It has been more than 33 years since Julia Cameron’s groundbreaking book, The Artist’s Way, was first published. That book was a change-maker in helping everyday people overcome what “blocks” them from using their native creativity.
Sue Monk Kidd is no stranger to bestsellers herself. Her The Secret Life of Bees, for instance, has sold in excess of six million copies (a similar number to Cameron’s The Artist’s Way), and was even adapted for the big screen in 2008 by screenwriter and director, Gina Prince-Bythewood. This is her artists’ way.
Writing Creativity and Soul is part memoir, about Kidd’s pilgrimage as a writer and creative, and part inspiring manual for other creatives who desire to find their voice, in whatever form that takes. This will happen, Kidd emphasizes, when you find your true self and bravely learn to say what it is that is uniquely yours to say.
There is a chapter devoted to encouraging your dreams in support of your creativity, and another chapter encouraging “the empty space” that is needed to grow creativity, which includes avoiding distractions, including the “digital allurement” kind. There are also chapters that encourage you to be bolder, as well as hands-on chapters about story, plot, and scene-making.
Also intriguing was the short chapter on “writing rituals,” where Kidd details some of her own, starting with: “While working on a book, I keep a little box on my desk that holds an assortment of small symbolic objects related to the story I’m writing.” This sort of practicality is then reprised in a later chapter in the book called “These Are a Few of My Favorite Things,” in which Kidd talks about creating a sense of place with her writing, how to focus on “a core image,” avoiding stereotyping language by “thinking the opposite,” and successfully using the first-person voice.
