Blog
The 10 best things that happened because I said yes to my writing
Once I started treating my writing as a non-negotiable—a spiritual gift, a calling—surprising and wonderful things began to happen. Amazing, beautiful things that have nothing to do with the usual measures of success, like selling a book proposal or making...
Spark Your *Visual* Story!
My new ecourse on visual art inspired creative nonfiction begins Monday! We'll be learning about the panel essay--inspired by medieval diptych and triptych paintings--as well as the visual essay (i.e. the photo essay, pictorial essay, and...
CNF hybrid forms: the concrete essay
What is a concrete essay? Intrigued by unconventional storytelling structures? The concrete essay is an example of what can happen in the space between creative nonfiction and visual art. A subgenre of the visual essay, the concrete essay has its roots in...
Mirror Image: A Diptych by Rowan McCandless
Subject: 1955 Wandering through Hell’s Kitchen Flea Market, I discovered an unframed oil painting of a young girl about the age of six or seven. She was on the ground, leaning against a wooden table leg at one of the booths selling vintage...
Captured in Black & White: A Diptych by Rachel Laverdiere
All because I clicked the shutter at that precise moment. For an eternity, the sun casts shadows that accentuate the angles hidden beneath the baby-soft curves—almond eyes, sharp cheekbones, a refined nose, and a strong, square jaw. An old artifact that...
Fox and Woman: A Diptych by Carolyn Moore
1 Woman Knees bent into spring grass, lime-handled trowel turning soft black earth. Gloved hand dropping a seed here, a seedling there. This is what he sees even if he cannot say. She sees the other just as she is seen: a red fox trotting...
Diptych 1: Iconoclasts
Thirteen inches of agony, drops of blood painstakingly painted on side wound, wrists and ankles. I couldn’t keep that gory cross—my exact words to Rachelle, who laughed—but also couldn’t recall seeing a religious item donated to the local thrift shop. My...
Fish-Bird-Kite: a prose poem*
1. I am a murky expanse. You are watery and fetal. I can taste you, Jellyfish. There is the iron smell-taste in my nose, clotted damp earth in my mouth. My body may be at sea, but my mind is a vessel. And you, over time, no longer boneless: the...
Getting to the truth of our stories: A conversation with Karen Zey
"Emergent writers need to keep asking themselves: what can I eliminate, what can I expand, what can I rework to get to the heartbeat of my story. Writing creative nonfiction is, after all, heart work." Today I'll be wrapping up my series...
Truth, myth, metaphor: A conversation with Isaac Yuen
"The world is not an easy place, and sometimes it is scary, and in order for stories to have staying power, they must be true enough to reflect that complexity and darkness, out there and in ourselves." Isaac Yuen is a prolific writer of short...
I 'm Nicole Breit
- Award winning poet and essayist residing on Canada’s gorgeous Sunshine Coast
- Memoir coach whose superpower is helping writers achieve their literary dreams faster than they thought possible