Meet Ronit Plank: Writer, Editor, and Teacher

I’m a writer, instructor, editor, and podcast host. My fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for multiple Pushcart Prizes and have earned Best Microfiction and Best of the Net nominations. My work has appeared in places like The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, Writer’s Digest, and The New York Times, but for a complete list of links please visit my Published Work page.

My first book the memoir When She Comes Back won a Book Excellence Award, was named a Book Riot Best True Crime Book of 2021, and became a Finalist in several competitions including the 2022 Housatonic Book Awards. This book traces the loss of my mother to the guru at the center of the Netflix docuseries Wild Wild Country when I was a child and our eventual reconciliation. It’s also a coming-of-age story about giving up one’s power, growing up in the 80’s in Queens, struggling with poor body image, and the ways children survive when parents leave.

My second book is the short story collection Home is a Made-Up Place, Winner of the 2020 Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Award for Short Stories. My work has also been anthologized in Collected Memories Volume 2: 15 Years of Creative Nonfiction from Hippocampus Magazine and Manna Songs: Stories of Jewish Culture & Heritage from ELJ Editions.

Before I began writing and podcasting, I was an actor and I still do some acting and voiceover work though my big passion is stories –how they connect us and help us learn who we are. I got my MFA in Nonfiction Writing from Pacific University, am the creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review, and I teach memoir writing courses and workshops for a host of writing programs and conferences.

In 2022 I created Let’s Talk Memoir, a podcast for memoir lovers, readers, and writers featuring conversations with memoirists about their writing process, paths to publishing, craft advice, and experience creating these most personal of narratives.

Some of my guests include Debra Gwartney, Maggie Smith, Camille Dungy, Phillip Lopate, Steve Almond, Allison K. Williams, Nicole Graev Lipson, Brittany Means, Gina Tron, Sue William Silverman, Camille U. Adams, Kaila Yu, KB Brookins, and Jane Friedman. You can find all of my podcasts on your favorite podcast platform and from the menu above.

If you want to connect or would like more information about hiring me to freelance, edit, speak, or teach, please email me at ronit (at) ronit plank (dot) com.

Thank you for your interest in my work!