Excited to announce that my new book is out now! It's currently riding high in the charts, as Amazon's #1 hot new release in feminist criticism, psychology & emotions. You can order it here http://goo.gl/u6BLvx or find out more below...

 

It's called Letting Go: How to Heal Your Hurt, Love Your Body and Transform Your Life and here's what some of the critics have been saying...

‘A practical and heartfelt guide to healing for anyone who has suffered from low self-esteem, a lack of confidence, or disordered eating. Woolf writes with intelligence, wisdom and compassion for a generation of women battling an enduring media onslaught of perfectionism. The fightback continues.’
Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett, The Vagenda

‘Psychology, philosophy and personal growth marvellously rolled into one, Letting Go is a must-read. This book shows us how to develop inner confidence, open new doors, and rediscover joy and meaning in our lives.’
Deanne Jade, psychologist and founder of the National Centre For Eating Disorders

‘Letting Go is not about giving up, but about letting freedom in. This brave and personal account shows us that the path to true liberation is through embracing our true selves, however flawed we fear they might be.’
Sally Brampton, author of Shoot the Damn Dog and columnist for Top Santé and Psychologies

‘A timely reminder that though we may take ourselves for granted at times, self-care is a divine responsibility. In Woolf’s intimately personal yet relatable voice, Letting Go empowers us to accept both the role of wounded and healer.’
Caroline Kent, Telegraph journalist

‘Gutsy and engaging, Letting Go combines research and real-life advice on fulfilling your inner potential and building self-belief... Woolf’s latest book is highly recommended.’
Tim Weeks, Olympic trainer

‘Emma Woolf is the voice of friendly sanity; she is the warm, assured hand that reaches out and grasps yours. A wonderfully helpful book.’
Kate Long, author of The Bad Mother’s Handbook

Exploring the issues of love, loss, healing and happiness, this manifesto for freedom from one of feminism’s liveliest voices will guide you on the path to feeling newly, truly confident. Life doesn’t need to be a struggle. Letting go is the strongest thing I’ve ever done…

Asked what the happiest moment in her whole life was, Virginia Woolf responded 'with a shining face…. I think it’s the moment when one is walking in one’s garden, perhaps picking off a few dead flowers, and suddenly one thinks,‘My husband lives in that house, and he loves me.'

Excitement ahead June 4-7 at Virginia Woolf Conference 

If you are still sitting on the fence about attending the 25th Annual International Conference on Virginia Woolf, now is the time to jump off that fence, block off June 4-7 on your calendar, and get ready to travel to Bloomsburg, Pa. The conference, held at Bloomsburg University, is on the theme Virginia Woolf and Her Contemporaries and will feature some real excitement. Here are some highlights now available on the conference website.

Most exciting of all will be Cecil Woolf as the featured speaker at the Saturday evening banquet — and the attendance of acclaimed author Jean Moorcroft Wilson. The couple head up Cecil Woolf Publishers of London

Cecil Woolf and Jean Moorcroft Wilson

Cecil is the nephew of Leonard and Virginia Woolf, and Jean is a well-respected critic and biographer of the World War I poets and the leading authority on Siegfried Sassoon. Cecil and Jean have not attended a Woolf conference since 2010, so their participation in this year’s event is a long overdue treat, both for young scholars who have never had the opportunity to meet this notable couple and for Woolfians who have been befriended by the pair at previous events. As is customary at Cecil’s talks, he will share stories of his experiences with Virginia and Leonard.

https://bloggingwoolf.wordpress.com/2015/01/12/excitement-ahead-june-4-7-at-woolf-conference/

 

'I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes.' 

e.e. cummings

interesting Jonathan Franzen interview on the Paris Review website -

"...Not everything in the world needs to be laughed angrily at, you realize. There turn out to be more emotions available to a working writer than I might have guessed earlier on. And one of them might be love—love and gratitude."

"...I like attention, I do! But it’s counterbalanced by a need and craving to be alone most of the time. This is one reason I’ve found being a writer a very suitable profession. You have the possibility of great bursts of satisfying attention, and then you’re left alone."

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/6054/the-art-of-fiction-no-207-jonathan-franzen

throwback Tuesday... photo-shoot for Red magazine

 

Sweetness

 

Just when it has seemed I couldn’t bear   

   one more friend   

waking with a tumor, one more maniac   

with a perfect reason, often a sweetness   

   has come   

and changed nothing in the world   

except the way I stumbled through it,   

   for a while lost   

in the ignorance of loving   

someone or something, the world shrunk   

   to mouth-size,   

hand-size, and never seeming small.   

I acknowledge there is no sweetness   

   that doesn’t leave a stain,   

no sweetness that’s ever sufficiently sweet ....   

Tonight a friend called to say his lover   

   was killed in a car   

he was driving. His voice was low   

and guttural, he repeated what he needed   

   to repeat, and I repeated   

the one or two words we have for such grief   

until we were speaking only in tones.   

   Often a sweetness comes   

as if on loan, stays just long enough   

to make sense of what it means to be alive,   

   then returns to its dark   

source. As for me, I don’t care   

where it’s been, or what bitter road   

   it’s traveled   

to come so far, to taste so good.

 

(Sweetness, by Stephen Dunn)