(Please note that I do not use Goodreads actively: my blog posts here are updated automatically from my website. If you would like to get in touch with me, please visit www.patschneider.com. Thank you.) I am a writer of poetry, plays, libretti and non-fiction, and I am the founder of Amherst Writers and Artists. For thirty-four years I have taught writing in Massachusetts and around the world. My two best-known books are about writing, both from Oxford University Press. My new book, HOW THE LIGHT GETS IN: WRITING AS A SPIRITUAL PRACTICE, offers seventeen chapters that engage the connection between writing and spirituality, regardless of one’s religious tradition or one’s level of expertise in writing. Chapter one takes Einstein’s statement, “There is a spirit,” as inspiration, and the book then moves through chapters that explore what to do with one’s own tradition—tradition in writing and tradition in religions – as well as “The Dark Night of the Soul,” “Forgiving,” “Being Forgiven,” “The Body,” “Freedom,” and ending with “Joy.” The Library Journal review from February, 2013 says this: “Her book will have wide appeal to both amateur and seasoned writers and spiritual seekers whether or not tied to any tradition. The book is also useful as a tool for growth through reflection and writing. Highly recommended.” My earlier book, WRITING ALONE AND WITH OTHERS, offers guidance and help to the writer working alone, and in the second half details the Amherst Writers & Artists method of creative writing workshops and writing groups. It is used widely and internationally in classrooms and independent workshops as a method that develops the craft of writing without doing harm to one’s original voice. The method it describes is also widely used as a tool for the empowerment of under-served populations, in prisons, shelters, and with youth-at-risk.