A Writer’s Diary Episodes



We share diary entries about writing and the writing life from Charlotte Donlon and other writers because the writing life can be a solitary life.

Sometimes it’s nice to know we aren’t alone.

Find the submission guidelines for A Writer’s Diary here. (Submissions are currently closed.)

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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode One: Welcome to A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Two: When You Can't Sleep and You're Thinking about Your Book Proposal
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Three: Writing for at Least 15 Minutes Most Days Should Be Doable
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Four: On Ordering Our Desires
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Five: I Just Want Someone to Tell Me What to Do
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Six: There's a Line Outside the ABC Store and I Need to Complete My Sample Chapters
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Seven: Mary Karr's Writing Kit and Mine Too
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Eight: Katie Rouse: You Don't Have to Live Up to Their Expectations
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Vist Katie’s Website at katierousewrites.com
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Nine: When You Show Your Work and Hope It Works Out So You Don't Look Like an Idiot
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Ten: One Thing I Do When I Despair
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Eleven: On Writing Community, Social Media, and Parenting. Welcome to My Brain.
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twelve: Holly Oxhandler: Navigating Grief and Gratitude after Completing Copyedits
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Visit Holly’s Website at hollyoxhandler.com
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Thirteen: Some Writers Start Writing Later in Life
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Fourteen: On Virginia Woolf, Writing, and Marriage
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Fifteen: On Authors Helping Authors and Opportunities for Disappointment
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Sixteen: On Being Thankful for Writer Friends and Other Diary-ing Items
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Seventeen: I Really Don't Want to Know If People Are Saying Bad Things about Me in Their Group Chats
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Eighteen: On Playlists for Books and How Music Helps Us Belong to the Past, Present, and Future
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode 19 (Do-over): On Claiming Your Writing Space and Claiming It Quick
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty: On Sliding into a Sabbatical
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-One: Christina Kukuk: On the Struggles of Writing
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Two: Christina Kukuk: On Borrowing Art and Finding Inspiration When the Well Is Dry
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Three: Tamara Jong: On Drawing and Taking Notes
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Four: Laura Boggess: Reflections on the Writing Life after the Release of a New Novel
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Five: Laura Boggess: On Wintering and Running Late and the Rising Sun
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Six: On Being Awake for Two Hours in the Middle of the Night
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Seven: Toni Morrison Says We Need to Make Our Art
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Eight: Am I Writing a Novel or Am I Writing a Memoir?
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Twenty-Nine: Writers Who Read: Landslide by Susan Conley
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Thirty: I Failed 100 Days of Creative Acts and Please Don't Make Me Create a Community
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Thirty-One: Move Closer to the Creative Work That Won’t Leave You Alone
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A Writer’s Diary with Charlotte Donlon Episode Thirty-Two: On Considering Giving Back the Advance and Not Writing the Book
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Charlotte Donlon helps her readers and clients notice how they belong to themselves, others, God, and the world. Charlotte is a writer, a spiritual director for writers, and the founder of Spiritual Direction for Writers™. Her essays have appeared in The Washington Post, The Curator, The Christian Century, Christianity Today, Catapult, The Millions, Mockingbird, and elsewhere. Her first book is The Great Belonging: How Loneliness Leads Us to Each Other. She’s currently writing her next book, Spiritual Direction for Writers, which will be published by Eerdmans in 2024(ish). For the latest and greatest, subscribe to Daily Nourishment here and subscribe to Five Good Things here.