The Wrong Point of View in a Memoir Can Throw the Story
In 1996 and 1997, I composed about 200 pages of a memoir of my high school years and then it wasn’t going anywhere more than where it had been—mired in facts and details with no spirit. What I didn’t know was it had a wrong point of view problem
I merely stored it in various computers for years.
In the fall of 2013, I completed my mother’s memoir (We Were Not Spoiled). Because I was looking for a writing project I might devote myself to next, I picked up the high-school memoir again.
(Lest you think that I went to a high school like yours, let me assure you that I did not. I attended a Catholic high-school seminary. No, I’m not writing about sexual shenanigans—there was none of that whatsoever. I am writing about my life there between 1960 and 1964 and how it shaped me. This theme of identity is usual stuff for a memoir, but the setting is exotic in many ways and not at all usual. Almost none of you who are reading this have “been there”—trust me.)
Suddenly, after more than a decade and a half, the memoir spoke to me again!
“Write me! Write me!” it shouted. The text seemed “alive” again. [Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
How Long Does It Take to Write a Memoir?
Sometimes, years after I’ve heard from someone that he is writing a memoir, I will connect with the writer again. Perhaps it’s three or four or five years later, but the writer is working on the same memoir. I don’t get it. So I ask politely, “What has snagged the memoir?” In short…
I has taken that writer too long to write his memoir!
How long does it take to write a memoir?
Well, I don’t actually know the answer to “how long does it take to write a memoir?” What I know is a memoir needn’t take so long to compose. A memoir—and interesting and meaningful one—can be written in 12 to 24 months.
If that’s so, then why do some memoirs drag on?
Here are some reasons your memoir may be taking you too long.
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
Too Much Backstory–Are you making memoir writing more difficult than necessary?
How much backstory is too much? Today we will discuss how to avoid too much backstory in your memoir.
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
Memoir Coaching Laser-focuses on Getting Your Memoir Written Faster and Better
How does memoir coaching improve your manuscript?
“What does ‘My family was poor’ mean, ” I asked a memoir writer in a recent coaching session.
“Poor?” he asked at the other end of the phone line. “What do you mean what does poor mean? Poor means poor!”
“Does poor mean you didn’t have enough to eat or does it mean you never ate out at restaurants? Does poor mean you were forced to run out on your rent or does it mean you did not have an in-ground pool?”
Clearly, descriptive always adjectives don’t mean what we think they mean!
Empty literary “calories”
On the spot, I shared with him how adjectives are empty literary “calories.” They do nothing for the story but fill up space. They pretend to be effective but are not. Every writer needs to depend on scenes, dialog, settings, characters to tell the real story.
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
Are Your Details Destroying Your Memoir? How to Avoid These Memoir Writing Mistakes
Are you making this memoir writing mistake that may be undermining your lifestory?
The following is based largely on a response I wrote to a comment on a post called But is it a Memoir? Rereading my comment, I realized it is of value to all the new readers to this blog since then—and to readers who may have forgotten or never read it.
—
A Memoir Serves as a Guide to the Reader
Liberties with facts ultimately, I believe, undermine the authority of a memoirist to present his/her life experience as a lived (vs. fictionalized) version of the mythic journey. The lived hero’s tale must figure at the center of every memoir if the story is to rise above a chronology, a dirge or an encomium. In the nameless book I quoted in But is it a Memoir?, too many paragraphs erode confidence in the memoirist’s fidelity to what happened (the lived experience) and create a sense of fictionalization–of choices to nurture the drama of the story (by making things up) over decisions to explore only what happened in view of arriving at an understanding/appreciation of the lived experience.
If one accepts that fiction begins with feeling/insight (what we might call “theme”–example: “life is hard”) and ends up with plot line, characters and setting which will hold the writer’s insight for the reader, then one can grasp that fiction is based a priori on the author’s “take.” In a very real and different way, memoir begins with plot, characters and setting and proceeds to theme (“wow, that life as it was lived was hard”).
Details can throw the reader off.
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
Stay in the Memoir Conversation: Be Part of a Writing Community
What does writing a memoir have to do with a writing community?
Show me your friends and I will show you your future.
There’s a bit of folk wisdom—or there should be if there isn’t—that goes somewhat like the above.
Isn’t our belief in the truth of “show me your friends and I will show you your future” why we are reassured when we see our children hanging out with “nice” kids, children who are respectful and serious about school, who benefit from healthy pastimes—drama club, sports, an interesting job—and who find ways to enjoy themselves that is not injurious to themselves or to others? Why? Of course, when we see our children with such friends, we know they are learning, or having reinforced, habits that will serve them well as adults.
How does this apply to writing a memoir? Well …
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
I Finish A Sugary Frosting: Notes on the Memoir Writing Process
Note: This is the 1starticle in a series of 4 on the memoir writing process of A Sugary Frosting published in 2016.
Post 1: I Finish A Sugary Frosting: Notes on the Memoir Writing Process
Post 2: Mechanics of Writing a Memoir: It’s not all Inspiration
Post 3: Preparing for A Successful Book Launch
Post 4: Better Book Production is Possible
Memoir writing can be simple.
It was 2016, and I was in the very last days of the memoir process and polishing A Sugary Frosting / A Memoir of a Girlhood Spent in a Parsonage, the early lifestory of my deceased spouse, Martha Blowen. It was a time to make sure I had written what I wanted to write and to check grammar and spelling before it went out to a copy editor.
I had promised Martha that I would write her stories so that our grandchildren would know something about her. In May 2015, I began gathering the stories she had written of her life. My intent was to create a booklet of these stories. But, to be honest, it has never appealed to me to write booklets. I like to write books. That’s what I do and that’s what I do well.
As I read through Martha’s stories, in a few instances, I understood that some were fragmentary and needed filling out. I knew the story she was trying to convey but then I had lived with her for 31 years. Would someone who did not know her—our grandchildren, for instance—appreciate the tale? So, I tweaked the stories to make them more complete, more meaningful. Good work, I thought. [Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
Don’t Pass On Reaching A Larger Audience – 4 Tips
Perhaps you’ve been writing a memoir for your family and friends. The composition started off easily enough. You jotted a few memories and passed the stories out. People started saying you ought to write a book, but you were doubtful no one else but family and friends would be interested. For a long while you were satisfied creating your book for a small audience and then it occurred to you you that you were writing with a theme that might interest a larger audience. Perhaps, you wondered, if there was something in your lifestory that could address a larger audience of strangers. Or…
Perhaps from the get-go, you had a sense that, while this story of yours is personal, there was something in it that certainly could interest a larger audience.
While family and friends are always a worthy readership for your memoir, it is possible to reach an even larger audience.
“But, how to do that?” you ask. “What’s the magic bullet?”
Well, I don’t have a magic bullet but I do have a few suggestions to help you reach beyond a small circle. Below are four suggestions to empower your story to appeal to a broader public. [Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
9 Tips for a Fast Start Writing Your Memoir
Ever wish you had the secret of generating a fast way to fast start writing your memoir—or most any other book?
A proven way to start writing is to follow a set of steps that will help you get into the writing habit. When I wrote and published A Sugary Frosting / A Memoir Of A Girlhood Spent in a Parsonage, I appreciated the efficiency and effectiveness of my writing process all the more. A Sugary Frosting is the story of the first 20 years of my deceased wife’s life. She had written a number of her stories but died before completing a memoir. When I took up the task, I followed what I consider to be “best practices” of memoir writing.
Below I offer them to you to help you get a fast start and to write more prolifically—and even bring it to a finish in the form of a published memoir.
Here are my nine “best practices” for memoir writing. They are tried and true and bear implementing today.
1. Set up a regular writing time. This will get you a fast start writing your memoir.
How long you write is perhaps not as important as how frequently you do so. Once you have set up a writing time, honor it as you would a medical appointment. Don’t allow others to usurp your time!
A schedule may be the tool you need to make a success of your writing. Don’t become another person who tried to write, who is thinking of writing.
2. Give yourself permission to write a rough first draft.
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]
We'd love to have you access this content. It's in our members-only area, but you're in luck: becoming a member is easy and it's free.
Already a Member?
Not a Member Yet?
The First Paragraph Can Make or Break a Memoir for the Reader
Writers sometimes struggle with how to begin a story and will not write the story until they have the beginning—the first paragraph.
This is not a good way to proceed.
The first paragraph of a memoir sets the tone.
The first paragraph creates the tone and often presents imagery that will shape the reader’s appreciation of your story—whether a vignette or a full memoir.
In a short story I wrote many years ago, I did not compose the first paragraph until I had written the whole story. Frankly, I was stumped and did not know how to begin the story, how to launch the reader.
[Free Membership required to read more. See below. ]