Your Memoir Is Not a Monologue

It is perhaps inevitable that writers—and certainly I have had my moments—indulge in a certain fantasy that their book will appeal to a large audience and garner universal popularity. But, unless you are already famous—like Taylor Swift or Kamala Harris—or writing about an experience that was in itself very well known—a major flood or a nuclear disaster, for instance, your book is not likely to interest a large audience that would propel it into a best-seller status.

This does not mean your book will not be well received—by its audience!

Look for your Niche: Write with Your Audience in Mind

You can increase your chances of success if you accept your book can sell to its natural audience—your niche.

I don’t mean to be a downer, but while a memoir by Joe Biden will find a huge audience, you probably will not—that is, outside of the niche waiting for your book.

I hope this will encourage you: I am about to offer how your memoir can find as large an audience as possible.

Before you start writing your memoir—or as you are currently writing, if that’s the case, ask yourself who is likely to read this book you have in mind to spend months and even possibly years to write.

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“Ask, ‘Whom can I serve? Who needs my book?’ Your audience will appear.”

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Let’s do this discovery process with a fictitious book. Let’s say you raised a Down syndrome child and are now writing about how it was so transformative for you in a very positive way.

Who will be the audience for such a book? Will it be everyone who is curious about Harry Windsor and Meghan Markle? Probably a few of them but not many.

Your audience is likely to be made up of people who themselves have a Down syndrome child or who are employed in social services and spend their time assisting families and individuals with Down syndrome or perhaps they are teachers of exceptionality.

The fact is an audience interested in your Down syndrome book is likely to be narrow but it is also likely to be deep. Your book can answer many questions that people have about the topic of your memoir. Subsequently, they will recommend it to people who need to read it.

An exercise to focus your book on the needs of your audience:

Write down a list of questions and concerns that your audience is likely to have. Write at least 20 questions your readers will have. (Don’t let yourself off the hook by writing fewer questions!) These questions and your answers to them will make your book a useful tool for its readers.
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“When you ask what your audience needs right now, you are caring for your readers. You are writing not only what you want to write but what they want to read.”

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As you are writing your memoir, you are, of course, being true to your own experience but you are also attentive to answering your audience’s questions and concerns as you have identified them. The experiences you choose to write about will be answers to your readers’ questions—so let serving your audience be in front of mind.

Let’s explore developing your memoir.

If a concern you have identified as important to your readers is choosing an early childhood education program for your Down syndrome child, you will be attentive to your own experience of finding such a program and how you made it work for your child and for your family. You will not be quick about it and write, “After an extensive search, I found the right school for my Jonathan, and then everything was fine.”

No, you will offer us criteria for selecting a school. You will talk about what to look for in school visits. You will help us to understand how you were able to help your child make the best of the school experience. You may also write about how you dealt with any naysayers in your environment. Writing about dead ends you went down can also be helpful to the reader.

So, the above is how you identify your audience and answer their questions and concerns. This book of yours will speak to your audience.
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“It doesn’t matter that the Wall Street economist doesn’t want your memoir of raising a Down syndrome child; it matters only that the Down syndrome parent or professional wants it. Write to serve the person affected by Down syndrome not to win over the economist.”

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This, of course, is not a textbook that you are writing. It is a memoir, and as all memoirs, it will be based on vignettes and stories. It needs to nurture character, action, setting, theme, point of view, and many other elements that I speak about throughout my blog and throughout the Better Memoir Writing Master Class Channel.

To see this post as a video, click here. Listening is a fine review as you do the dishes or drive to the grocery store.

And remember: “inch by inch, it’s a cinch; yard by yard it’s hard.”

Good luck writing your stories!

Here is this week’s FREE video course:

~ Larger Audience than Family and Friends    

~ Whom Are You Writing For?

~ 2 Reasons I’ll Read Your Memoir   

To see this post as a video, click here.