Book Citations

None of these books have been officially published yet. But when they are, this is how you will be able to cite them. I will update their final page counts and ISBNs when I have that information.

• Kurtz, C.F. 2025a. Working with Stories in Your Commmunity or Organization: Participatory Narrative Inquiry (Fourth edition). 550 pp. Kurtz-Fernhout Publishing.
• Kurtz, C.F. 2025b. Working with Stories Simplified: Participatory Narrative Inquiry in Brief. 180 pp. Kurtz-Fernhout Publishing.
• Kurtz, C.F. 2025c. The Working with Stories Sourcebook: Questions and cases for Participatory Narrative Inquiry. 250 pp. Kurtz-Fernhout Publishing.
• Kurtz, C.F. 2025d. The Working with Stories Miscellany: Essays and Other Writings on Participatory Narrative Inquiry. 450 pp. Kurtz-Fernhout Publishing.

Keywords

Stories, narrative, groups, commmunities, organizations, participatory action research, conflict resolution, facilitation, dialogue, sensemaking, brainstorming, future planning, decision support, organizational development, organizational learning, knowledge management.

Target audience

Researchers, leaders, organizers, teachers, activists, everybody.

Copy-paste book descriptions

Working with Stories is a textbook on Participatory Narrative Inquiry (PNI). It explains the fundamentals of story work and explains how to plan and carry out projects that help groups, communities, and organizations work with their stories to discover useful insights, find new solutions to problems and conflicts, and make decisions and plans.

Working with Stories Simplified is a quick guide to Participatory Narrative Inquiry (PNI). It briefly explains the fundamentals of story work and explains how to plan and carry out projects that help groups, communities, and organizations work with their stories to discover useful insights, find new solutions to problems and conflicts, and make decisions and plans.

The Working with Stories Sourcebook contains 50 question sets for use in Participatory Narrative Inquiry projects plus 50 descriptions of real-life PNI projects.

The Working with Stories Miscellany is a collection of 40 essays and other writings about stories, story work, and Participatory Narrative Inquiry.

Copy-paste author bio

Cynthia Kurtz is an independent consultant, researcher, author, coach, and software developer. She began her career as an animal behaviorist, then learned to write software, then discovered organizational and community narrative. Since 1999, she has consulted on over 150 participatory narrative projects for a variety of government agencies and for-profit and non-profit corporations.

Downloadable author photo

This photo is a little out of date, but it's the orginal Working with Stories picture, and I still like it.

Here's a more recent (and more serious-looking) photo.

Reviews and interviews

None yet, at least none for these new books. If you would like to interview me or tell me about a review of any of my books, send me an email at cfkurtz@cfkurtz.com.

Presentations and articles

None yet on the new books, but you might find this recent article of interest:

• Colla, R., Kurtz, C. 2024. Storying Research: Exploring the Benefits of Participatory Narrative Inquiry as a Methodology for Wellbeing Research. International Journal of Applied Positive Psychology 9. 1-20. 10.1007/s41042-024-00147-4.

Contact information

You can contact me at cfkurtz@cfkurtz.com.