The Theme-focused Memoir
While many of the people whom I have helped to write a memoir have come ostensibly to write about their lives – to celebrate some achievement, I would say that many of these people are also writing a mission-driven memoir, a theme-focused memoir. Behind the desire to tell about their lives, there is some intent […]
Learn Better Writing: how not to wander aimlessly in your memoir
DL: This is part of several posts of free products available to you to learn better writing.This is Part 1.—You know the scene. You’re in an unknown town—never been to before. You have some general directions: your location is in the north end of town: perhaps it’s on a side street; after a fast food […]
Only Telling the Truth in Your Memoir Will Set You Free
I urge all readers to commit to telling the truth—100% of it—in their memoir. It’s the only way you will get to the truth—and as they say, the telling the truth will set you free.
“Making Nice” Will Trip You Up
You can always tell the story in the “official” version, but you will be at odds to tell the story well. When you distort your insights in order not to contradict other people’s take on your story, your readers will sense that something is wrong.
Facts Are Important in Memoir Writing
Facts are important in memoir writing. The inclusion of dates, addresses, names, and relationships, are one of its special features. Memoir writing cannot, without deleting from its value, omit dates and specific identification of locales, names of individuals and their relationships to one another. Memoir writing is factual writing: hence the importance of facts. A […]
Where Do You Begin Writing Your Memoir?
Is there a best place to start writing your memoir? It’s a quandary: where do you start writing your memoir? Many people may say: from the beginning. But, I don’t think that is the best place to start composing. The answer is actually quite simple.
The Wrong Point of View in a Memoir Can Throw the Story
I was challenged by the point of view in a memoir. I had put off completing the book because I could not resolve its thematic problems.
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 writing client 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 […]
Are Your Details Destroying Your Memoir? How to Avoid These Memoir Writing Mistakes
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.