Ce n'est pas un chien

Ce n'est pas un chien
Ceci n'est pas un chien./ Click on photo to go to Cancer Bitch blog
I'm a writer, editor, teacher & writing coach. I'm the author of a short-story collection, The Sweetheart Is In; the essay collection Holocaust Girls: History, Memory, & Other Obsessions; and the nonfiction chronicle The Adventures of Cancer Bitch. Contact: SLwisenberg (at) sbcglobal (dot) net
Keep scrolling for info on my books. I edit Another Chicago Magazine.

I'm teaching Meditation for Writers again via the U of Chicago Graham School at your house. 6-8:30pm Mondays, March 29-May 17, 2021. There are free online meditation/yoga options in the right column of this page. Keep scrolling.
I'll be teaching point of view in fiction and nonfiction this summer.



some recent publications:

fiction:
"Sheetrock," Jewish Fiction
nonfiction:
"The South in Texas," Modern Southern Folklore
"America: a Polemic," Killing the Buddha
"On being one-breasted," Chicago Tribune
poetry:


some of my pandemic art:


resources on productivity & organization: 

 Freedom distraction blocker
Time-managementapps & other resources for ADHD adults
More time-management apps
Timetracker
Guardian on effectiveness of time-management apps
Pomodoro technique
Timer
Keeping track of time: tools and apps
The Now Habit, Neil Fiore
Printable monthly calendar (when you get there, scroll down, on right)


Bio, July 2020

bio
S.L. Wisenberg is the author of two prose collections, The Sweetheart Is In, and Holocaust Girls: History, Memory, & Other Obsessions, and the nonfiction chronicle The Adventures of Cancer Bitch, based on her blog. She is a third-generation native Texan who lives in Chicago. She has an MFA in fiction from the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop and a BSJ from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She was a feature writer for the Miami Herald and has published prose and poetry in The New Yorker, Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, New England Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Colorado Review, and many other places. Her anthologized work is in Short Takes: Brief Encounters with Contemporary Nonfiction, Creating Nonfiction: A Guide and Anthology, Imaginative Writing: The Elements of Craft, and a number of other books. For ten years she was co-director and director of Northwestern's then MA/MFA in Creative Writing program and was a graduate faculty recipient of a Distinguished Teacher Award. She has been the literary editor of TriQuarterly, the creative nonfiction editor of Another Chicago Magazine. and is now the editor of ACM. She's received a Pushcart Prize, and fellowships from the Illinois Arts Council, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. She was the Coal Royalty Chair for a semester at the University of Alabama. Wisenberg has read her work and lectured at many universities and colleges, including Brown, Creighton, Minnesota State, Texas A&M, University of Tampa, Ripon, and Lafayette. She has just finished writing a play, Texas Mutiny & Early Sorrow: a Docudrama, and is working on a nonfiction book about time, history, family, and the American South. --updated 071620

The Adventures of Cancer Bitch (nonfiction)

The Adventures of Cancer Bitch (nonfiction)
Click on the cover to order from Bookshop.org.

To listen to The Adventures of Cancer Bitch:

Click to order from Audible, read by Jennifer Teague.

reviews, The Adventures of Cancer Bitch:

"The Adventures of Cancer Bitch is funny, touching, sad, uplifting and informative - all at the same time."
--Chicago Tribune

"Best book for someone who likes the idea of the Oprah Book Club but thinks they're too cool"--Time Out Chicago

"... smart, self-deprecating sense of humor..." --MORE magazine, "Tackling Breast Cancer with Humor Books"

“witty and relentless, surprising and honest" –Audrey Niffenegger, author, The Time Traveler’s Wife

“deeply personal, often darkly funny"–Kirkus Reviews

"Wisenberg brings her serious writing chops to bear in unflinching observations on breast cancer, cancer research, and teaching." --Library Journal

"(An) incredible book.... Wisenberg is acerbic, unsettling, truthful, and often hilarious." --Rain Taxi

"A frank, funny and insightful account of one woman's battle with breast cancer. Wisenberg reveals the realities of life with cancer and how smarts, style and a self-deprecating sense of humor help her fight back against disease."--Self magazine Cancer Resource

Holocaust Girls (essays)

Holocaust Girls (essays)
Click on the cover to order from Bookshop.org.

reviews, Holocaust Girls

“Anyone who gets meditative around the High Holy Days, wondering exactly what it means to be a contemporary American and a Jew, will find a caring companion in Chicago-based journalist S.L. Wisenberg. . . .The strength of this collection is not so much in the answers Wisenberg provides, but in the questions she raises." --Forward

"With her lucid style and power of observation, Wisenberg's insightful essays are gems not to be missed." --Booklist

"This is one of the more provocative collecitons of writing I have encountered in some time, and I remain in admiration of Wisenberg for her curiosity, her use of imagination, and her eloquence...Wisenberg is an original voice, a writer who takes risks, and...I'd willingly follow her anywhere her mind may take her/us."--Maureen Stanton, Fourth Genre

The Sweetheart is In (stories)

The Sweetheart is In (stories)
Click on the cover to order.

reviews, Sweetheart Is In

"Wisenberg presents a tart first collection of short stories concerned with the threads that hold families together....With humor and wisdom, Wisenberg charts the small misfortunes and heartbreaks that a lifetime contains and gives readers sharply drawn characters they will enjoy meeting." --Brendan Dowling, Booklist

"Traditional Jewish storytelling is given a vibrant new twist in The Sweetheart Is In, a witty and intimate debut collection of short stories by S.L. Wisenberg. In pithy prose and brief paragraphs, Wisenberg documents the secret hopes and fears of her characters, many practicing Jews, others mindful of their heritage." --Publishers Weekly

"...deeply felt and rewarding."--Kirkus Reviews