Thoughts & Observations

Welcome to the blog, a chance for me to share in small doses (but don’t hold me to that!) thoughts that I hope are largely amusing, potentially poignant, on occasion insightful and rarely blah.

Leslie Gura 10/11/23 Leslie Gura 10/11/23

Free to Write For Me

For the first time in 43 years of working life, I’m not being paid to write or edit. It’s weird. And oddly liberating.

Leslie Gura 10/4/23 Leslie Gura 10/4/23

Right Ways to Write?

Writing advice? Old standards may not always work.

Leslie Gura 9/28/23 Leslie Gura 9/28/23

Home Sweet

When the cosmic tumblers slip into place, a home envisioned as “temporary” can become much more.

Leslie Gura 9/20/23 Leslie Gura 9/20/23

New Cat on the Block

Leslie Gura 9/13/23 Leslie Gura 9/13/23

Squatters in the Hood

Think it’s easy to get squatters out of a home they illegally entered? Think again, my friends.

Leslie Gura 9/6/23 Leslie Gura 9/6/23

The Path from Journalism to Counseling

Sharing about the seemingly unusual (but not really) move from journalism to clinical mental health counseling.

Leslie Gura 9/1/23 Leslie Gura 9/1/23

Getting Started

Forty years ago today, a “cub” reporter started his first job in newspapers, at the Fontana Herald News, a 4,000-circulation, six-day-a-week newspaper in Southern California. A man died that day.

"Leslie Gura contextualizes the process of psychotherapy within an engaging story with complex, compelling characters. Unwrapping is an important and rare novel about the process of trauma recovery that is both insightful and entertaining.”

Mark B. Scholl
Professor of Counseling
Wake Forest University
Winston-Salem, NC
“Others have shared the techniques and theory of the art of care; Gura is the only one that I know of who has brought that carefully honed practice into proper focus with the dramatic perspective it deserves. What could be more amazing, surprising or compelling than people helping each along their way through life?”

Gary Gunderson, MDiv, DMin, DDiv
Professor, Faith and the Health of the Public
School of Divinity
Wake Forest University
Winston-Salem, NC
"It's difficult to find a book that is teaching vital information while absorbing the reader simultaneously into a story, allowing our imagination to take us there. Gura found the middle world between reading enjoyment, learning about hard and triggering topics, and tools that can be utilized for learning."

Laneita Williamson, RN, BSN
Trauma-informed Care Manager
CareNet Counseling
Winston-Salem, NC
"I absolutely loved this novel! So many different story lines. The characters are real and their stories are true. I feel for them."

Maria Teresa Jones, MDiv, BCC
Spiritual Director and Dreamwork Facilitator
Ceiba, Puerto Rico
“Take intriguing plot twists, romantic angst and generational trauma, and you get Unwrapping. I came away with deep empathy for Gura’s well-developed characters. An informed, touching read."

Sherry L. Allen, LPC, NCC
Owner and Principal Therapist
GrowSteady
Nashville, TN

Thoughts & Observations

Free to Write For Me

Right Ways to Write?

Home Sweet

New Cat on the Block

Squatters in the Hood

The Path from Journalism to Counseling

Getting Started

What People Say About Unwrapping

"Leslie Gura contextualizes the process of psychotherapy within an engaging story with complex, compelling characters. Unwrapping is an important and rare novel about the process of trauma recovery that is both insightful and entertaining.”

"I absolutely loved this novel! So many different story lines. The characters are real and their stories are true. I feel for them."

“Take intriguing plot twists, romantic angst and generational trauma, and you get Unwrapping. I came away with deep empathy for Gura’s well-developed characters. An informed, touching read."