This is an exciting and unusual collection of stories and poems written by people in recovery. Every Friday at Seattle’s Recovery Café, in downtown Seattle, people struggling with addiction, mental illness, trauma, and homelessness come together in Anna Bálint’s Safe Place Writing Circle to write and share writing. Here they discover their own unique voices and ways of shaping language to write stories and poems as part of reclaiming their lives. The literary range and breadth of human experience found in this collection flies in the face of prevailing stereotypes of some of the most marginalized members of our society. These are voices that need to be heard.In the forward, Killian Noe, Founding Director of Recovery Café, says “The Safe Place Writing Circle is a small, intimate, healing community within the larger Recovery Café community. The level of knowing and being known and loving and being loved that takes place in that “safe place” is nothing short of astounding and transformative. You will catch a glimpse of the miracles that take place in that circle as you read the following expressions, and you will likely experience that you are standing on sacred ground.”Inside these pages we encounter themes as varied as living with multiple voices, and identities; memories of lost or missing parents, moments of nurture and times of madness; celebrations of music and dance, and old neighborhoods; prison life and institutionalized childhoods; growing up with a Holocaust cloud. Writers explore chance encounters with bears, blue herons, ex-wives, people who smile at us or don’t, unexpected welcomes, and making peace with the aging process. They discuss waking up in a hospital, sobering up, discovering books as best friends and Academia as a form of therapy. There is humor at every turn in these gems. As both a writer of poems and a psychiatrist practicing psychotherapy, I believe I'm a student of human nature. In this area of study, all experience is my university. And in reading the collection of offerings called Words From the Café, I find myself in an accelerated curriculum.-Jed Myers, author of The Marriage of Space and Time "Speaking plainly, Words From the Café is a recovery program knocking on the door of mainstream American culture. Editor Anna Bálint has shaped an anthology that breaks down conventional definitions and boundaries." -Jim Bodeen, Ed., Seeking Light in Each Dark Room/Buscando Luz en Cada Cuarto Oscuro What's so astonishing about this collection is the range of emotions and the quality of the writing: joy and grief, exuberance and ennui, as well as a host of other emotions, all dwell together in this compelling book." -Tod Marshall, What's so astonishing about this collection is the range of emotions and the quality of the writing: joy and grief, exuberance and ennui, as well as a host of other emotions, all dwell together in this compelling book." -Tod Marshall, Washington State Poet Laureate (2016-2018) In the forward, Killian Noe, Founding Director of Recovery Café, says "The Safe Place Writing Circle is a small, intimate, healing community within the larger Recovery Café community. The level of knowing and being known and loving and being loved that takes place in that "safe place" is nothing short of astounding and transformative." If you want insights into human resilience, or inspiration to change your life, read this book: 206 pages from the heart. As Tamar informs us, "A new beginning doesn't have to start in January." -Sharon M. Carter, MD "As I read Words From the Café , I find myself entering not only into the lives of others through their poems and prose, but into a whole range of physical, cultural, philosophical and psychological territories...." -Martha Linehan, Organization for Prostitution Survivors