Writing Routes ― A Resource Handbook of Therapeutic Writing

`Detailed maps are needed for where to start in creative writing and how to proceed. Writing Routes provides just such an atlas, essential information for anybody setting out on the adventure of self-discovery through words.'---from the Foreword by Gwyneth Lewis

Creative writing is a powerful vehicle for personal or professional development, yet often the most difficult part is knowing how and where to begin. The experiences of others, and the strategies and approaches they have used in their own writing, can provide tried-and-tested models for practice, and `ways in' that facilitators can recommend to others.

Writing Routes is a fascinatingly diverse collection of personal journeys, which introduces and demonstrates many different ways of beginning and deepening creative writing for personal or professional development. Seventy contributors from a variety of different backgrounds explain how and why they came to write a particular piece, how they found ways of transforming their experience into writing, and how the process of doing so was beneficial to them. Their writing ranges widely, from journal entries and stream of consciousness to autobiography, poetry, fiction and drama, and the pieces are organised by theme and genre for ease of navigation, designed to be `dipped into' as and when they are needed.

This rich and varied collection will provide writing practitioners, counsellors and other related professionals with ideas and techniques to share with their clients, and is a useful resource that individuals writing for their own personal and professional development will return to again and again.

Gillie Bolton has worked in reflective and therapeutic writing for 25 years, and has written and edited five books, one of which is in its third edition.
Victoria Field is a certified poetry therapist. She has co-edited three books on therapeutic writing and is a poet, playwright and Associate Artist at Hall for Cornwall.
Kate Thompson is a BACP senior accredited counsellor and supervisor. She is a faculty member of the Center for Journal Therapy and the Therapeutic Writing Institute and the author of Therapeutic Journal Writing: An Introduction for Professionals, also published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers.