Kristin Bartley Lenz

Kristin Bartley Lenz, LMSW, is a writer and social worker who has lived in Michigan, Georgia, and California. She has a B.A. in psychology from the University of Michigan and a MSW from Wayne State University in Detroit. 

Her rock-climbing adventures inspired her debut young adult novel, The Art of Holding On and Letting Go, which was a Helen Sheehan YA Book Prize winner, a Junior Library Guild Selection, and an honor book for the Great Lakes Great Books Award. Her work has been published in a YA poetry anthology (Rhyme & Rhythm: Poems for Student Athletes), The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, Lunch Ticket, Hunger Mountain, Michigan Reading Journal, Great Lakes Review, Literary Mama, Women On Writing, The New Social Worker, and more. 

She also writes freelance for Detroit area nonprofits, teaches creative writing for teens and adults, and escapes to the woods and lakes in northern Michigan whenever she can. Learn more at kristinbartleylenz.com.

The Door Swings Open

Ella’s missing. Without a trace. A runaway.
Charlotte’s searching. For her missing friend. For help for her veteran father.
Aiden’s running. From his brother. From his past.

Tarot cards, urban art, lunar energy, fireflies, thin places.

A girl trying to reinvent herself.
A girl trying to find herself.
A boy trying to right his wrongs.

One will escape.
One will get caught.
One will die.

The Art of Holding On and Letting Go.

Coming soon!

“When every piece falls into place, it’s like a dance, a delicate but powerful balancing act. The art of holding on and letting go at the same time.”

Competitive climber Cara Jenkins feels most at home high off the ground, clinging to a rock wall by her fingertips. She’s enjoyed a roaming life with her mountaineering parents, making the natural world her jungle gym, the writings of Annie Dillard and Henry David Thoreau her textbooks. But when tragedy strikes on an Ecuadorian mountaintop, Cara’s nomadic lifestyle comes to an abrupt halt.

Starting over at her grandparents’ home in suburban Detroit, Cara embarks on a year of discovery, uncovering unknown strengths, friendships, and first love. Cara’s journey illustrates the transformative power of nature, love and loss, and discovering that home can be far from where you started.