Unstuck
101 Doorways Leading from the Blank Page to the Last Page
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- Pre-Order
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- Expected Apr 14, 2026
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- $12.99
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- Pre-Order
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
A Most Anticipated Book of 2026 from LitHub
“Ramona Ausubel has poured so much humor and wisdom and practically useful counsel into this extraordinary book, a guide for both writing and living.” —Karen Russell, author of The Antidote
Unstuck: 101 Doorways Leading from the Blank Page to the Last Page is about staying in love with your writing: feeling excited, mischievous, productive, and hopeful—the opposite of being stuck.
Critically acclaimed, award-winning author and beloved teacher Ramona Ausubel offers 101 exercises that promise to welcome you back to the page again and again; to reinvigorate your process and help you see your writing through to the end. Full of personal stories and hard-earned wisdom of a veteran writer, Unstuck is written in the first person, human to human, writer to writer. Practical, clear, and welcoming, Unstuck offers immediately useable strategies for beginning, continuing, and finishing a piece of writing.
Organized into doorways and keys, Unstuck turns problems into possibilities, offers keys to put into use right now, all designed to lead the writer back to the art, not toward an outside idea or formula. With Ausubel’s steady, encouraging advice—find your doorway, unlock the lock, and get writing again.
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In this encouraging how-to, novelist Ausubel (The Last Animal) catalogs writing's many "doorways" and the keys to unlocking them. She augments these lessons with personal stories of her own zigzagging journey through the creative process. Her plethora of sage suggestions include "Cut half the things on your plot to-do list. Spend twice as much time in moments that matter to characters," and "Close your eyes. Breathe deeply and slowly. Place yourself in a scene you want to write." Ausubel also tackles how to prepare for the next day's writing session, suggesting: "Write the word NEXT at the bottom of the page and jot down your ideas for the next two scenes, ideas, moments, or questions." Throughout, she provides a kind, supportive voice to help keep nascent writers on course. Her calming vibe is encapsulated by her parting words in doorway #101, "Begin Anywhere (Again)," wherein she advises: "I want you to finish a project and hold it in your hands. But here's what I know: When you get there, after the high fives and a cocktail, everyone else will go home and all you'll be left with is a chair and desk, your own mind, and a thousand, million doorways. And it will be the most beautiful thing in the world." This is a gentle tonic for writers in need of a boost.
