Emerging Form

“My writing often comes to me that way–something that interests me in the real life world, something kind of political and thorny, something I don’t entirely totally know how I think about it, something I’m interested in exploring.” These words from short story writer and novelist Claire Boyles are at the heart of this episode on the relationship between fiction and real life. How might having personal experience in a certain arena both help and hinder our ability to use it as material for fiction? How can characters drive the way opinions are explored in a book? How do we create more compelling characters? What must be let go as we create a fictional realm? How can fiction help us explore “thorny” political themes? And how might our past lives help us in practical ways as we move forward in our creative lives?
Claire Boyles (she/her) is a writer and former farmer. Her debut novel, Appraisals, is forthcoming in August 2026. A 2022 Whiting Award winner in fiction, she is the author of Site Fidelity, which won the High Plains Book Award and was longlisted for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Award, the Colorado Book Award, and the Reading the West Award. Her nonfiction has appeared in Sierra Magazine and Virginia Quarterly Review, among other journals, and she is a screenwriter with multiple credits on the Hallmark Channel. She splits time between Loveland, Colorado and Ames, Iowa, where she is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing and the Environment at Iowa State University.
Claire will be a speaker at the Grand Mesa Writer’s Symposium in Cedaredge on September 12. Details here: https://www.grandmesawriters.org/schedule


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“Sometimes I let the subconscious deal with it,” says science writer Elizabeth Preston, author of the new book The Creature’s Guide to Caring, How animal parents teach us that humans were born to care. In this interview, we talk about the evolution of a manuscript–how she went from the “Big Idea” to the actual book. Other threads include the importance of walking away, balancing parenting with a writing life, why humor helps, the invitation to be bold, and how the “gnomes in the back of my head” have helped Elizabeth solve structural problems with her creative projects.
Elizabeth Preston is a science journalist who contributes regularly to The New York Times and has written for Science, The Boston Globe, The Atlantic, Orion, Slate, Audubon, Discover, National Geographic, and others. She is a winner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Kavli Science Journalism Gold Award. Preston is also a humor writer whose work has appeared in outlets such as McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Parents, and Real Simple, and was the editor of Muse, a magazine about science and ideas for kids. She lives in Massachusetts. Her new book is The Creature’s Guide to Caring: How animal parents teach us that humans were born to care


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“The book is about the opposite of the eureka moment,” says science writer Roberta Kwok about her new book, LOST IN CURIOSITY: Field Notes From Scientists’ Adventures into the Unknown. Join us in a conversation about the difficulties and gifts of showing up day after day. We talk about patience, wrestling with process, and the long slow path to epiphany–in science and in creative endeavors. We talk, too, about how to choose the right people to interview for a book based on research, how the body may or may not be a part of creative process, the possibility that walking is not the most important tool in a writer’s toolbox, and the thrill of collaboration.
Roberta Kwok is a science writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times, NewYorker.com, Nature, New Scientist, Audubon, and other
publications. She has received a fellowship from the Knight Science Journalism Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and awards from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Geophysical Union. Before becoming a journalist, Kwok worked in a genetics lab at Stanford University. She lives in the Seattle area and is originally from Canada.


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“One of my superpowers is I see the nuance in everything,” says podcast host and author Eric Zimmer. “That is also sometimes my greatest weakness because I want to caveat the living heck out of everything that I say.” In this episode of Emerging Form, we talk with Eric about the process of writing his book How a Little Becomes a Lot: The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life. We cover
· how the stages of change relate to creative process,· why dedicating time is an essential part of setting ourselves up for creative success,· how to support our expectations of wanting to create something really good,· how the hardest parts of our process teach us the most,· why asking for help can help build our trust in our selves as creatives,· why it helps to identify our motivations and intentions for our creative endeavors,· the importance of trust in the evolution of our creativity, and· how the advice to “spend what’s in your pocket” can help shape a book.
Eric Zimmer is an author, teacher, speaker, and the creator of The One You Feed podcast—an award-winning show with over 50 million downloads across 800+ conversations exploring meaningful living. At 24, Eric was homeless, addicted to heroin, and facing prison. His journey from those depths sparked his lifelong inquiry into human transformation and resilience. Through his behavior coaching, workshops, and mentorship, he has guided thousands worldwide in creating sustainable habits that last—not through willpower or epiphany, but through steady change. His approach combines cutting-edge science with timeless wisdom, providing practical pathways to greater integrity and deeper meaning. His story and his work have been featured in the media, including TedX, Mind Body Green, Elephant Journal, the BBC and Brain Pickings. His new book is How a Little Becomes a Lot: The Art of Small Changes for a More Meaningful Life.
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“I didn’t know I enjoyed thinking so much,” says science writer Roxanne Khamsi when asked what surprised her most about writing her first book Beyond Inheritance. “I thought I enjoyed interviewing people and reading research papers and the process of finding the right verb in a sentence. What’s hard for me is once I get into that thinking space, I can’t let go of it.” In this episode we talk about how she made the leap from writing articles to writing a book—and why they are so different. We talk about creating an arc for a book of essays, what to do when the structure for your book isn’t working, letting go of a project once its over, meeting our self critic, the role of obsession in writing a book, the art of going for “the big idea” and how to carry that in a nonfiction book, how writing reflects the author’s personality.
Roxanne Khamsi is the author of Beyond Inheritance: Our Ever-Mutating Cells and a New Understanding of Health and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. Her articles on genetics have appeared in a wide range of publications, including The New York Times, Scientific American, Nature magazine and Wired. Roxanne served as chief news editor for the international research journal Nature Medicine for more than a decade. She is based in Montreal.
Author photos credit: Brian Friedman


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