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Writers at Work is where you produce your best work, get subscribers, earn an income, and build the writing career you want on Substack with guidance based on the advice Substack gave me.

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Free subscribers get weekly public posts to help you

• build your Substack, use the platform to get an agent and/or a book deal, generate media attention, sell your new and backlisted books, etc., and produce writing that readers (and agents and editors) really want to read and keep reading.

Paid subscribers also get

• the best monthly workshops with insider tips and in-depth guidance;

• access to the Substack Coworking Lab, which includes my Substack Writing Tip of the Month and the W@W Challenge of the Month;

• an invitation to the monthly members-only Substack chat where you discover what works and what doesn’t on the platform;

• discounted 1-to-1 mentoring sessions with me, which is the most efficient way to achieve your goals; and

• expert instruction on how to serialize a novel and/or memoir.

Full-access members also get

• the full library of workshop replays to help you quickly

  • create a Substack that gives you the writing career you want,

  • build community and a devoted readership,

  • publicize your Substack, and more

• for a fraction of what you’d pay for them separately.

**I encourage you to commit to your Substack and your writing for a year by getting the annual or full-access member subscription. (The annual is much cheaper than the monthly.) Substack is a long game. Stay in it.

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What people are saying about Writers at Work:

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Success on Substack 1-to-1 Mentoring

The fastest, most efficient way to succeed on Substack is through 1-to-1 sessions with me.

Book a meeting with Writers at Work with Sarah Fay

Schedule a meeting

Book meeting

I’ve seen the most amazing results in the Substack writers I’ve worked with. Their Substacks have

• doubled or tripled in subscribers,

• seen a sharp increase in real engagement, and

• been chosen as Featured Substacks.

Most importantly, they’ve found purpose in their writing and direction in their careers. This is what I want for all of us. Book now or find out more about meeting with me here.

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About me

I’m the creator of two bestselling, featured Substacks; an award-winning author at HarperCollins; a member of the creative writing faculty at Northwestern University; a freelance writer for The New York Times and elsewhere; a former advisory editor at The Paris Review; and a mentor who’s helped other writers build bestselling featured Substacks too.

At the Texas Book Festival

I have many degrees—M.F.A. in creative writing, M.A. and Ph.D. in literature. My first book is a journalistic memoir, Pathological: The True Story of Six Misdiagnoses (HarperCollins):

I’m currently serializing the sequel, Cured, right here on Substack:

I write for many publications, including Oprah Daily, The New York Times, The New Republic, The Los Angeles Times, The Atlantic, Time Magazine, and The Paris Review, where I was an advisory editor. My essays have been nominated for Pushcart prizes and chosen as notable mentions in Best American Essays. I’m the recipient of the Hopwood Award for Literature and grants and fellowships from Yaddo, the Mellon Foundation, and the MacDowell Colony, among others.

I live in Chicago with my two beloved cats, Siddhartha (a.k.a. Sweets) and Baby Theo. More than anything, I want a t-shirt that says, Ask me about my cats. (All typos in all posts are Baby Theo’s fault.)

Baby Theo (left) and Sweets (right) hard at work on their new novel

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Why does Writers at Work make me think of The Paris Review?

Because Writers at Work is a tribute to The Paris Review interviews, which I conducted for over a decade, learning the habits and practices master writers—everyone from Toni Morrison to E.M. Forster to Stephen King—developed to become great.

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→ For more, visit www.sarahfay.org and follow me on Instagram @sarahfayauthor.

→ I subsidize paid subscriptions for writers on a fixed income. If this is you, email me: mssarahfay1516@gmail.com.