In this episode Helen and I discuss:

• How blogging and memoir classes got her the feedback she needed to develop her manuscript.
• What is healing about writing a memoir and how it can help you cope with confusing, painful, and difficult personal experiences.
• Why she didn’t always use pseudonyms for her characters.

Plus, her #1 tip for writers.

About the Author

Helen Zuman is the author of MATING IN CAPTIVITY (She Writes Press 2018), a memoir of her five years, post-Harvard, at Zendik Farm, a neo-hippie cult with a radical take on sex and relationships. MATING IN CAPTIVITY received a starred review from Kirkus, was named a Kirkus Best Indie Memoir of 2018, and was a finalist in Creative Nonfiction for the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses’ 2019 Firecracker Award. Born in London and raised in Brooklyn, she currently homesteads with her husband on a steeply sloped quarter acre in Beacon, New York.

You can learn more about Helen by visiting her on Twitter and Reddit.

Mating in Captivity: A Memoir 

When recent Harvard grad Helen Zuman moved to Zendik Farm in 1999, she was thrilled to discover that the Zendiks used go-betweens to arrange sexual assignations, or “dates,” in cozy shacks just big enough for a double bed and a nightstand. Here, it seemed, she could learn an honest version of the mating dance—and form a union free of “Deathculture” lies. No one spoke the truth: Arol, the Farm’s matriarch, crushed any love that threatened her hold on her followers’ hearts. An intimate look at a transformative cult journey, MATING IN CAPTIVITY shows how stories can trap us and free us, how miracles rise out of crisis, how coercion feeds on forsaken self-trust.

If you decide to check out the book, we hope you’ll do so via this Amazon affiliate link, where if you choose to purchase via the link DIY MFA gets a referral fee at no cost to you. As always, thank you for supporting DIY MFA!

Link to Episode 323

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The post Episode 323: The Importance of Composting in the Writing Process – Interview with Helen Zuman appeared first on DIY MFA.