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[Jeanne Mance, founder of the first hospital in Montréal (the Hôtel-Dieu) and a key figure among the women in early Canada.] We want to believe that European settlement of North America was identical, but it wasn’t. The French and the English colonies established different patterns. The women in early Canada had a more public presence. In many ways, women in early Canada and those in New England did not have a similar status as I explain in Here to Stay / Lives in 17th Century Canada. A few peaks on the public role of women in early Canada as described (more…)
The Stalled Writer An unfinished manuscript haunts a stalled writer, sapping energy that ought to go into more writing. You started with a burst of writing motivation. You were super energized! You even perhaps had the best motivation for writing—ever! “By gosh, this memoir is going to get written and it’s going to be good!” you tell yourself. And the writing flows for the first while. Your energy remains high. You write regularly and you think about how to make your memoir better and better. At last, you feel like you are a “real writer!” Then, you beome a stalled (more…)

Why does a Book Tour work?

Done well, a book our allows people to know, like and trust you—essential characteristics of Here to Stayany selling and buying relationship. As I prepare a book tour to promote my soon-to-be-released Here to Stay/Lives in 17th Century Canada, I want to share some elements with you that I think make a book tour work.

But first, a moment of levity!

One fall evening in 1992, I was launching a book tour. My first stop was at my town’s library. As I approached the library, a copy of my recently published book, Turning Memories Into Memoirs / A Handbook for Writing Lifestories, lying on the passenger seat, its width thickened by slips of paper to indicate places from which I wanted to read at my program, I was evident there were few parking spaces along the town’s Main Street which was normally empty in the evening.

Well! How exciting could this be! Turning Memories Into Memoirs was my fifth book and my first how-to. I had great hopes for it. I had been leading memoir-writing workshops for the previous four years, and Turning Memories Into Memoirs was the summation of my teaching and coaching. It was truly a comprehensive guide that covered memoir writing from A to Z, and any writer making use of its many suggestions and guidelines was likely to succeed at undertaking and finishing an interesting and meaningful memoir.

The publicity—press releases, calendar of events, posters—was what was available at the time (1992), and I had, as they say, “covered my bases.” And now, it was the moment of my big launch at the local library—from which I had launched my four previous books—and that evening, I was apparently doing my outreach well as it seemed I had a full house! How exciting to have every available street parking space taken.

Not only do I always enjoy going up and down the rows of seats at the beginning of a program to ask people where they are at in their memoir-writing project but I feel it is important for establishing rapport with the attendees. Now, keeping my excitement in check, I knew I had to focus on finding a parking spot so as to be at the library not only on time but to “work the crowd.”

So, it was with a solid sense of anticipation that I found a parking spot on a side street and rushed to the library, joining the line of people streaming into the building.

Dashing inside, I entered the room where I was to read.

It was sparsely filled! Perhaps thirty people!

Huh? (more…)

My latest book is Here to Stay / Lives in 17th-Century Canada. In this post, I want to make clear that people then lived with different paradigms. It’s the only way I can explain things. Telling the past of New France was not easy. As I was writing Here to Stay, a story of my ancestors in New France, it became ever so obvious that the story was set in a time that operated under different paradigms than ours. The players in my story were from various Indian and European cultures. The book’s central focus, however, is on my seventeenth-century (more…)
Write an Advance Review of Here to Stay/Lives in 17th Century Canada. Thanks for stopping by! I need you help. Here to Stay/Lives in 17th Century Canada is about to launch into the world. Your advance review of Here to Stay will be an important element of its success. What is an advance review of Here to Stay? An Advanced Review [AR] is a review you write before the publication of a book and then post at or near the time of launching. Don’t worry: I will send reminders. Your reviews will cue the distribution media (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, (more…)
The following is an excerpt—Filles du roi/Daughters of the King: Marthe Quittel Comes for a Husband— from my Here To Stay / Lives in 17th Century Canada. It will be launched on October 15, 2025. ___ On July 16, the Marie-Thérèse, having left Le Havre on May 10, sailed into port. It was captained by the Sieur Poullet (Puet), a frequent visitor to the colony. In addition to bringing supplies, he carried two welcome cargoes—twelve horses sent by the new intendant, Jean Talon, who was yet to arrive, and eight filles du roi. The moose of France come to help (more…)
In the late autumn of 1988, as Mainers were beginning to hunker down for another winter, I had an experience that confirmed the power of telling our stories to an audience. One afternoon, I opened a door to a meeting of Foster Grandparents volunteers. I was walking into my future. But, I didn’t know that at the time. Having just published my first collection of short stories, What Became of Them, I was asked to create an afternoon program of readings from it for this meeting of Foster Grandparents volunteers. My collection clearly made use of autobiography—an approach to fiction (more…)
Become good at writing and learn to write a better memoir. To create a successful memoir, you need to know something about writing in general and memoir writing in particular. Being a good fiction writer or poet or essayist is not enough. It is a great start but it is not enough. You must have read many memoirs and have written in the genre. Your readers will rightfully expect no less from you. You cannot bypass learning to write a better memoir. 1. If you have not done so yet, immerse yourself in a serious program of memoir reading. Read (more…)
working copy of the cover Wanting to write a meaningful memoir is a start, but it is not enough. You must know how to write such a story. On the Third Thursday of every month (at 1 PM/ET, 12 CT, 11 MT, 10 PT), you can participate in a live memoir-writing workshop on ZOOM. As I write this, the next Gathering of Writer is Thursday, August 21, 2025. While this call is for my Substack paid members, you can easily join our ranks and benefit from the workshop group’s support by clicking on the icon below. I consider the in-person (more…)

Many disparities between women in early Canada and in New England

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[Jeanne Mance, founder of the first hospital in Montréal (the Hôtel-Dieu) and a key figure among the women in early Canada.] We want to believe that European settlement of North America was identical, but it wasn’t. The French and the English colonies established different patterns. The women in early Canada had a more public presence. […]

book tour

Why a Book Tour Works

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Why does a Book Tour Work? It does so because it allows people to know, like and trust you—essential characteristics of any selling and buying relationship. Why a Book Tour Works is an original contribution to LinkedIn’s Pulse. Pulse is a blog on LinkedIn for people to post on topics of their expertise. The post […]

History of early Canada

Telling the Past as It Probably Was!

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My latest book is Here to Stay / Lives in 17th-Century Canada. In this post, I want to make clear that people then lived with different paradigms. It’s the only way I can explain things. Telling the past of New France was not easy. As I was writing Here to Stay, a story of my […]

Here to Stay

Have You ever Written an Advance Review?

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Write an Advance Review of Here to Stay/Lives in 17th Century Canada. Thanks for stopping by! I need you help. Here to Stay/Lives in 17th Century Canada is about to launch into the world. Your advance review of Here to Stay will be an important element of its success. What is an advance review of […]

success of your memoir writing

The Power of Telling Our Stories

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In the late autumn of 1988, as Mainers were beginning to hunker down for another winter, I had an experience that confirmed the power of telling our stories to an audience. One afternoon, I opened a door to a meeting of Foster Grandparents volunteers. I was walking into my future. But, I didn’t know that […]

Become good at writing. Write for your audience

You can become good at writing!

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To create a successful workshop business of helping people to write their memoir, you must become adept with the memoir genre itself. You must learn to write better memoir yourself. Being a good fiction writer or a poet or an essayist is not enough. You must have read many memoirs and have written in the […]

Book launch reviews HTS

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working copy of the cover Wanting to write a meaningful memoir is a start, but it is not enough. You must know how to write such a story. On the Third Thursday of every month (at 1 PM/ET, 12 CT, 11 MT, 10 PT), you can participate in a live memoir-writing workshop on ZOOM. As […]