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A Practice of Attention
Make room for what matters.
Elena Vale
Small, practical invitations to notice more, collect better ideas and bring a little more intention to a creative life.
THE STORY
Step into the story.
A creative life rarely begins with a grand gesture. More often, it begins with noticing: the sentence overheard on a train, the colour of a room at four in the afternoon, the question that will not quite go away.
Drawing on a writer’s everyday practice, these short essays pair observations with manageable exercises. Keep a notebook that you actually return to. Take a walk without turning it into research. Give an unfinished idea enough time to become something.
Read from beginning to end, or open it wherever you need a fresh start. There is no perfect routine to master — only a way of attending to the life you already have.
The details
GENRE
Creative nonfiction
SERIES
Standalone
READING ORDER
Book 1
PUBLICATION
FORMATS
Paperback · eBook
LENGTH
192 pages
PUBLISHER
Rowan House · illustrative imprint
READ THE FIRST PAGES
Opening pages · A place to begin
Choose one thing you pass every day. It might be a tree outside the station or a window opposite your desk. For a week, give it a minute of your attention.
Do not try to find a metaphor. Do not take a photograph unless you want to. Simply notice what changes, and what you had assumed would stay the same.
On the first day, you will probably write down what the thing is. On the second, you may notice its edges. By the fifth, you might find yourself wondering who else stops there.
Attention has a useful habit of becoming curiosity. Curiosity, given a little room, becomes a question. And a good question is often a more generous beginning than a brilliant idea.
The story continues. Choose your copy above, or join the reader club for early chapters of the next book.
KEEP READING
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Early chapters, cover reveals and launch-day news — straight from the writing desk.