#124 Essays on Loneliness: Tethering An Isolated Writer To A Disconnected World Featuring Athena Dixon
Release Date: 01/30/2025
#142 Giving Motherhood a Microphone: How Listen to Your Mother Became a Movement Featuring Ann Imig
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
If you’ve ever felt creatively stuck or invisible after becoming a mom, this conversation will speak to you. Nearly 15 years ago, a single storytelling show about motherhood sparked a nationwide movement—and it’s still going strong. Here, we explore how Listen to Your Mother grew from one stage to 70, how the blogging boom birthed a wave of creative expression, and how vulnerability can turn into community power. We also dive into what happens after the kids grow up—when ambition, burnout, and joy collide in midlife. Ann Imig is an award-winning founder and speaker with numerous...
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#141 Solo Episode: Estelle’s Edge on How AI Is Disrupting Content Marketing—And What Writers Should Do Next
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
AI is disrupting the writing industry—fast. But what does that mean for you as a freelance writer, content creator, or journalist? In this Summer Shorts with Estelle solo episode, I share my editorial perspective on the recent Chicago Sun-Times controversy involving an AI-generated listicle that included fake book titles attributed to real authors. You'll learn: Why listicles and content marketing assignments are disappearing [3:38] What types of editorial content are most vulnerable to AI outsourcing [6:09] How ghostwriting and white papers are emerging as higher-paying,...
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#140 Growing Up in a Black-and-White World and the Truth Between the Lines Featuring Shannon Luders-Manuel
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
What does it mean to grow up in a world that doesn’t fully reflect your identity? In this episode, covering memoir, race, religion, the stories we’re told, and the ones we learn to write ourselves, Estelle Erasmus sits down with writer and memoirist Shannon Luders-Manuel, author of The One Who Loves You: A Memoir of Growing Up Biracial in a Black and White World. Shannon shares the deeply personal journey behind her memoir, which explores her childhood growing up mixed-race in a predominantly white family, her complex relationship with her Black father, and how those dynamics shaped her...
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#139 How to Submit Your Writing to Literary Magazines and Get Published Featuring Dennis James Sweeney
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
Submitting your work doesn’t have to feel like a mystery. In this episode, Estelle Erasmus is joined by Dennis James Sweeney, author of How to Submit: Getting Your Writing Published with Literary Magazines and Small Presses (New World Library). Whether you're a seasoned writer or just starting out, this conversation offers a grounded and empowering look at how to navigate the literary submission process. In this episode: How to find the right literary magazines and small presses for your work [5:56] How platforms like Substack are changing the publishing landscape [7:21] The...
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#138 Making Memoir Peculiar—and Propulsive Featuring Dinty W. Moore
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
What gives memoir its momentum—and its magic and what if the structure you’re resisting is exactly what your writing needs? Before we dive in…✨New TEDx Talk! I share a deeply personal story—and the actionable lessons I teach at NYU and in Writing That Gets Noticed—in my TEDx Talk: How to Get Noticed in Your Writing and Beyond Please watch to the end (that’s what counts!), and if it resonates, I’d be so grateful for a comment on the TEDx YouTube page. 🎥 Watch, comment, and share: Back to my illustrious guest...In this episode, I talk with celebrated writer, author, and...
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#137 Writing Through Rupture: Finding Belonging After Loss Featuring Casey Mulligan Walsh
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
What does it mean to truly belong — and how do we find our way back to ourselves after unimaginable loss? In this episode,I talk with memoirist Casey Mulligan Walsh about grief, belonging, resilience, and the journey behind her powerful book The Full Catastrophe. In this episode: Casey’s path to writing The Full Catastrophe and how the theme of belonging revealed itself [1:57] How early losses shaped her search for identity and home [4:42] Why grief looks different for everyone — and why there’s no "right" way to heal [6:22] The moment Casey realized her memoir wasn’t...
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#136 Writing Towards Recovery: Jackie Goldschneider on The Weight of Beautiful
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
Jackie Goldschneider gets real about writing her powerful memoir The Weight of Beautiful, opening up about her lifelong battle with an eating disorder, her journey to recovery, and what it was really like turning her story into a book—on her own terms. In this episode: Why Jackie chose not to use a ghostwriter for her memoir [5:25] How her eating disorder shaped her life and why recovery was non-negotiable [6:17] The writing process behind The Weight of Beautiful [7:00] What helped Jackie write a book while filming, parenting, and working [7:48] Tips for structuring memoir scenes...
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#135 Query Letters, Persuasive Proposals, and Publishing Secrets Featuring Literary Agent Joëlle Delbourgo
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
Joëlle Delbourgo is President of Joëlle Delbourgo Associates, a boutique literary agency founded in 1999. She represents a broad range of adult nonfiction and fiction. Her authors include NYT bestselling and award-winning novelist Ben H. Winters; Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Debbie Cenziper and Dale Russakoff; award-winning educator Michele Borba, the late Dr. Susan Forward, memoirists Ariel Burger, Rachel Stolzman, Grace Jung and Sara Sherbill; historians Philip Freeman, Joanna Sliwa and Elizabeth White; true crime writer James Renner; and novelists Marilyn Simon Rothstein, Lindsey J....
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#134 Writing a Memoir That’s Also an Industry Exposé Featuring Hannah Selinger
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
How do you turn personal experience into a powerful memoir that names names? Estelle Erasmus talks with Hannah Selinger, author of Cellar Rat, about transitioning from essayist to memoirist while tackling the dark side of the restaurant industry. In this episode: How Hannah’s viral essay led to a book deal What it means to write a memoir that’s also investigative Naming names and dealing with backlash The role of narrative in exposing abuse and toxic culture About Hannah: Hannah Selinger, author of Cellar Rat: My Life in the Restaurant Underbelly, is a James Beard Award-nominated...
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#133 Writing the Book You Need to Read When You’re Always Happy to Help Featuring Amy Wilson
Freelance Writing Direct with Estelle: Conversations with authors, journalists, agents, novelists, memoirists, niche writers, publishers, writing teachers, assigning editors and media experts.
AMY WILSON is a writer, podcaster, and performer. She is the author of the memoir When Did I Get Like This? and her latest book Happy to Help. Amy is also the co-host of the Webby-honored parenting podcast What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood. She and co-host Margaret Ables have racked up over 11 million lifetime downloads and 800 episodes since the podcast's launch in 2016, and regularly perform live shows for audiences around the country. As an actor, Amy appeared on Broadway as "Sunny Freitag" in the Tony Award-winning play The Last Night of Ballyhoo. She was a series regular...
info_outlineAthena Dixon is the author of essay collections The Incredible Shrinking Woman and The Loneliness Files and her work appears in publications such as Harper's Bazaar, Shenandoah, Grub Street, Narratively, and Lit Hub among others. She is a Consulting Editor for Fourth Genre and the Nonfiction/Hybrid Editor for Split/Lip Press.
In this episode:
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How the Pandemic pushed Athena into writing essays [3:26]
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The extreme loneliness epidemic in our country [5:35]
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How Athena explored loneliness in throughlines of grief, the concept of a “split self”, and journals [7:57]
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Why she used a multi-tiered braided essay in the collection [10:15]
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How she used the vessel of the body to play with the fear of the heart [11:09]
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The influence of her fanfiction fixation on Athena’s writing and ability to daydream a new reality [14:11]
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Her use of intention and ritual as a roadmap for bringing romance to fruition [16:51]
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Athena’s editorial work with Fourth Genre and Split Lip Press [24:44]
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Why Athena now values her loneliness and moments of isolation as a tool in her tool kit [25:47]
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Advice for identifying a strong throughline in your essay collection [32:45]
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Keys to figuring out the right format for your stories, when deciding between memoir or a memoir in essays [35:42]
Buy The Loneliness Files on Estelle’s Bookshop
Connect with Athena
Website:
https://www.instagram.com/the_muse_paper/?hl=en
TikTok
https://tiktok.com/@AthenaDIxon
BlueSky
https://bsky.app/profile/athenadixon.bsky.social
Split Lip Press
https://www.splitlippress.com/
Fourth Genre Magazine
Episode mentioned with Jeannine Ouellette
#103 Launching into New Dimensions with Embodied Writing
https://estelleserasmus.com/103-launching-into-new-dimensions-with-embodied-writing/
Connect with Estelle Erasmus
Her latest substack Post: My Predictions for Publishing in 2025
https://estelleserasmus.substack.com/p/my-predictions-for-publishing-for
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https://www.sps.nyu.edu/professional-pathways/faculty/e/1068-estelle-erasmus.html
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Writing That Gets Noticed: Find Your Voice, Become a Better Storyteller, Get Published: https://rb.gy/5ihwp0
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