Author mentorship

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These books were written with the support of Ekaterina Hoarau: this could include a single consultation or a series of sessions, participation in webinars, or long-term mentorship lasting several years. In each case, the outcome was not only successfully published books, but also a transformation in the authors’ approach to their creative work.

Ekaterina doesn’t just help people with their writing—she is also an exceptional connector, generously sharing her contacts in the publishing world. Thanks to her, I discovered that an editor at one of the country’s largest publishing houses had been reading and enjoying my blog. Ekaterina introduced us, and the result was a book deal signed almost immediately. Everyone benefited: Dutch Children Sleep Through the Night became a bestseller. I published my next book with the same publisher, in the same series as Ekaterina. It was a life-changing and genuinely delightful connection: a single consultation that changed everything.

Thank you for being my guide into the world of writing. Not just the world where people write books, but the world where words become real magic—helping us find our way to ourselves and to others, find our voice and be heard, change lives; a world where writers gently help one another grow and celebrate each other’s successes.
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My journey with you began with Hold On and Write—the audiobook narrated by you is absolutely wonderful! Then came Writing Sketches (whose notes I still return to today), social media writing, and more. By the time I joined the Advanced Editing Course, I already had drafts of my own book. Thank you for your generous and invaluable feedback: many readers mention in their reviews the stories I wrote with you during The Magic of Editing. Those are the stories that captivate, stay in the reader’s memory, and bring lightness to the text. A year later, during the Master’s Program, I was already exploring ideas for future books.
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I am so grateful our paths crossed, and I sincerely thank you for sharing your knowledge, skills, perspective, and experience so generously—not only in writing, but also in communication, self-expression, and life as a whole.

— I have a manuscript, but I haven't even reread it myself yet. Could you help me polish it? — I wrote to Ekaterina.
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Half an hour later, Ekaterina became my Facebook friend.
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Four hours later, Ekaterina became the first person in the world to learn that I wanted to write a book. That I was already writing a book.
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An hour later, for the first time ever, I sent money to someone I had met on social media on the very first day of our acquaintance.
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Some people know all my freckles, but Ekaterina knows all my commas — and where they are missing. She knows the hidden corners in the attic of my mind.
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When I couldn't bring myself to read my own texts, Ekaterina warmed them with her love and helped turn them into a book. After her thoughtful comments, I found the courage and patience to truly see my manuscript.
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One day Ekaterina said to me:
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— You've written an entire book. It's time to find a publisher!
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And then this:
— Here's a great course on how to get a book published.
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The result was the book "The Winged Gorilla: How to Create and Deliver Your Best Training Program", with Ekaterina Hoarau as its creative editor. It became a bestseller within the first months of publication and even made it into the Top 10 business books.
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Ekaterina, my muse, thank you for guiding me so gently and carefully through the impenetrable world of writing.
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You turned my clumsy texts into playful sparks. With your care and genuine love, you inspired me to finish the book. You introduced me to Shklovsky. And the tedious task of putting letters together became a soaring walk across a rainbow.
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If you'd like to learn how to write sincere texts for social media, articles, or books, Ekaterina is the best guide into this world!

My favorite teacher of the past 25 years!
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We worked together for a long time: starting with blog posts and short expert stories, moving on to articles for publications, and eventually taking the leap into writing a book. From my first texts, full of clichés, to original metaphors, longer formats, and a wide range of structures. Today, I am a writer. The journey was long, but wonderful. This book explores our relationship with ourselves and with others, addressing some of the most common issues

Working with Ekaterina Hoarau and taking her courses (without exaggeration) helped me make my dream come true — to write, edit, translate, and publish my book.
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The idea for “Then I Choose a Horrible End” first came to me in 2021. I would most likely have stalled halfway through the draft if I hadn’t received the book “Hold On and Write” as a gift. The exercises across different topics and the structure and discipline behind them helped me finish the first version. The draft was terrible (again, no exaggeration), but the idea stayed. It was just waiting for its moment.
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When Ekaterina launched the first round of “Magic of Editing”, I initially bought only the first module — just to try it. But the course turned out to be something else entirely: the knowledge, the support from mentors, the exercises, and the community completely changed how I saw online learning.
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After finishing it, I wanted more — more depth. My scenes, dialogues, “magic wands” — my texts were bursting with fireworks of beauty, but they didn’t truly land emotionally. “Magistratura” — Ekaterina’s next course — gave me what I was missing: depth, warmth, and motivation.
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Four years after starting this journey, I finished and published my book. I overcame my fear of publishing, especially in English, and found readers in more than 10 countries.
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Then I Choose a Horrible End was released on October 14, 2025, and it changed me.
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I first heard about Ekaterina from a lecturer at a literary institute. I was told she was someone who could make a writer's text much stronger.
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When the final draft of my novel "The Midday Maidens" was nearly finished and had already been reviewed by an editor, I decided it would be useful to revisit some of the writing techniques Ekaterina had taught me during our consultations.
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I reread her bestselling book Hard One to Write! and attended an excellent webinar on editing. Then I sat down with my manuscript again and realized I could make the first chapter better. Then the second. Then the third. Finishing the manuscript ended up being delayed by another couple of months as I worked my way through to the end. I had to rewrite everything once more, but in return the novel gained its own unforgettable atmosphere. I barely changed the plot; I simply added imagery, details, and color, rewrote entire paragraphs, and they emerged much more vivid than before. As it turned out later, it was well worth the effort.
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The novel went on to win the National Youth Literature Prize, and both the judges and readers singled out the language, texture, style, and atmosphere of The Noon Witches as its greatest strengths.
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I believe that's also why film producers became interested in the book—the story had become easy to visualize, and in cinema that's everything.

I read Ekaterina’s book Hard One to Write, and it felt as though I had just had a heartfelt conversation with a close friend. As if we had known each other for years and this was simply another one of our meetings. I wrote to Ekaterina and asked for a consultation, not even knowing exactly why. I simply wanted to meet her. Later, I bought and completed almost all of Ekaterina’s courses, each time being amazed by the breadth of her knowledge, her deep understanding of the subject, and her incredible empathy. I have never seen anyone give feedback as thoughtfully, gently, and at the same time as transformatively as Ekaterina does. The topic of my book was never in doubt. Thirty years of work as a naturopath, nutrition specialist, and reflexologist, combined with my father’s personal story, made that choice very easy. The more difficult task was getting a publisher to agree to acquire the book. Only Katya’s patience and belief in me helped me get through all the challenges of writing the book proposal. In the end, everything worked out. And every time I hear about someone whose health has improved thanks to the book, I mentally pass their gratitude on to Ekaterina.

Driven by years of professional experience that often spilled out into notes and articles—and encouraged by persistent friends—I came to Ekaterina with a few questions:
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- Can all my notes be brought together under one cover, or is that not how books are made?
- How does it read as a whole? Would it be interesting to people who are far removed from customer experience and service topics?
- Is there any point in self-publishing, or is that simply not done?
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Katya treated both me and my work with great care and sensitivity. She read it, praised it, helped me improve it, offered recommendations, and gave me the green light. I am endlessly grateful for her support and encouragement to publish Customer Experience Kaleidoscope. I am so happy that my book came into being.

Working with Ekaterina Hoarau goes far deeper than developing writing skills. It is about accepting yourself, your individuality, and allowing yourself to show up in the world.
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Ekaterina taught me to see and value my authorial voice and to let it speak. Through working with her, I started to believe in myself, and a book came into being. Meeting Ekaterina was a life-defining event for me that changed the direction of my life.
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When I came to Ekaterina Hoarau, I had one book in my head and a completely different one in my heart. And it was Ekaterina who helped me see the one that carried the real energetic leap — the one that suddenly lit up like an Edison bulb.
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Over the course of our work, the book grew layers I had not initially imagined, but which naturally emerged from what we were creating together with Ekaterina. I wanted to add a personal layer of migration, and instead of a psychology textbook, it became a multi-layered narrative with a psychologist-heroine at its center, moving through her own journey.
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I should add that finding an editor and teacher who can so carefully support moments of student growth is extremely rare. Ekaterina’s comments don’t settle inside you like a lead weight that makes writing heavier with every line. Her feedback is always about possibility, curiosity, and a generous belief in each person’s creativity. So far, I haven’t found another specialist at the same level.
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The book “Hard One to Write” by Ekaterina Hoaraufelt like a letter from Hogwarts to me. And her consultations — like learning how to cast a Patronus against inner dementors.
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The first consultation began in a very wet way: I cried and apologized, cried and apologized. And Ekaterina waited. She didn’t rush to comfort me, didn’t get emotionally pulled in, didn’t get triggered. Even then, she already knew that tears and honesty weren’t far apart.
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When the tears finally ran out, Ekaterina led me into the world of writing, giving tools that were the right size, the right necessity, the right intention. I didn’t avoid rewriting — of course not, that would be an illusion. I rewrote many, many times. But the small pearls she highlighted in my text, I still remember today.
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I treated Ekaterina’s consultations like a collectible Mercedes — I prepared for them carefully, and each one carried me forward at a speed that probably shouldn’t have been legal.
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Even now I’m still warmed by her finely woven network of writers — online courses, retreats, live sessions, webinars. And she still has something to give me. Facebook recently showed that we’ve known each other for more than 7 years.
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“I'm practicing!” — that was the name of a training for psychologists where Ekaterina Hoarau spoke about what and how to write in a better way. Inspired by the writer’s talk, I enrolled in her writing courses “How to Write on Social Media” and two seasons of sketch-writing.
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Ekaterina, editing texts in her uniquely precise way, pushed me to start writing a book. Some of the sketches written during Ekaterina’s courses even made it into it. The way Katya can spot what truly matters and gently cut away the rest deserves a story of its own.
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My book came into the world thanks to just one consultation with Ekaterina. In my case, it truly felt like literary midwifery.
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I remember coming to her in the autumn of 2019 with a completed manuscript and a fear of sending it to a publisher. By February 2020, I was already holding the first printed copies of my book in my hands. At that moment, what I needed most was a thoughtful and careful reflection on my work from a real writer and writing teacher. It was important to hear from someone I knew and respected as a professional that my book had, in fact, become a book.
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Today, I continue to study the craft of writing with Ekaterina and am working on my second collection of therapeutic novellas.

At a certain point in the process of writing a book, every author needs to look at their work from the outside—with fresh, unbiased eyes. For the author, this is nearly impossible, because they are completely immersed in the manuscript.
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And it was at exactly such a moment that I was fortunate enough to meet Ekaterina. She gently and thoughtfully, yet with impeccable precision, highlighted weaknesses in the structure and plot, helped us find the right tone, and pointed out opportunities for stylistic improvement.
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And voilà! Our book is now on sale! Not only did MIF publish it, but they also invited us to create an audiobook version—something not every book is offered. I consider that a clear sign of success. And I am sincerely grateful to Ekaterina for her contribution!

The webinar "How to Walk Into a Publishing House with a Manuscript and Walk Out with a Book" was a turning point for me. A single insight was enough to make me approach things differently from how I had before. I was deeply impressed by how thoroughly Katya prepared for the webinar: she interviewed publishing professionals and showed what people on the other side of the publishing industry actually think about and look for when selecting manuscripts. After the webinar, I returned to the synopsis of my book "Copywriter's Daily Life" with renewed energy. I added one important section I had previously overlooked and gave it a polished presentation. The publisher said yes.
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The webinar "How to Promote Your Book When You're an Author, Not a Marketer" gave me something incredibly valuable: permission to promote my book "Copywriter's Daily Life" without awkwardness or embarrassment, without worrying about seeming pushy or repetitive. Katya shared dozens of ethical and creative promotional ideas that I actively use today and build upon to create my own marketing approaches. I now talk about my book confidently and enthusiastically, keeping in mind one memorable line from the webinar: "Friends, you've written a book! Be like Simba in The Lion King!"

You are the person who allowed me to speak in my own voice. Our one-to-one sessions turned my life upside down — I started to value my unconventional way of seeing business and life, and to share my experience.
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I am learning from you not only writing craft, but also delicacy toward authorship, how to work with clients, and respect for different opinions.
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I still remember when you told me: “I won’t work with you if you keep writing just for yourself and never publish.” I also remember how, during an argument, the name of the website IZYUM BIZNESA (“Essence of Business”) was born, and how I immediately bought the domain.
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I remember how difficult it was to publish my first text. And if it weren’t for you, I probably would never have taken that step.
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I also remember how after the text “Victory on Three Fronts” there were many views, and people started asking me for permission to publish my texts on their platforms.
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