Publications

Writing for Girls’ Life: The “Get Inspired” Series

~ Marie Lorene Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Happy holidays, my Internet friends!

Something I am grateful for this year is that I had the opportunity to create a series of articles for the “Get Inspired” section of Girls’ Life‘s website. I interviewed three girls who were State or National Honorees at the Prudential Spirit of Community Awards, a program that recognizes kids and teens for their outstanding community service. Riley Callen is a high school freshman who holds hike-a-thons to raise money and awareness for benign tumor research. Lorelei McIntyre-Brewer is a seventh grader who developed a kid-sized compression heart pillow that she sends to kids all over the world.  Gable Sloan, who is pictured below, is a seventh grader whose bakery has generated thousands of dollars for charity, in addition to funding an annual scholarship. Girls' Life Gable Sloan (2).pngI have worked with and written for Girls’ Life over the past seven years, and I’ve had some really awesome experiences along the way. In 2010, I began as a Blog Moderator for their website, where I not only approved comments but answered advice questions from readers in real-time. As you may imagine, it was really challenging at times—some of their questions warranted a more thorough conversation than we could have in the comments section!—but I was so grateful to get to listen to them, learn from them, and help out where I could. When I became an Online Contributing Writer the following year, I got to write about everything from how to host a “cupcake war” to bringing up tough topics with your parents. One of my favorite tasks though was interviewing awesome girls, including many who had given back in big ways like Riley, Lorelei, and Gable. (All of my Girls’ Life links are available here!)

I am genuinely grateful to get to help share these girls’ stories, because I think it’s incredibly valuable for them to be heard. Whether you’re a kid or an adult, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by what’s going on in the world and wonder what your place in it is. We all have so much power—power to create, power to help others, power to change the world—and sometimes, hearing someone else’s story can inspire us to begin writing our own. In my recent article on BuzzFeed, I mentioned that Deborah Reber’s book In Their Shoes changed my life for the better, and I really meant that. I read that book when I was 16 years old and starting to think about life after high school. After reading the profile on Jess Weiner, who described herself as an “Actionist,” or someone who uses their voice, their career, and their actions to make the world better,  it was like everything clicked into place. I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to write and create things for girls that would help them navigate the wild ride that is growing up and becoming who you want to be. Granted, the road hasn’t always been smooth, but having that guiding goal has helped me make decisions along the way that could have been a lot more difficult. I am so grateful for Jess, and for Deborah, and for the girls who have let me share their stories in hopes that we can send light and inspiration to someone who needs it.

If you haven’t yet checked out the articles about Riley, Lorelei, and Gable, please do so! Also, if there is someone whose story inspired you in some way, please feel free to tell us about it in the comments below. You never know who you could help inspire.

xoxo

Marie

Writing for BuzzFeed: “6 Teen Nonfiction Books for Girls of All Ages”

~ Marie Lorene Hansen ~ Leave a comment

Hello, digital friends!

I have exciting news to share with you! This previous week, I published an article on BuzzFeed about some of my favorite books from my favorite section in the bookstore. You can check it out here.

BuzzFeed 6 Teen Nonfiction

While putting together a proposal for the book I’d like to write, I’ve been eager to share what I’ve learned or come across, as with my previous blog post. One key part of a nonfiction book proposal is a rundown of the “competing” or complementary books for the one you want to write.The point is to show where among the many books in the bookstore yours would fit. With that in mind, I have spent extra time this year exploring what’s new in my favorite section of the bookstore, teen nonfiction. What I found inspired me to share some of my favorites. Hence, this article!

I find writing book lists valuable for a few reasons. For starters, I like browsing book lists, and I hope that I can help someone find a new read they’ll enjoy. But also, I love getting to shine light on others’ creations. Putting yourself out there, whether it’s through writing or music or something else entirely, is such a special thing, but also a potentially nerve-wracking one. So when I come across a great book, I love getting the chance to share my appreciation.

On top of all that, every once in a while, you get to hear back from the authors themselves, and that’s really cool:

Erin Chack Twitter

If you enjoy teen nonfiction and have any favorites you’d recommend, please let me know either in the comments or on Twitter! I would love to check them out.

xoxo

Marie

 

Literally, Darling: “Cheryl Strayed’s Truth Bombs Inspired Me to ‘Write the Thing I Needed to Read’”

~ Marie Lorene Hansen ~ 2 Comments

Hello, Internet friends!

I’m excited to share that an essay I wrote was published on Literally, Darling, an awesome website designed with millennial women in mind, this week. The essay is titled “Cheryl Strayed’s Truth Bombs Inspired Me to ‘Write the Thing I Needed to Read.’” It’s about the lines in books that resonate like nothing else can, which I like to call “truth bombs,” and the impact my favorite author has had on me. cheryl-strayeds-truth-bombs-home-pageThe inspiration for this piece sprouted from seeing Strayed speak last year at the writing conference AWP (on my half-birthday, no less). But the seed was planted, so to speak, two years ago, when I included Tiny Beautiful Things on this book list for The Huffington Post and first used the term “truth bombs” to describe my experience reading her work.

My essay—which was originally titled “‘Truth Bombs’ an
d the Subjective Magic of Reading,” and then “On Cheryl Strayed, ‘Truth Bombs,’ and the Magic of Reading”—went through a lot of changes to get ready for the web. I ended up cutting what I thought was the final draft almost in half. Doing so was not only helpful in making the piece more succinct, focused, and easy to read, but also a good exercise as a writer. However, there was one part of the original essay that got left on the cutting room floor that I still really wanted to share with you, because I think it shows how powerful books really are—and the whole experience was also just a bit wild.

Sometime during the fall where I was going through a tough time (that I mention in the essay), I had this line pop into my head: “Allow yourself to be gutted.” I didn’t know that I would ever find a place to use it in my writing, but I thought it was good, so I saved it in a note on my phone, just in case. A few months later, I pulled out my copy of Tiny Beautiful Things, and realized that along the right side of the front cover was a line from the book: “Let yourself be gutted.” Oops.tiny-beautiful-things

Then something else happened. I started writing my essay last spring, and I realized I hadn’t read Tiny Beautiful Things since the spring semester of 2013, so I decided to reread it in between working on my draft. One day, I wrote a section where I compared reading a truth bomb to falling in love:

That’s why—and I’m going out on a limb here—I think finding a truth bomb through reading is an experience made out of some of the same stuff as falling in love. Because, just as a person in love can detail all the things they love about their loved one, without the magic glue that holds their reasons together, there’s no way others will be able to observe the same picture.

Later that day, I was reading Tiny Beautiful Things, and in one letter from Sugar/Strayed to three women who are considering leaving their current partners, she compares her second marriage to her first: “My two marriages aren’t so different from each other, though there’s some sort of magic sparkle glue in the second that was missing in the first.” What?! I had written my own “magic glue” reference mere hours before, years after reading that passage for the first time. I was legitimately flabbergasted. I take those two freaky/cool experiences together as proof that the books we care about weave themselves into our minds, perhaps even in ways of which we aren’t aware. Books have changed my life for the better, and for that I am incredibly grateful.

xoxo

Marie