Author Guide · Creativity
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In 2011 Austin Kleon, then a copywriter in Austin, Texas, gave a talk to students at Broome Community College in upstate New York: ten things he wished someone had told him when he started out. He posted the text and slides on his blog, the post went viral, and a year later it was a book, Steal Like an Artist, which became a New York Times bestseller. Kleon calls himself “a writer who draws”. His books are small, square, hand-lettered and full of his own drawings and blackout poems, and together they have sold more than two million copies. This guide covers his six key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 6 key books · 2010–2026 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Austin Kleon has published six books: Newspaper Blackout (2010), Steal Like an Artist (2012), Show Your Work! (2014), The Steal Like an Artist Journal (2015), Keep Going (2019) and Don’t Call It Art (2026). Start with Steal Like an Artist, the book that grew out of his 2011 talk; the two that follow it build directly on its ideas.
Where to Start with Austin Kleon
If you want the book that started it all
→ Steal Like an Artist (2012) — ten rules for anyone who makes things.
If you want to share your work with an audience
→ Show Your Work! (2014) — on showing your process instead of self-promotion.
If you want to keep going when work stalls
→ Keep Going (2019) — routines and habits for hard times.
If you want to make something tonight
→ Newspaper Blackout (2010) — poems made with a newspaper and a marker.
6 Austin Kleon Books, in Order
Newspaper Blackout
Kleon takes a newspaper page and a permanent marker and blacks out every word he does not need; the words left behind are the poem. The collection, published by Harper Perennial, gathers poems first posted on his website. It was his first book, and after it came out he moved from web design into advertising copywriting.
Steal Like an Artist
An expanded version of his 2011 talk at Broome Community College, published by Workman in February 2012. Its ten short chapters run from “Steal like an artist” and “Write the book you want to read” to “Be boring (it’s the only way to get work done)” and “Creativity is subtraction”. The argument is that nothing starts from scratch: you build your own work by collecting and transforming what you admire. It became a New York Times bestseller.
Show Your Work!
The follow-up to Steal Like an Artist, published by Workman in March 2014, about getting your work seen. Kleon argues for being findable rather than networking: sharing your process, a little every day, so that others can learn from it and build on it. Chapters include “You Don’t Have to Be a Genius”, “Share Something Small Every Day” and “Stick Around”. It too became a New York Times bestseller.
The Steal Like an Artist Journal
A notebook built on Steal Like an Artist, which Kleon describes as a journal for “creative kleptomaniacs”. It turns the ideas of the first book into prompts, lists and exercises to fill in by hand.
Keep Going
The third book in what became the Steal Like an Artist trilogy, about keeping up creative work over years rather than starting it. Its ten chapters include “Every Day Is Groundhog Day”, “Build a Bliss Station”, “Forget the Noun, Do the Verb” and “Demons Hate Fresh Air”, covering daily routines, limiting the news, walking and the seasons of creative work. It was a Publishers Weekly bestseller.
Don’t Call It Art
Ten lessons Kleon drew from watching his two young sons make things, published by Tarcher in June 2026 as his first hardcover. It began around 2016 as a book about art and kids, was set aside and reworked after the pandemic. Topics include permission to be bad, throwing out the instructions and not needing a vision, and it argues for what Kleon calls “intergenerational hanging out”.
In What Order to Read Austin Kleon
Steal Like an Artist, Show Your Work! and Keep Going form a trilogy, and publication order is also the natural reading order: first how to start making things, then how to share them, then how to keep going for years. Each is short enough to read in an evening, and each stands on its own.
Don’t Call It Art follows the same square format and ten-part structure, but it looks back at how children make things rather than forward to a career. Newspaper Blackout and the journal are a different kind of book: one is something to look at, the other something to fill in.
A reading path
1. Steal Like an Artist (2012)
2. Show Your Work! (2014)
3. Keep Going (2019)
4. Don’t Call It Art (2026)
5. Newspaper Blackout (2010)
The years · 1983–2026
Quick facts about Austin Kleon
- Known for
- Austin Kleon is known for short, illustrated books that treat creativity as a set of everyday habits anyone can learn, starting with the idea that every artist builds on other people’s work.
- 1983
- Born in Circleville, Ohio
- 2019
- Keep Going
- Born
- 16 June 1983, Circleville, Ohio
- Education
- Miami University, Ohio
- Early work
- Public library in Cleveland; web designer at the University of Texas law school; advertising copywriter
- Lives
- Austin, Texas, with his family
- Readers
- Books sold over two million copies; translated into more than a dozen languages
- Newsletter
- A weekly newsletter with about 300,000 subscribers
The red mark is 2012: Steal Like an Artist, the book that grew out of his 2011 talk.
How Austin Kleon Writes: Ten Rules, Drawn by Hand
Every one of his trilogy books, and Don’t Call It Art, has the same shape: ten short chapters, each a rule or a slogan (“Be boring”, “Make gifts”, “When in doubt, tidy up”), opened up in a few pages of short paragraphs, quotations from other artists and his own drawings. The format comes from the 2011 talk that became Steal Like an Artist, which was itself a list of ten things.
He writes in the open. The ideas usually appear first on his blog or in his weekly newsletter, and the books gather and sharpen them; Newspaper Blackout began as poems posted on his website. That is the method Show Your Work! recommends: share the process, a little at a time, and let the work find its readers.
Much of each book is other people’s words. He quotes writers, musicians and artists constantly and names his sources, which is the point of “steal like an artist”: study and credit what you take, and turn it into something of your own. For a longer book on the same subject, see Rick Rubin and Julia Cameron.
Frequently asked questions about Austin Kleon’s books
How many books has Austin Kleon written?
Six: Newspaper Blackout (2010), Steal Like an Artist (2012), Show Your Work! (2014), The Steal Like an Artist Journal (2015), Keep Going (2019) and Don’t Call It Art (2026). The first three creativity books are also sold together as The Steal Like an Artist Audio Trilogy.
What are Austin Kleon’s books in order?
Newspaper Blackout (2010), Steal Like an Artist (2012), Show Your Work! (2014), The Steal Like an Artist Journal (2015), Keep Going (2019) and Don’t Call It Art (2026).
Where should I start with Austin Kleon?
Steal Like an Artist (2012). It is the first of the trilogy, it is short, and the two books after it build on its ideas.
What is Austin Kleon’s most famous book?
Steal Like an Artist, published by Workman in February 2012 and a New York Times bestseller. It grew out of a talk he gave to students at Broome Community College in 2011, which went viral when he posted it on his blog.
What are the 10 rules in Steal Like an Artist?
Steal like an artist; don’t wait until you know who you are to start making things; write the book you want to read; use your hands; side projects are important; do good work and put it where people can see it; geography is no longer our master; be nice (the world is a small town); be boring (it’s the only way to get work done); creativity is subtraction.
Is Steal Like an Artist part of a trilogy?
Yes. Steal Like an Artist (2012), Show Your Work! (2014) and Keep Going (2019) form the Steal Like an Artist trilogy. Kleon’s site calls Don’t Call It Art (2026) its follow-up.
Does Steal Like an Artist encourage plagiarism?
No. The title is a provocation: the book argues that all creative work builds on earlier work, and asks readers to study, credit and transform what they borrow rather than copy it.
What is Newspaper Blackout?
His first book (2010), a collection of poems made by taking a newspaper page and blacking out the words he did not need with a permanent marker. The poems first appeared on his website.
What is Don’t Call It Art about?
Published in June 2026, it offers ten lessons Kleon took from watching his two young sons make things, for adults who want to make things with the freedom they had as children. It is his first hardcover.
Is Austin Kleon still writing?
Yes. He was born on 16 June 1983 in Circleville, Ohio, lives in Austin, Texas, publishes a weekly newsletter and released Don’t Call It Art in 2026.
Footnotes
- Austin Kleon — Wikipedia
- Steal Like an Artist — Wikipedia
- Books — austinkleon.com
- Keep Going — austinkleon.com
- Don’t Call It Art — Bookshop.org
- A Conversation with Austin Kleon — The Rumpus, 2026
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Computers have robbed us of the feeling that we’re actually making things.”
— Austin Kleon, Steal Like an Artist (2012)
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