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1 week ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
**********************************************************************First! Hello! At the end of this post, I’m going to introduce you to a James Beard Award-winning food writer, Leslie Brenner, whose Substack, Cooks Without Borders offers some of the best recipes and reflections on food culture you’ll find on the Internet. I love listening to experts of any kind talk about their areas of expertise, so I love asking Leslie food questions.
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3 weeks ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
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1 month ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
This is a story of estrangement. I have no relationship with my surroundings. I barely understand what a landmark is. To me, “hopelessly lost” is redundant. The hippocampus allegedly fires “place cells” to ground us in new environments. My hippocampus shoots blanks. I have so many memories of getting “hopelessly lost,” the moment I feel disoriented, my body tenses and my pulse throbs. I can’t recall places in detail.
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2 months ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
Hi everyone!I’d love to see you in a week for a one-time Zoom class I’m teaching: The Art of the Personal Essay. It’s just an hour, but we’re going to pack a lot in. Read more about it and secure your spot here. Love,DianaP.S. If you’re into writing prompts, check this out.
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2 months ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler |Greg Olear
Today marks 100 years since The Great Gatsby entered the world and the formidable has released a beautiful new edition of it that includes an essay I wrote. For a year of my 20s, I had a stalker. I’ve never published anything about him before. I’m including the essay in full below. It’s unfashionable now to like it, but The Great Gatsby is one of the most gorgeous novels ever written. I hope you’ll re-read it and see for yourself.
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2 months ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
Hi!I’m so excited to offer this one-hour Zoom class on April 29 at 7 p.m. Central (that’s 8 p.m. Eastern, 5 p.m. Pacific, the middle of the night in Europe, etc). The Art of the Personal Essay is perfect for anyone who wants to learn (or learn more) about how to write a compelling personal essay. For over two decades, I have been working as both a professional writer and a teacher of creative writing on the college, graduate, and adult-education levels.
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2 months ago | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
I used to include a writing prompt in every post, inspired by the essay’s subject. I stopped sending out prompts in May 2024, but the prompts are back! I’ve compiled all of the old prompts here, each linked to the post that inspired it. I’ll add to this document each month—one on-topic prompt per essay I send out. If enough people express interest, I’d like to hold Zoom sessions for paid subscribers who want to read from the work that the prompts generate.
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Mar 21, 2025 | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
Recently, a stranger cried to me. She worked in a hotel I was writing about in the wilds of Texas. We had met the day before when she’d shown me to my room, where the sliding bathroom door had come off in her hands. We’d struggled together unsuccessfully to get it back on its rails, finally leaving it propped against the wall. She was strikingly beautiful, with a thick, black braid pulled over one shoulder, big turquoise earrings, and a pre-Columbian carving of a face.
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Jan 28, 2025 | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
The whole thing stemmed from a miscommunication. Last fall, I received an email from the PR representative of an Oklahoma City hotel, inviting me to “experience the property.” Travel writers get invited to “experience” a lot of “properties”. Some property-experiencing prospects entice more than others. For the hell of it, I checked Google Maps and saw that from Dallas, I could drive to Oklahoma City in three hours.
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Jan 27, 2025 | 
dianaspechler.substack.com | Diana Spechler
If you didn’t make it to class, enjoy the video here!