
CONNECT:
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