In Franco-American New England, marching drill teams were popular. These teams were made up of girls who played instruments and marched in formation. Rhéa Ledoux was a team captain and she got to march in front of the other girls. The various drill teams would prepare elaborate sequences which they performed in parades—often in competition for a prize. Some of the local teams were very good. I join a marching drill team. Our uniforms were made of wool and were vary warm in the summer. The St-Jean-Baptiste parade was always a focal point as Canadians celebrated their patron saint on (more…)

Who were these Beatles, anyway? Everyone was screaming. Everyone, even Betsy, sitting next to me. Betsy was a charter member of our secret club that was the envy of nearly every girl in our class at Washington School who wasn’t a member and wanted desperately to know what the secret three-letter club name meant. Now Betsy was screaming her brains out. I stared at her in disbelief. But as I looked around Park Theater, the only movie theater in the Caldwells, the very green end-of-the-line little towns on the long boulevard that stretches from the big, bad city of Newark (more…)

DL: Today May 26 is my maternal grandfather’s birthday. Born in 1898, Joseph Cyrille Verreault would be 116 in 2014. The following is an excerpt from my mother’s memoir, We Were Not Spoiled. In these two excerpts, my mother shares her memory of her father’s playful side. The excerpts begin in 1925. [I, too, remember how my grandfather loved to tell a story.] My father loved to tell a story. He would sit three or four of us on his lap and ask us what kind of story we wanted to hear. “Perhaps un petit rien tout nu (a little (more…)

The is an excerpt from a yet-unnamed memoir of my high school years spent in a seminary continues to chronicle my first days there. The school is in Bucksport Maine, and the year is 1960. In this vignette, I write about my first morning. The memoir is in progress.

At 5:45, it was still dark outside, night really. Except for an occasional mumble, the regular breathing of boys in deep sleep was the only noise punctuating the quiet of the dormitory. Perhaps we were all back home in our dreams, with our families once again.

Suddenly—Brrr!

The “bell”— an electric ringer really, resounded loud and insistent in the silence.

“Laus tibi, Christe,” shouted the head Fourth-Form admonitor from his bed in the center of the dorm.
Only from the deep-voices of the other two admonitors at the opposite ends of the room was there an answering “Deo gratias!”<!–more–> (more…)

DL: The following is an excerpt of my grandmother My grandmother Marie Bilodeau Ledoux from a family booklet I created around the year 2000 and gave to family members. A Backstory to Marie Bilodeau Ledoux’s birth When Thomas Bilodeau walked out of the mansard-roofed Empire-style farmhouse he had built several years earlier at the end of le rang Saint-Noël, he could turn his head to the left and see the spire of the parish church which dominated the countryside. He was thirty-four the year Marie was born. Five years earlier, he had married Aurélie Gagné on July 1, 1879, in (more…)

This is an excerpt from my high school memoir, In Another Century. I am 13. In the first published excerpt, it is still summer and I am thinking of what it will be like to leave home for the seminary. In the previous excerpt, I had just arrived at the seminary high school where I will be living. This excerpt starts as I have brought my trunk up to the dormitory and are about to leave the room. I am with my parents, my grandmother my brother and two sisters. All the people in the story are bilingual. We walked (more…)

In her memoir, novelist Kate Christensen, author of The Great Man and the The Astral Hotel, has undertaken to organize her lifestory around food. It is an interesting concept, a theme, around which to make sense of a lifetime. If the memoir is, as Rainer Maria Rilke said of poetry, a momentary order, then Kate Christensen has done just that.

“Kate Christensen always remembers what she ate, what was served, what was cooked, what she cooked, what it tasted like,” reads the book jacket. “…much of her life, she describes herself as being ‘a hungry lonely wild animal looking for happiness and stability.’ Having found them at long last, she finally feels able to write about her search.”

<!–more–> (more…)

This post is the 300th on The Memoir Writer’s Blog. I am amazed at the number. I realize that other blogs have more posts but even so, 300 archived posts is an achievement. I want to honor that I have been writing my own posts and curating guest posts for a while now and have achieved this constancy—300 posts. If that makes for a successful blog, then I have done it. but… I like to think that a successful blog does not depend only on its numbers but on its quality. I hope you have found the article to be (more…)

I recently had the opportunity to interview author William Andrews about his experience writing his recent book, Daughters of the Dragon: A Comfort Woman’s Story. This book was a departure for us as it is not a memoir, but we felt honored by Bill’s confidence that we could deepen his story and hone its writing. I had coached and edited an earlier version of this novel for Bill (as well as two other novels) which had a different name and a different narrator. At the time, Bill was working during the weekday and writing mostly at night and on weekends. (more…)

marching drill teams were popular in Franco-American New England

I Join a Marching Drill Team

By Lucille Ledoux

She Loves Her, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah

By Christine Terp Madsen

Who were these Beatles, anyway? Everyone was screaming. Everyone, even Betsy, sitting next to me. Betsy was screaming her brains out. I stared at her in disbelief. But as I looked around Park Theater, the only movie theater in the Caldwells, the very green end-of-the-line little towns on the long boulevard that stretches from the […]

My mother's book has found its audience.

My Father Loved to Tell a Story

By Lucille Ledoux

My father loved to tell a story. He would sit three or four of us on his lap and ask us what kind of story we wanted to hear. “Perhaps un petit rien tout nu (a little naked nothing)?” he’d suggest. Not knowing what that was, we would nod our heads eagerly. “Do you want […]

My First Morning Away

By Denis Ledoux

Marie Bilodeau Ledoux’s story

By Denis Ledoux

My grandmother Marie Bilodeau Ledoux was born in St-Narcisse-de-Lotbinière, Québec, on May 15, 1884. The following is excerpted from a booklet I wrote about my mémère some fifteen years ago and gave a s a Christmas gift to my extended family. (more…)

Discovering My New Home

By Denis Ledoux

This is an excerpt from a memoir I am thinking of calling either In Another Century or A Very Catholic Boy. I am 13, and in the previous excerpt, I have just arrived at the seminary high school where I will be living. The excerpt starts as I have brought my trunk up to the […]

Kate Christensen talks about writing Blue Plate Special / An Autobiography of My Appetites and about writing in general.

By Denis Ledoux

In her memoir, novelist Kate Christensen, author of The Great Man and the The Astral Hotel, has undertaken to organize her lifestory around food. It is an interesting concept, a theme, around which to make sense of a lifetime. If the memoir is, as Rainer Maria Rilke said of poetry, a momentary order, then Kate […]

The Memoir Writer’s Blog—a Successful Blog?

By Denis Ledoux

This post is the 300th on my blog. I am amazed at the number. I realize that other blogs have more posts but even so, 300 is an achievement. I want to honor that I have been writing my own posts and curating guest posts for a while now and have achieved this constancy—300 posts. […]

How to Write A Book: A Chat With Author William Andrews Part 1

By William Andrews

William Andrews about his experience writing his recent book, Daughters of the Dragon. Bill exemplifies a commitment to writing. It is the same commitment but in the memoir field that will see all of us succeed at our endeavors. (more…)