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(L.M.) Leslie M. Browning is a TEDx speaker, publisher, and the award-winning author of twelve titles. She grew up in the small fishing village of Stonington, Connecticut. In her writing, Browning explores the confluence of the natural landscape and the interior landscape. She holds degrees from the University of London and Harvard University. Over the last ten years of her career, she has served on the Board of the Independent Book Publisher’s Association and is a Fellow with the International League of Conservation Writers. In 2011, she founded Homebound Publications and its divisions, which has gone on to become a leading independent publisher in the country. She currently serves on the State of Connecticut’s Suicide Advisory Board and CT-NAMI’s Lived Experience Committee. A vagabond-turned-homesteader, Les is currently posted up at Homebound Publications’ woodland basecamp in the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts where she is solo homesteading 15-acres of raw land, in her own modern Walden.
TEDx Yale: Radical Authenticity & Writing on Life
“The theme of the Yale University TEDx Conference in 2018 is UNCHARTED. My ‘uncharted territory’ is the limits of our sanity in the face of successive trauma and our ability to transcend that senseless suffering into something meaningful via a practice I called ‘Radical Authenticity.’ What is Radical Authenticity? For me, it was a reckoning—it was the process of confronting everything in my life I’d been running from and eventually coming to own that journey . . . ” – L.M. Browning
forthcoming april 2022
“…A quiet-yet-fierce rebirth of the wounded spirit.”
–James Crews, Poet and Editor of The Path of Kindness
“…breathtakingly vulnerability.”
–Will Falk, author of How Dams Fall
Pre-order in Paperback & eBook
Publisher-direct (Signed Ed). • Indiebound • Target • Amazon • B&N
“…Exquisitely delicate and lyrical. Her magnum opus.”
–Caitlin Garvey, author of The Mourning Report
A POETIC MEMOIR ON TAMING, RECLAIMING & BECOMING WILD
FEATURING NEARLY 100 ORIGINAL BLACK AND WHITE PHOTOS FROM THE ROAD.
Following the release of her micro-memoir, To Lose the Madness, and the TEDx Talk at Yale University based on her life, Browning returns from a six-year poetic silence with, Drive through the Night. Raw, gritty, lonesome, and stunningly authentic—we pick up Browning’s trail at mid-life as the poet reflects on her journey through her major relationships, both with lovers and self. The map of these poems traces the poet’s journey of overcoming and re-becoming while simultaneously set against the iconic backdrop of the American Southwest. In Drive Through the Night, we follow the trail of an orphan-turned-vagabond who left behind the white picket fence for the open range and open road.
follow
wild silence
“Sit with the silence. there is something there waiting for you.”
AWARD-WINNING micro-memoir
“A laconic, beautiful, and deeply insightful account about coping with loss.”
–Kirkus Reviews
Available in Paperback, Audiobook & eBook
Publisher-direct (Signed Ed) • Indiebound • Audible • Amazon • B&N
“In this spellbinding book, poet and novelist Browning spares no detail in telling the story of her descent into profound grief as one loss piled upon another. Though small, this effective and plainspoken memoir is densely packed with tales of harrowing experiences that require emotional, intellectual, and spiritual investments on the part of the reader. Browning’s journey of recovery will be of help to anyone looking for courage in difficult times.”
–Publishers Weekly
“Impressively candid and articulate, extraordinarily honest and insightful, exceptionally well written, organized and presented, To Lose the Madness is an inherently compelling read from cover to cover. Thoughtful and thought-provoking from first page to last, To Lose the Madness is unreservedly recommended for personal reading lists, as well as community and academic library collections.”
–Midwest Book Review, *Reviewer’s Choice
“Browning’s essay explores the confluence of natural and interior landscapes in a manner both beautiful and searing.”
–Foreword Reviews, *5 Stars
To Lose the Madness | Audio Book Sample
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