Sari Botton

Instructor & Writer
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Sari Botton is a writer and editor living in Kingston, NY. She is a contributing editor at Catapult, and the former Essays Editor for Longreads. She edited the anthologies Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving & Leaving NY and Never Can Say Goodbye: Writers on Their Unshakable Love for NY. She teaches creative nonfiction at Wilkes University, Catapult and Bay Path University. She publishes three newsletters: Oldster Magazine, Adventures in "Journalism,"  and Memoir Monday. Her memoir-in-essays, And You May Find Yourself... will be published by Heliotrope in June, 2022.

Photo credit to Sylvie Rosokoff

Classes

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Stories

Cover Photo: This black and white photograph shows a woman in front of a mirror. We see a side view, so we see both the woman, holding a hand over her eyes, and her reflection.
After Fifteen Years, I Stopped Panicking, Started Declawing, and Finally Published My Memoir

At last, I took my teachers’ and mentors’ advice, and scrutinized my own behavior more than anyone else’s.

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Sari Botton
Jun 16, 2022
Don’t Write Alone | Writing Life
Cover Photo: This header image is a headshot of the author, Jen Doll, next to the cover of her upcoming book, THAT'S DEBATABLE. The book cover is yellow with an illustrated teenage boy and girl standing next to each other, speech bubbles raising above them to frame the title of the book.
How’s the Writing Going, Jen Doll?

“I think I’m trying to reconcile the need to write and have a deadline with the need to be a human? And right now, the human is winning.”

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Sari Botton
Jan 06, 2022
Don’t Write Alone | Columns
Cover Photo: This header is a headshot of author R. O. Kwon on the left and her book cover on the right. The cover of her book has scattered lines in it, which have been added to her headshot to mimic the book cover.
How’s the Writing Going, R. O. Kwon?

“I know that when I’m really writing, when I’m really, really lost in a sentence, I forget I have a body, I forget what time is. I forget to eat.”

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Sari Botton
Nov 09, 2021
Don’t Write Alone | Columns
Cover Photo: On the left, we see a picture of the author Michael Seidlinger. He is wearing a black t-shirt with a white splotchy design on it and sits against a black wall. His hand is up to his temple, touching his glasses, and there's a concerned look on his face. On the right, we see the book cover of Michael's novella, RUNAWAYS, which has birds on the cover. Some of the birds are flying off the cover and into the frame of Michael's picture.
How’s the Writing Going, Michael Seidlinger?

“I always battle with the realization that the stuff I write doesn’t need to exist, and I wonder how many people actually want to read the horror and speculative fiction that I write.”

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Sari Botton
Sep 22, 2021
Don’t Write Alone | Columns
Cover Photo: Illustration by Meryl Rowin for Catapult
The Summer I Became a Thief

Sometimes I thought of it as war reparations. On the outwardly civil but quietly vicious battlefield of my parents’ divorce, I had been the clear loser.

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Sari Botton
Apr 29, 2019
People | Generations