Unleash Your Story
Welcome you wondrous creature. You with your story caught in your throat, on the edge of your lips, tingling your fingertips into sharper prints. You who knows words=medicine. You who can’t wait a moment longer to use and loose your voice—that wild, astonishing music that belongs to you alone. May you and your story find sanctuary here.
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Affirmation Station
The hardest part of signing up for a writing class is wondering if your voice will be heard and you’ll come away with your story, not one the teacher wants. So with all my vulnerability, I signed up for Jen’s DTB class, compelled to tell my stepmother story, knowing I couldn’t get there on my own. I came away with the outline and introduction to a kick-ass book with my ideas and stories refined and expanded.
Since the class, I've completed a full draft of my book and am preparing to share it with test readers, and Jen has been there, answering key questions and supporting me throughout the process.
From the Blog: Story Water
Were you looking for my latest writing?
Then you've come to the right place, to get to the right place! Just click on the button for some unbuttoned stories. A little more scoop: I've started a new Patreon page and will be … [Read More]

Studies in Silence #1: Listening isn’t Reacting.
I’m studying silence right now, or maybe it’s studying me. Schooling me. Honing me. Regardless, I’m paying attention to silence. How I crave it. How I loathe it. What fear it can hold. What balm it … [Read More]

Vinegar and Frosting Don’t Mix
So I made this cake last Sunday to share with the Joy Search Party gathering in my apartment on Monday. It was a white cake with chocolate chips, and the first thing I’d baked since the car accident I … [Read More]
About Jen
Jen Violi is the author of Putting Makeup on Dead People, a BCCB Blue Ribbon Book, finalist for the Oregon Book Awards, and shortlisted for the PNBA and Oregon Spirit Awards.
As a mentor, editor, and facilitator, Jen helps writers unleash the stories they’re meant to tell, from blogs to websites to award winning books.
With advanced degrees in theology and creative writing—devoted to creating sanctuary for stories and their humans—for twenty years Jen has facilitated retreats and workshops and mentored and nurtured hundreds of writers as they find their voices, hone their manuscripts, and take creative leaps and plunges.
Jen is a columnist and regular contributor for Sweatpants & Coffee and has been a featured presenter at The Louisiana Book Festival, Wordstock, the Antioch Writers’ Workshop, A Frock-alicious Life is Calling, and the Saints & Sinners Literary Festival.[ Read More ]