Write Better: Let writing bring joy and well-being to your holiday!

Mary Vasudeva

Write Better, Right Now:Holiday 23

Clarity, Concision, Impact

3-min read

These gift ideas relate to writing/reading that will bring joy to you and/or someone you love this holiday season!

Create

●      Write someone a letter! On paper with a pen, pick a fun, joyful color! Never underestimate the power of a handwritten note to bring someone joy.

●      Encourage joyful poetry composition: Share a little box of happiness with Magnetic poetry.

●      Purchase a Gratitude Journal or cards as a gift or for yourself.

●      Write thanks 52 times in 2024 with this handy set of note cards.

●      Use this inspirational Poetry Prompt Advent Calendar to compose 25 joyful poems.

●      Unwrap 12 days of stationery with the Typo Stationary advent calendar, a special writing surprise for twelve days straight!

●      Put your writing muscles to work composing music with “The Song in My Head” card deck.

●      Create your own bound comic book for kids and adults.

●      Make a personalized word cloud for someone.

Read

Children’s Books

This selection is designed to inspire writing joy in young readers!

●      Author: A True Story, Helen Lester (Ages 5-10). Inspiring children’s book of how Lester overcomes hurdles to become a famous writer.

●      A Squiggly Story, Andrew Larsen (Ages 4-6). Encourage an interest in story telling and writing for your young reader.

●      Dear Beast, by Dori Hillested Butler (Ages 6-9), a beginning chapter book about a dog and cat who write letters to one another.

●      The Boy Who Loved Words, Roni Schotter (Ages 4-9). A great book for developing a love of vocabulary and writing.

●      Any Questions?, Marie-Louise Gay (Ages 6-9). An author answers children's questions on how a book is written with great illustrations and a variety of writing styles (doodling, collaging, painting, etc). A great book for inspiring creativity.

Older children

Finding books for older children that bring joy can be difficult. But these books fit the bill.

●      On Wings of Words: The Extraordinary Life of Emily Dickinson, Jennifer Berne (Ages 6-11), inspires both reading and writing.

●      The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3/4 , Sue Townsend, (Ages tween, young teen), introduce your young teen to this 8 book series, part comedy, part soul searching and all writing.

●      Famous Last Words, Jennifer Salvato Doktorski (ages 12-18), a young woman takes an internship writing obituaries, but her writing and her life blossom into positive self and social discovery.

●      Find Your Voice: A Guided Journal for Writing Your Truth, Angie Thomas, renowned author of The Hate U Give and On the Come up, created this interactive book to invite young people to respond to prompts designed to encourage them to become writers.

Fiction Adult

●      The Rosie Project, Graeme Simsion: There is nothing like an emotionally inept character to inspire empathy, and The Rosie Project uses this device to bring joy and laughter.

●      Remarkably Bright Creatures: Shelby Van Pelt: have you jumped on the “Octopus as the key to happiness” bandwagon? This is just one of the books (and movies) that are motivating more and more people to value these once rather off-putting creatures. This is a completely unrealistic but compelling book that inspires joy.

●      Stardust, Neil Gaiman: this playful fantasy with considerable subtle humor will appeal to both adults and older tweens/teens.

●      The Housekeeper and the Professor, Yoko Ogawa: I come back to this novel again and again. It’s short, lovely and heart warming. Even the cover brings joy!

NonFiction Adult

●      The Book of Joy, Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu: in dialogue, Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama explore the process of finding joy even in the darkest of times (There is also a children’s version of this book, “The Little Book of Joy”).

●      Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Bring Extraordinary Happiness, Ingrid Fetell Lee is a designer and this book focuses on how our surroundings can inspire joy.

●      The Little Book of Gratitude, Robert A Emmons: the research showing that gratitude can do wonders for inspiring joy continues to pile up, and this little book is a great way to dip your toe in.

●      A Walk in the Woods, or anything by Bill Bryson–guaranteed to make you laugh as Bryson takes you on his journey of taking life a little less seriously.

●      Forest Bathing: How Trees Can Help You Find Health and Happiness, Qing Li. This guide to Japanese “Shinrin-yoku” (literally forest-bath) delivers readers into the woods where joy flows from the healing power of trees (Note that there is a significant body of research (and here) that supports the relationship between forest bathing and well-being).

Wishing you and yours peace and joy (and writing improvement!) for 2024

Have a writing question? Comment? Or Idea for future issues?

I’d love to hear from you: mvimpactllc@gmail.com