Today we’d like to introduce you to Abbie Britton, M.A.
Hi Abbie, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I have always done two things very well in life: 1) I was an award winning journalist/writer for 25 years. 2) I have a special gift for healing people’s bodies with my knowledge of optimal body geometry and my ability to fix bodies with my hands.
After the magazine industry crashed, I turned to bodywork and built that business.
Now I am back to being a writer/author and building that business. Today I write mystery stories and non-fiction books.
Two years ago I entered a publishing contest with a book I’d written 10 years earlier: Uncharted Territory. I’d written it with my mother, academy award winning actress Estelle Parsons. I entered the contest as a fluke. It won at 10K publishing prize. This brought me back to being a full time writer.
A writers life is not a thing you decide upon. It is a thing you must do: Record life around you whether it is in the form of fiction or non fiction. I have been a writer since I was 6 years old. It has always been my way of making sense of the world. I’m good at it. Whether it’s writing for magazines, newspapers, plays, novels, essays, doesn’t matter. What I do best is write. Both of my sons are the same. We seem to have this thread through us which is that writing makes us whole. Both of my sons, Eben and Augustus Britton are also published authors. It’s just what we do.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
There is no such thing as a smooth road. Without struggle we do not fine tune our practice or skills, nor can we assess our true purpose.
One of the most agonizing things about being a writer today is that people think that writing instagram captions makes them a writer. The same way they think that spouting their philosophy about healing makes them a healer.
I come from an actual family of writers and healers and I look at the catch phrases on instagram about things like yoga, writing, healing and I think the ancients would roll over in their graves.
25 years olds spouting about healing, when they have absolutely no road underneath them. No lineage. This makes me nuts. Instagram is the single worst thing that has ever happened to training and authenticity of lineage for writers and yogis. It used to be that it was an honor to hone your craft over years and years. And a good thing to have age on your side.
I find it embarrassing that people in their 20s who can do a drop back handstand think they know anything about yoga. And I find it equally embarrassing that a person calls themself a writer when they’ve used AI.
At some point this will backfire. Not sure how. But it will.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
One of the things I learned as a young writer is that one must have a day job. So I became a journalist. And then the magazine industry was destroyed by the internet so I started doing private bodywork sessions and teaching yoga. I have done that for almost 40 years to support my writing. My aim has always been to be a best selling mystery writer, but my first book Uncharted Territory Life Lessons from the Theatre won a publishing prize from Balboa Press last year and was published rather quickly. This was co-written with my mother, the academy award winning actress, Estelle Parsons. I recently published another book called 11th Hour which is daily yogic practices to move from crisis to recovery.
The book series I am most excited about working on now is Mother Wolfe Tales. I always wanted to be a detective, but the next best thing is writing suspense/detective fiction. Mother Wolfe Tales is a series of mysteries about a serial killer who hunts down and kills people who abuse animals. There are billions of animal lovers worldwide who will love this series that focuses on animal rights. I discovered during the writing of this that the FBI has an animal cruelty database which keeps an eye on animal abusers reasoning that this often leads to serial killing of humans. It’s a great and suspenseful series.
To my knowledge no one has tackled this subject in a mystery before. This will go through a traditional publisher in 2025.
Uncharted Territory and 11th Hour are both available at www.amazon.com.
What makes you happy?
We are a family of incredibly accomplished writers, despite the fact that the business of being an author has been shot to hell by instagram and so called bloggers. It used to be that being a writer meant taking years to hone your craft in every area of being an author– journalist, essayist, fiction, non fiction, screenwriter, biographer, novelist, poet, playwright. These ways of being a writer meant something important. Mostly that you had honed your craft. Now, any schnook with access to AI can consider themself a writer. Or even anyone on instagram.
My roots are in writing and intellectualism. My dad, Richard Gehman was a prolific journalist, my mother Estelle Parsons is an academy award winning actress who refused to go Hollywood. The men and women in my family all went to Ivy League: Harvard, Dartmouth, Columbia.
My sons Eben and Augustus are both accomplished writers.
We have a lineage in writing and theatre.
The fact that we come from a family of artists, writers and athletes keeps us sane. My mother, the actress Estelle Parsons is 96. She is still acting and still exercises every day. She’s a total phenomenon. My father was called the “machine”. I remember going to his studio and he had 11 manual typewriters each with a different piece he was working on.
We have a family history of intellectualism and artistry that we uphold.
My family keeps me sane in a world gone stupid. Both my sons are writers and athletes as I am. My grand daughter is an amazing athlete. My twin sister Martha Gehman is the co artistic director of the Actors Studio in New York.
As writers, this bonding is important to keep each other up beat. The publishing industry is in shambles right now. Book agents are no longer looking for writers, but entertainers who can tell a story to someone. The book agent and artistic management industry is utterly vile.
My youngest son Augustus is studying Muy Thai, and my oldest, Eben, is a former NFL player turned yogin.
Both my sons are writer/authors. Augustus’s book/short film How To Kill a White Man is a phenomenal take on the superficiality of the instagram generation. He is a talented screenwriter and playwright. Eben’s book, The Eben Flow is about his journey from being a gladiator of the gridiron to being a solid father and partner. They’ve written a book together called A Life Worth Dying For.
My family lineage is that of writers, artists and people who are intrepid physically. This is our lineage. But can I get an agent or manager on the phone? No. It’s hideous out there. Especially the representation industry.
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Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.brittonrx.com
- Instagram: @11thstepyoga
Image Credits
All photos are personal archives. T
Eben and Augustus Britton
Estelle Parsons and Abbie Britton, M.A.
