June 12, 2025 Edition
đź‘‹ HELLO, WRITERS!
Can you believe we're already at the halfway point of 2025? Summer's arrival brings not just warmth and longer days, but a natural invitation to pause and reflect. By now, you've likely settled into a creative rhythm—a vibe, so to speak—that's marking your year. Some aspects of your practice are probably singing, while others might be quietly (or not so quietly) asking for reinvention. Our 100-Day Summer Intensive participants are discovering this in real-time, as are members across our community who are using this midpoint as an opportunity for honest creative assessment.
🌟 COME TO OUR CLASS
Your Writing Practice Map: A Mid-Year Creative Reset Thursday, June 19th at 10 AM PT via Zoom
As we reach the halfway point of the year, let's convene and evaluate what's working and what can be reinvented as you head into part two of 2025. Some parts of your practice are likely serving your creative flow, while others might be holding you back. This meetup offers an intentional space to get honest about what's working, release what isn't, and intentionally design a practice that supports your authentic voice as we move into the rest of 2025.
What We'll Explore Together: We'll evaluate our present creative habits and create our personal Writing Practice Maps to guide the rest of the year and re-center with your goals and projects.
You'll Leave With: Your personalized Writing Practice Map—not a rigid schedule, but a flexible framework based on your own insights about what genuinely supports your creative flow. Think of it as a compass rather than a GPS, guiding you toward the conditions where your best work emerges naturally.
There will be lots of time for Q&A, so bring what's on your mind!
Whether you're preparing for a summer project, seeking more consistency, or simply curious about what your writing practice could become, this meetup honors where you are while opening space for what's possible.
Can't join us live? The session will be recorded and available in your member portal.
This monthly meeting is exclusively for current Fountain members. Not a member yet? Join The Fountain today to access this meetup, every monthly meeting going forward, plus our growing archive of past classes, audio experiences, and access to our supportive community of writers.
🧠NEUROSCIENCE NUGGET
Your brain is remarkably efficient at creating habits—both the ones that serve you and the ones that don't. By the six-month mark of any year, your you have likely established clear patterns around your creative practice. The fascinating part? Your brain doesn't distinguish between helpful and unhelpful habits; it simply reinforces whatever you repeat.
This is actually great news for your mid-year reset. Consciously evaluating our habits activates the prefrontal cortex—the brain's executive center—which can override automatic patterns. When you create something like a Writing Practice Map, you're essentially giving your brain a new blueprint to follow. The key is starting small: changing just one element of your practice can create a cascade effect, making other shifts feel more natural and sustainable.
🔍 MEMBER SPOTLIGHT: RACHEL TAFF
This month we're celebrating Fountain member Rachel Taff, whose debut novel Paper Cut is slated for publication with William Morrow in early 2026, and who's currently working on her second novel while participating in our Summer Intensive!
What are you processing right now with The Fountain? During the first week of the intensive, I reflected on the story of my creative life so far and it was fascinating to review the messages I received, the rejections I took to heart, the praise I craved, and most importantly, the precious times I was in flow. Despite the occasions I questioned my worth as a creative, I was also blown away by the many times I fought for the work and my belief in myself.
Right now, I'm processing how to create from a sustainable place that is not concerned with perfection. I'm also trying to leave the false beliefs that are no longer serving me behind. Instead, I want to focus on indulging my curiosity, treating myself with more compassion, and enjoying the work.
What are you working on? I am working on my second novel for William Morrow! It's a family drama and suspense story I've carried with me for a long time that deals with generational trauma and what it means to be a southerner today. I see it as a modern Southern Gothic with elements of Where the Crawdads Sing, Succession, and the Murdaugh Murders.
What is one recent win you'd like to share? My debut novel is currently in production and slated for publication in early 2026. Last week, my editor's assistant sent me the bound copy of the manuscript that we're using to send to authors for blurbs. Even though it's not the final copy or even the galley with the cover, it felt like a win to hold it in my hands—book-sized, formatted, official—not something I printed off at FedEx myself. I reread the ending I wrote and allowed myself to feel proud of the work I'd done. I can't imagine what it will be like to hold the real thing!
Follow Rachel on Instagram @racheltaff or check out her website for updates on Paper Cut.
👩‍💼👩‍💼 FOUNDERS' CORNER
• Summer Intensive Magic: The energy from our 100-Day Summer Intensive has been transformative for everyone involved—including us! Working alongside these writers as they courageously reimagine their creative practices has created a powerful feedback loop of inspiration.
• Our *New* Ideal Agent Clearing: In case you missed it, to complement our May Meetup, The Connective Query Letter, we released The Ideal Agent Clearing—a guided visualization that helps you envision the connective, supportive relationship you'll find with your ideal literary agent. This Clearing moves beyond the transactional aspects of agent-seeking to help you visualize a true creative partnership built on mutual understanding and shared vision for your work. Find it in your Clearings Library.
🖋️ OUT IN THE WRITING WORLD
- Kim's Paperback Launch: Kim will be celebrating the paperback release of We Were the Universe at Bishop and Wilde (in the Tin House building) with a reading and conversation with Caitlin Delohery—come celebrate on June 24th at 7pm!
- Pacific University Summer Residency: Kim will be teaching her low-residency MFA students at the Forest Grove campus from June 19-29, including a reading with Ellen Bass and Chloé Cooper Jones on June 25th as part of the Pacific Reading Series (open to the public).
- Motherhood in Recovery: Chelsea will be at Literary Arts on June 27th at 5 PM for a conversation about the joys and challenges of sober motherhood and creativity with Claire Bernardo and Meg Lucero, moderated by Hailey Hosler.
🎯 WRITING PROMPT Your Summer Manifestation & Grounding Object
Set a timer for 15 minutes. Create your Summer Manifestation List for your writing practice. Let yourself dream freely and write down:
- What you want to manifest in your creative practice this summer
- How you want to feel when you sit down to write
- What old patterns you're ready to release with the season
- The creative rhythms you're calling in
- One wild creative dream you haven't let yourself voice yet
- The quality of relationship you want with your work
Now, look at your list and identify the core feeling or intention that runs through it. Is it trust? Flow? Joy? Courage? Playfulness? What does this manifestation represent to you?
Now keep your list somewhere special you can reflect back on come summer's end.
Your assignment: Find or choose a physical object that embodies this quality—a smooth stone, a feather, a small figurine, a photo, a crystal, anything that speaks to you. Place this object in your writing space as a tangible reminder of the practice you're manifesting.
Each time you sit down to write, touch this object and reconnect with your summer intentions. Let it ground you in the creative practice you're calling forth, not the one you think you "should" have.
Remember: This object is your creative compass for the season—a physical anchor for the writing life you're creating.
Until next time,
Chelsea and Kim
