RubyAnn Stiegelmeier
stories and songs that heal
These are my books, written after I’ve asked myself the toughest of questions: “what would I tell someone else who’s in my shoes?”
Everything I do, from massage therapy to chocolate-making to writing songs centers around the same idea.
Healing.
And finding a way to make something beautiful out of the ugliness I’ve experienced.
Best Sellers
In a last-ditch effort to salvage her mental health, Maddy LeDoux flies to Scotland, serendipitously crossing paths with Micah Macgregor. Two weeks of dancing and hillwalking heal her heart that’s bruised from her ex-fiancé leaving her with a ramshackle house full of wedding decorations. As she returns home to North Dakota, Maddy makes a pact with herself: live like she did overseas for 90 days. At that point, if she doesn’t get relief from her diagnosis of treatment-resistant depression, she’ll move to either the Highlands or Heaven, if her un-angelic language doesn’t land her somewhere warmer.
Layers of her underlying religious trauma surface, though, along with new dents in her car after she collides with a handsome police officer. As her budding confidence, bold wardrobe changes, and new addiction to baking sticky toffee pudding brings her family’s controlling behavior to light, Maddy grapples with whether being her unfiltered self will keep Micah close or push him away. When an uncomfortable truth surfaces, testing her resolve to ride out the clock on her pact, Maddy is forced to answer the toughest question of all: when all you can control is yourself, how do you get what makes you happy?
‘Maddy LeDoux does the Impossible Thing” is a heartwarming romp, filled with gallows humor, hope, and enough twists and turns to land you in A&E.
You and I are in this together - different boats, same ocean.
These poems are words of kindness for anyone on their way out of depression or grief (or both) and back to home within themselves. I wrote these for myself in moments over a fifteen-year period where I needed to hear support, and since I didn’t have it, I wrote what I needed to hear so I could repeat it out loud to myself. These were my answers, and I’ve been brave enough to title them “answers,” while your answers may be quite different. Please use this as a traveler’s guide while getting to know your own intuition. I’ve titled each poem with the question I was asking at the time when I wrote the poem, and arranged them to start in a place of struggle and end where I am writing from a place of feeling hopeful about life, confident in myself and comfortable in my skin.
To be clear, I am not “better.” It’s not “over.” The truth about my own struggles is that it is equal parts the storylines I was born into, the place society “affords” me as a woman, the reality of being a human living on a planet with seasons and storms and day/night cycles, with a hefty dose of my own existence as a learning mind and an occasionally reckless attitude.
Featured at the 2025 National Book Festival’s ‘Roadmap to Reading,’ this is my first picture book for children - and the adults who read to them.
Summary:
“Sir Rupert loves helping people, but his friend Bertha has a problem that's too big for them to solve alone. What will Sir Rupert do?”
This book is a hilarious approach to creative problem solving, cooperation, and perseverance. Sir Rupert is a young person living in the castle, aspiring to become a "real" knight someday. He tries to help everyone he can to gain necessary knighthood experience. When his friend Bertha, the castle cook, comes to him one day asking for help with squirrels that have overrun the kitchen, Sir Rupert's skills are put to the test. He asks everyone he can find for help, but no one has practical advice.
So, he and his friends team up to tackle the problem on their own. This story highlights the challenges of asking for help, perseverance, and handling situations that don't turn out the way you planned.
Listen Up
Explore a curated collection of my music.
2021 Best New Filmmaker
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2025 National Book Festival 'Roadmap to Reading' author
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2009 regional MTNA composition winner
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Editor - The Dickinson Press
2021 Best New Filmmaker 〰️ 2025 National Book Festival 'Roadmap to Reading' author 〰️ 2009 regional MTNA composition winner 〰️ Editor - The Dickinson Press
music. chocolate. stories.
the dense moss, rich with moisture, is a perfect growing medium for iceland’s many species of mushrooms. experienced mushroom hunters know to visit their favorite spots a few days after it rains to find the biggest variety.
songs that stemmed from
the unspeakable
for most of my life, the piano bench was where I found personal space.
it became a place I processed life.
now, people say the songs I write help them process their lives.
how’s that for a circle of fifths?
