Joanna Friedman Member Member since 2016

Writer and poet inspired by love and life.

Fiction

Joanna Friedman’s stories and poems are relationally focused and have appeared in a variety of publications. She works as a psychologist in the San Francisco area where she lives with her husband, twin girls, and the spirit of her pug dogs, Roger and Blue.

Location:: CA
Birthdate:: 23 October
Social:: Blog/web
Bluesky
Facebook
Medium

Interview with Joanna Friedman

Where do you prefer to do your creative work?

In a hidden chair behind the drum room next to my tortoise.

Who are your literary (or artistic) heroes?

Sylvia Plath, Jeannette Winterson, S.E. Hinton, David Nichols

If you could only take one book on a ten-year voyage, what book would you choose?

Written on the Body by Jeannette Winterson

How much of a typical day (or week) are you able to dedicate to your creative work?

1-2 hours a day on weekdays, 3 hours on Sat and Sunday each.

What makes you procrastinate when you could be doing your creative work? What are your strategies for finding focus?

Having browsers open kills creativity. I try to write and do the hard stuff before opening the browsers.

How do you celebrate your successes, such as acceptances? How do you handle rejections and other setbacks?

I share acceptances with my friends, and post the links on my website. As for rejections, it depends. If it's a journal that I was really hoping to get into, I can get kind of down about it for a bit, but I have a list of reminders for times of rejection. These are quotes I've read, or moments when someone has said something positive about my writing. So I read those over, and I always feel better.

How much time do you spend reading for pleasure or edification?

Thirty minutes a day. Sometimes I get caught up in a book though, and I will read straight through for a few hours. That's usually on a Saturday or Sunday though.

Do you have a personal creative style? How would you describe it?

Literary, lyrical prose with strong imagery and character driven stories.

Where do you find inspiration?

In life's beautiful moments. (Nature, relationships, people)

What single creative achievement are you most proud of?

I recently wrote a novel, Sensitivities of a Gene Edited Girl, that captures so much of what I've wanted to say for many years. It needs fine tuning, and like a good stew, may take a few more years to perfect, but it's brewing.

What fictional character would you most like to be?

Princess Buttercup from The Princess Bride.

What advice would you give to a young, budding writer (or artist) with less experience than yourself?

Find time to write everyday, and set aside ideas of it being good or bad, just write, write, and write some more. Also, sketch those moments that are vivid to you. They don't have to be perfectly written, but capture the essence of those in some way. Start there.

For your first draft (or sketch), do you prefer analog or digital tools, or a mix?

I usually write on my laptop, using word. Sometimes I do write in a journal ideas and thoughts for a story. I'm not much into digital tools or anything fancy. Definitely no AI.

Do you incorporate generative AI/LLMs into your creative process? If so, how?

Never.

What is your favorite word and why?

Ephemeral. It has a lightness and captures the essence of the spirit.

What would you like your epitaph to say?

She loved. She wrote. She died. The End.

Are you an unreliable narrator?

I would say most of the time I'm pretty reliable, but I do have my moments of unreliability.

Last Updated: 14 Sep 2026