Natalie Goldberg

Monday night I had the opportunity to see one of my favorite authors, and my favorite author of writing books. Natalie Goldberg wrote Writing Down the Bones, the book that my writing group uses often to spark our timed writings. She has also written many other wonderful books. She was speaking at Left Bank Books to promote the paperback release of her latest book, Old Friend from Far Away: The Practice of Writing Memoir.



Left Bank Books is a smallish independent bookstore in St. Louis. The place was PACKED. It was mostly women in the crowd, but there were a few men as well. Hearing Natalie speak and read from her book was amazing. She's such a neat person, and her real life personality is pretty close to what I expected from her on page personality.



After about an hour of speaking, reading, and Q&A she signed books. I had "Writing Down the Bones" and "Thunder and Lightening" signed. It was a very cool experience. If you ever get a chance to see her, GO! I hope to someday have the opportunity to participate in one of her workshops in New Mexico (where she lives.)



My favorite answer from the night was when someone asked Natalie how she gets inspiration for her memoirs.

"I fell in love with my life."