I spent the first six years of my writing life training one-on-one with Barbara Helfgott Hyett. After that I spent three years at Walnut Hill School for the Arts, a performing arts highschool, where I started to diversify my work. Unfortunately health issues stopped me from graduating from Smith College, but it has never stopped my writing. I publish sporadically (Plainsong, Seventh Wave) but I'm really trying to make a name for myself. I'm looking for a critique group, but also just to make connections with other writers. I'm currently working on a novel, but that's really not my forte so any guidance would be much appreciated!

As a multidisciplinary writer,  I am interested in a range of genre and styles.  My ideal peer group is supportive, well-read  and a strong ecelectic mix of writers with developed craft, fair-minded, with a sense of committment to the group as well as one's own individual investment.   

I am a semi-published author. Most of my writing experience, though, hasn't been gained by working with publishers or editing for well-known authors. I have spent years behind the scenes. I'm aware that my work is eclectic and often doesn't fit in one category or another. My goal is to legitimately publish my work before this year is over with, with a subsequent goal of being well on my way to a second legitimate publication by the middle of next year. These are lofty goals, I know, but I am taking the necessary steps to get there and am really looking for a group of individuals who have gone through this same process and can share their experiences.

I previously wrote marketing and business copy for creative professional firms but have been away from that for a long time. My interests now center on poetry and fiction but I also enjoy humorous essays and history, especially the American Revolution and Colonial America.

I aspire to write far more than I do as I find it very hard to maintain focus so I will write voraciously for brief periods of time and then, poof, completely forget that it was a thing I was doing. My brain is funny this way and has done a fine job of making writing progress really, really difficult.

I've mostly written free-verse poetry over the last year, or so, when I have written but think often about writing essays and book-length fiction but the brain intervenes so I mostly just cobble together fragments of things here and there. It's highly disappointing and painfully frustrating. 

I'm looking to know what strategies for writing work for other people and how to feel like I deserve to prioritize my writing. This is a tall order, but I feel like if any people understand what I'm experiencing it's going to be other writers.

I have one published work, a poetry collection entitled growth which I self-published through Amazon when I was seventeen and to-date has sold 57 copies. I also delivered a spoken-word TEDx poem for TEDxNCState, which is published on both the TED website and the official TEDx Talks Youtube channel! My writing comfort zone typically involves poetry, mental health, and trauma recovery, as well as nature and environmental themes. My social media presence is @jtommyj and @jtommyjcreates on Instagram and @tommybbyboy on Twitter!