On Writing

Subscribe to my Substack, The Reported Essay, for freelance tips and narrative nonfiction craft lessons.

The Sunday Long Read. On multidimensional storytelling.

Nieman Storyboard: How a freelancer’s story instincts landed a piece in The New York Times. Erika Hayasaki found characters, scenes and themes in the aftermath of the Maui wildfires that she couldn't set aside despite multiple rejections. Interview by Kim Cross.

Nieman Storyboard for The Pitch (Take Two): Erika Hayasaki on the reality of landing a big freelance story. In the second of a two-parter, the former LA Times reporter scrutinizes the first pitch – and then the revision – that earned her a cover piece in Wired.

Nieman Storyboard Interview for The Pitch: Erika Hayasaki on how to leave the newsroom and kill it as a freelancer. Interview by Katia Savchuk.

How to Make Long-Form Journalism Work—a webinar by the Institute for Independent Journalists. Experienced long-form writers, editors and documentarians discuss their strategies for how to pitch and the reality of the challenges and joys.

Resources to Rethink Structure, Power, Objectivity, Craft & Reporting in Literary Journalism & Narrative Nonfiction. Google Doc.

Writer Resource Guide: For emerging writers and freelancers interested in longform, reported essays, nonfiction storytelling. On my Substack.

Narrative Journalism panel on C-SPAN with Nicholas Dawidoff (The Other Side of Prospect), Erika Hayasaki (Somewhere Sisters), Kirk Wallace Johnson (The Fishermen and the Dragon), and Ali Winston (The Riders Come Out at Night) at the 2023 Los Angeles Times Festival of Books.

Women Who Pitch: Freelancing in the Digital Age, Medium.

Finding the #Longform Idea, Medium. How to spot it. Report it. Tell it.

Words That Didn't Come Easily, Medium. He was 87. I was 33. Here’s what we learned in our email writing club.