Blog writing heroes

 Last post, I wrote about ‘The Writer as Hero’ and how my favourite writers inspire me and my writing, just as sporting heroes might be a source of inspiration to others. I’m excited to be writing today about my blog writing heroes. These are the people I have followed online through their blogs who have successfully built a blogging presence and reader platform over time, committed to regular writing both on and off their blog and are writing towards further publication of their work offline.

These writers are among My Seven Stars and are such great role models with unique vision, commitment to craft and belief in their goals. They have set writing goals, strived to put this into practice and shared the journey with others through their blogs. They are true writing heroes influential in their impact on my personal journey of a writing life and that of many others.

I celebrate the following blog writing heroes:

Chris Guillebeau

Chris has just published the book of  ‘The Art of Non-Conformity’ after building a successful blog of the same name. As Chris says,

One of the main reasons why I started AONC was to write a book. It only took two and a half years (it’s not dead, but publishing is indeed a sloooow industry), but here we are.

This dream is the same for many writers and I count myself among them. Here is someone who started the journey and committed to the vision of the ‘art of non-conformity’ in all its forms: travel, the nature of work, how we write, entrepreneurship, living your dream and providing the tools and the model for how to do it practically. I am a big fan and Chris’s work has been very influential to me over the past 18 months since I started among his readership. I am loving watching Chris promote his book across all 50 states in the US on the Unconventional Book Tour. In addition, designated proceeds from his book go towards his charity project in Ethiopia. The book and the projects around it are an excellent practical demonstration in every way of the ‘art of non-conformity’.

Joanna Penn

Joanna is another inspiration in writing, blogging and publishing; not least because she manages all this with a day job in another sphere. Through the ‘The Creative Penn’, Joanna has built up a strong audience of people interested in writing and publishing through providing loads of useful information, podcasts, links and experiential tips. Her resources on writing are excellent. Apart from this, Joanna has written a number of non-fiction books and is currently working on her first fiction book, ‘Pentecost’. On her blog, she shares the experience of writing this novel with her readers in posts such as ‘Editing your Novel: High level Story Read Through’ and ‘7 reasons why you should read your book out loud’. I look forward to reading ‘Pentecost’ when it is finished; I’m sure many of Joanna’s other readers are also looking forward to it. In this way, Joanna is developing the very platform based audience that she blogs about as a new publishing trend.

Susannah Conway

Susannah started her blog in 2006 and has developed a strong following for her beautiful work based around photography and creativity of all kinds that has grown out of grief and her healing journey.  Susannah has also created the Unravelling e-course based on photography and journalling as reconnecting and healing tools for how you see yourself and your world. I am a current Unraveller and although only in week 2, it is already a fabulously powerful personal experience. In May this year, Susannah announced ‘Unravelling: the Book’. She shares her writing journey on her book in posts like this one on overcoming getting stuck on a long piece of writing. Again, the reader platform for the book is already growing exponentially even before it is written based on Susannah’s blog and Unravelling presence.

Shanna Germain

Shanna is also writing her book, a novel, now. I have loved following Shanna’s writing journey from when I first joined her when she was writing on a remote Scottish island some time ago. Shanna documents her writing life, her commitment, her goals, her striving towards them and her publishing successes which have been many. In a great recent post, Here I Go, Shanna explains how she has been writing away, has had her novel accepted for publication on the basis of a synopsis and the first third, and how she is off for five days to a retreat in the woods to enter further into the writing experience of the novel. I am so excited for her. It is what I would love to be doing and hope one day to do; but Shanna is doing the hard work of making this real now. All courage to her.

Sage Cohen

Sage is a published poet, author of ‘Like the Heart, the World’ as well as the exceptional “Writing the Life Poetic: an Invitation to Read and Write Poetry’, one of the best ever books on the subtle art of writing poetry.  She also teaches the ‘Poetry for the People’ online courses of which I am a ‘graduate’ of levels 1 and 2. I loved these courses for their excellent teaching, mentoring and encouragement that truly helps poets to develop and re-engage. Sage has a blog and an ezine as well as a new book to be published through Writers’ Digest out in December this year, The Productive Writer. It’s available by pre-order through Amazon now. I know this book will be full of Sage’s practical and tested advice on productivity and writing. Again, Sage has built her readership through an online presence and e-courses in advance of the publication of her book.

So a sincere thanks to my blog writing heroes for being so personally inspiring to me.

Who are your blog writing heroes? How do they inspire you?

Image, Young woman blogging – after Marie-Denise Villers  by Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com from flickr and used under a Creative Commons license with thanks