Words
I first started earning a steady paycheck via writing when I fumbled my way into a job as a small-town newspaper reporter at the tail end of 2018, at the ripe old age of not-quite-50.
Now, after a family move to downstate Michigan in early 2023, I tackle freelance writing gigs while working on my Big Project on my own time and dime.
Here’s a sampling of my work in recent years.
I spent four years on the criminal justice beat at The Alpena News, a daily paper that works its tail off covering four counties in Northeast Michigan. This story, one of my personal favorites, reported on a shift I spent inside our county jail disguised as a corrections officer in training.
I now sometimes write for The Brooklyn Exponent, a weekly paper in Brooklyn, Michigan. I try to use my stories to help residents see their small town in the bigger picture of safety in Jackson County — like this story putting a human face on crime statistics.
One of our state’s largest papers, The Detroit News, published my stories reporting on the double murder trial I attended as part of my Big Project. The News removed the subscriber-only paywall for the verdict and sentencing stories so I could share them on this site.
For a decade, I posted devotional columns on a blog site so my mother-in-law could read them. Now, I use the blog to house the essays I write to help me process thoughts about murder, motherhood, and everything in between.
I have written several times for a daily devotional magazine published by my church body and distributed in more than 100 countries. A set of my devotions appears in the April-to-June 2024 edition of Portals of Prayer.
I currently serve as editor for Jackson Magazine, a monthly publication committed to sharing positive news about local businesses. As editor, I help other writers write words with impact and craft stories that make the community better.
I’m among a stable of writers who report for the Southwest Michigan Journalism Collaborative, a group of folks in the Kalamazoo, Michigan area who think media outlets can do more when they work together. This story forever changed how I understood the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on today’s young people. Tough times for those folks.
Some of my reporting centers on the good work various groups do to strengthen their neighborhoods, including in Detroit. This story is among my favorites, and not just because my opening sentence got to reference “a group of pole dancing, crime-fighting, take-no-guff seniors” who believe their twilight years are for having fun.
One of the joys of being a writer is the phenomenal things people let you do sometimes, from riding in speeding cop cars to jumping out of an airplane. In this story, I got to tag along with a DNR guy during the fastest hunting season of the year. Who knew throwing spears at prehistoric fish could be such fun?
I’m happy to think you might like to poke around and read some of my past work. But I’m most excited about the work that’s yet to come. Read about my Big Project and why I spend a lot of time reading police reports lately.
Julie J. Riddle 