100 years: July 21, 1921 to July 21, 2021
Today is the centennial anniversary of my mother’s birth. Her life offers a typical Franco-American story. Lucille Verreault Ledoux was born on July 21, 1921. She lived until May 5, 2015—just shy of 94 years. I have written extensively about her life both here on the blog and in the memoir we wrote together, We […]
Dialog in a memoir: “So what did you say?”
Dialog is important in a memoir because it allows us to “hear” the subject, but using dialog is also fraught with problems. It can throw your memoir off. Pitfalls of using dialogue in a memoir Essentially, most writers use dialog that is too long. A memoir, of course, is a remembered story. When the writer […]
How I Launched Myself Publicly in the Creative Life: I Publish a Book
“Is it possible to support myself in the creative life?” you ask.One day in 1988, I stood in front of a door, on the other side of which was a group of Foster Grandparents. I had in hand a copy of my recent collection of autobiographical short stories What Became of Them and Other Stories […]
Memoir Success: Approaching Neverland
Memoir Success Over the years, I have worked with many writers to help them create and shape their memoirs. It’s my pleasure to bring to your attention once again the success of one such writer: Peggy Kennedy from San Ramon, California, for whom I had the pleasure of providing coaching and editing help that led […]
The Origins of Christmas—it started with fearing darkness
Early Christians, wishing to remake the December 25 Roman holiday of the Birth of the Unconquerable Sun, adopted the day to celebrate the birth of Jesus. (more…)
Write a memoir: practical how-to information to ace it.
As you write a memoir, you will find that you need much more information about technique or about style or about research or any number of other topics. Unless you have been writing much over the years, this is likely to be you. Going to the library for information is a necessary next step for […]
Photos in Your Memoir Layout
While it may seem obvious, it bears repeating that where you place photos in your memoir book layout will influence how readers appreciate your story. The only way I can see that makes sense is chronologically. (more…)
The Making of the Photo Scribe: A Writing Guide / How to Write Stories into Photo Albums
One day in 1996, I read an article in a local newspaper about a scrapbook workshop called Creative Memories that was about to be presented. The article mentioned both designing photo albums and writing stories for photos—actually the article said “photo captions” but I immediately thought of stories. There was something about the tone of […]
Dare to Share Your Writing
One of the critical steps you can take as a writer is to find ways to share your work with others. Those others might be writers, they might be friends, or they might be family members. Don’t let your hard work sit in a drawer unread. Writing is meant to be read. We write down […]