Katherine Scott Crawford

The book publishing business is kind of a like a mythological beast: sometimes terrifying, sometimes beautiful, always layered. I know from personal experience that the best thing you can do when you love a book is to talk about it–to share as far and wide as you can. Recently, I read, and adored, Beautiful Writers: A Journey of Big Dreams & Messy Manuscripts — with Tricks of the Trade from Bestselling Authors by Linda Sivertsen. Here’s what I posted about it on social media:

This bright, beautifully real, laugh-out loud funny, relentlessly optimistic (heavy on the mystic), gift of a writer’s book has been bringing me an unexpected–and insanely necessary–jolt of joy in my daily reading, since the moment I picked it up. Writers, get your copies or put it on your wish lists. People of writers, it will make for a perfect gift.

I didn’t know what to expect when I pre-ordered. I came to Linda Siversten’s popular Beautiful Writers podcast late, during the pandemic, and didn’t know a thing about her. Listening to interviews with writers both known and (to me) unknown was a salve during an uncertain time. And just so much damn fun, because they laugh a lot and tell so many great stories! The book is MORE. Even authors, celebrities, leaders, and creatives I thought I knew, like Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry McMillan, Ann Patchett, Abby Wambach, Patricia Cornwell, share things in these pages I’ve never heard or read from them before–about writing, life, and being a creative in the world.

Sivertsen’s voice throughout as she shares her beautiful and messy life felt so familiar to me as a mom with young kids–the bumps in the roads of friendships and partnerships, the yearning for connection, the unceasing urge to heal and connect to the earth, the glorious and brutal challenge of motherhood. It’s all there, and done with such a bright, light hand you feel like you’ve been to a fabulous group yoga class where you not only found a bit of inner peace, you also dissolved into giggles on your mat because somebody cracked a joke under their breath.

Bonus: Beautiful Writers is printed sustainably.