Episode 75: Interview with Tiffany Clarke Harrison (part 1)

Today, Fable and the Verbivore have the pleasure in sharing part one of this enchanting two-part interview with Tiffany Clarke Harrison.

Tiffany is a developmental editor, intuitive writing coach, and self-published author of the novel If I Fell. She has a profound understanding of the inner journey intuitives undertake when they sit down to create and consistently provides gems of advice for writers on her Instagram account @rochellewritersstudio. We also highly recommend checking out the free offerings on her website Rochelle Writers Studio: 1) a guided meditation to help Reclaim your voice and 2) a written guide to help Revise your draft.

In this episode, Tiffany unpacks a ton of wisdom gained throughout her career helping others enhance their writing, education, and through her own writing journey. A few of the many topics she addresses are:

  • How psychologically our minds and emotions can react to stepping out to create

  • Being prepared to work through emotional baggage as part of the writing process

  • The importance of getting to know your characters psychologically and why they make the choices they do

She also talks about using language to create artistic and visceral experiences. Using a selection of prose from the novel Giovanni’s Room as an example, Tiffany describes how word choices can be used to further the plot, help show who the characters are, and set the tone - preparing the reader for the type of journey that the story will take.

Tune in next week for the second half of our interview with Tiffany, where she digs into some of what she’s learned through querying and working with an agent, as well as her coaching process.

We hope you enjoy listening to this episode! Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,

Fable & The Verbivore

Notes:

Tiffany’s professional website is RochelleWritersStudio.com and her Instagram account is @rochellewritersstudio. You can connect with her on social media, and we would highly recommend checking out the wisdom and advice located within the Writing Tools and Music Muse sections of her Instagram stories. Her website also lists the developmental editing and book coaching services she provides and her current rates.

Tiffany quotes a section from the opening of James Baldwin’s novel Giovanni’s Room. Here is the quote:

  • “Then, for the first time in my life, I was really aware of another person’s body, of another person’s smell. We had our arms around each other. It was like holding in my hand some rare, exhausted, nearly doomed bird which I had miraculously happened to find.”

The Smashing Pumpkins song that Tiffany mentions is “Bullet with Butterfly Wings” (The World is a Vampire).

Books Mentioned:

Music from: https://filmmusic.io
’Friendly day’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com)
Licence: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

interviewBethany Stedman