Chipping away at the statue that is our story

You know when you are watching a movie and the camera stays a heartbeat too long on the kitchen knife and you just know that something pivotal is going to happen with that knife? In most cases, this sort of cinematic emphasis to a prop means that the prop is going to be used later on in the film – the knife will be used to cut the ropes for escape, used to stab the bad guy, etc.

And likewise, I’m sure that you’ve seen films where you’ve noticed the knife and only after, you frustratingly realize that the knife was meaningless to the story. In that case, it was a poorly directed movie, where no one paid attention to that major rule of storytelling.

If you emphasis a prop, then you need to use that prop later on.

You’ve probably heard the advice for carving a statue – take a block of marble and cut away everything that does not look like the final statue. Easy enough huh?

The same advice goes for writing.

When you write a scene, you are obligated to incorporate detail. Think of the five senses, taste, touch, smell, sight, and hearing. Obviously, you don’t need to use them all but you need to strive to “paint” a textual picture of where your characters are. Everything in your scene must exist to propel your story’s action or plot.

The problem is that many writers rely on their own interpretations of the scene. You might recall a fancy restaurant where you had a memorable dinner once as the scene for your characters to have a heated argument over a pending divorce.

Even though you remember the forks as being incredibly study (and trust me, I appreciate a heavy fork as much as the next person) it’s not necessary to mention the forks in your scene, no matter how impressive they are.

If, however, one of your characters is going to steal a knife and then stab the other and then frame someone else, you might want to mention the sharpness of the steak knife, the way the lighting glints off of the blade. Even if they use another knife, attention to this knife might be warranted in the guise of foreshadowing.

As writers we must use our personal filters for all of our writing. It’s a given and that’s what makes our work individual and unique. However, as crafters of stories, we need to recognize that even though we see our stories through our own eyes, we need to be vigilant about chipping away all of our words that don’t leave behind the finished statue.

***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens). (www.simplethrift.wordpress.com)

For the record, I’ve even “borrowed” a heavy fork that had impressed me.

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Writing Through Grief

My mother died last month. Her death was long anticipated and when it finally came, something of a relief. But losing a parent is one of life’s great transitions, moving the next generation closer to the front line of death. As expected as my mom’s death was, it also caused my universe to wobble. In order to hold on and begin working my way through a grief I expect to accompany me the rest of my life, I started doing what I always do to help me understand myself and my place in the universe: I wrote.

I’m not just talking about my journal, which I’ve been keeping since I was nine and which has been a companion for this long, arduous journey of my mother’s decline. I’m talking about the writing that accompanies a death, and that has allowed me a formal, disciplined way to organize my experience.

First, I wrote my mother’s obituary. I drafted it the first week of Mom’s final decline, when hospice took over. Two weeks later, I looked up the few facts about which I’d been unsure, and the day after she passed, when my oldest brother asked if I would write the obit, I was able to zap it to him via email.

I was enormously pleased that my oldest brother acknowledged me as a writer, relied on my services at my family’s time of need. After reading what I’d written, this brother wrote back saying, “This is great!” Now that Mom is gone, relationships with my siblings have become even more important, and this accolade from my oldest brother affirmed my sense of belonging to this band of brothers who tortured me through childhood, but whom I now hold dear.

The second writing task was the memorial service, which I organized. I solicited stories of remembrance, organized them so they had a narrative arc, and wrote a prologue and epilogue, giving the entire service a shape. My youngest brother, a playwright and filmmaker, gave me some directorial advice that added an element of bittersweet humor to the event. Laughter is good medicine, even – especially – in the face of death.

Next, I thought about my mother’s journey from octogenarian skier just seven years ago, to a human husk ravaged by dementia, leaving her without language, memory or mobility. It’s a grim fate, though not uncommon. Five million Americans currently suffer from Alzheimer’s Disease, which is only one of several kinds of dementia. Dementia is predicted to reach epidemic proportions worldwide by 2050 – by which time I’ll probably have it, if I’m still alive. So I wrote my monthly column for the local paper about how my family coped with my mother’s final year of care, figuring my story probably isn’t that unique. Ironically, now that medicine can keep our bodies going so long, we have to decide how we want to live, which means we also have to consider how we want to die.

Now, I’m writing about how we write about death right here. And I doubt that I’m done yet. But for now – and for this blog – it seems important to restate the obvious: We writers have an obligation to articulate the truth as we see it, to say the hard things, to tell the stories that are sometimes painful, to point out the conundrums our culture has created, to confront our readers with our thoughts, so they can push against them and discover their own.

It’s a great responsibility, being a writer in this world. And for those of us for whom writing is as essential as breathing air, writing is also a great comfort, especially in the face of death.

Deborah Lee Luskin is a novelist, essayist and educator. She keeps bees and chickens in southern Vermont. Learn more at www.deborahleeluskin.com.

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Manuscript – ngh. Time to face the music

I looked at my to-do list as I sat down in front of my computer this morning. I always write it in the evening as a way to ground me, to let me know what lies ahead for the next day.

The problem with doing this though, is that sometimes the shorthand I use at night is not the same shorthand I use during the day. I read through my list:

Photo credit: Edgar Sousa

Manuscript – ngh

I knew I was making reference to the manuscript I’ve been challenged to finish by the end of the month, “ngh”? “ngh”? What was I trying to say?

And then with a sinking heart I realized that “ngh” was my code for:

“not gonna happen”

Last night as I made my list filled with plans to write articles and blog posts that were due (and go to the bank, and pick up vitamins), I also decided to give up the ghost on my book challenge.

It seemed like a doable challenge when Julie and I made the pact at that writer’s dinner a few weeks back. Finish what both of us had already started by the end of the month, it should be a breeze right? After all, both of us are writers.

But then life got in the way. Cars sprung oil leaks which reduced this family of 8 – 4 of which are working – to one car, requiring our best Excel spread sheet skills to organize. Driving people to where they needed to be became a full time job. Members of our flock got sick enough to land in the hospital for a few days. College kids (some for whom the worry never stops) needed to get ready to go back to college, and a little part time job taken to ensure gymnastic costs are covered each month ended up taking more time than expected as I put my feet sore from not having to stand for hours at a time e;evated on the couch pillows each time I’d come home.

Layer all of this on top of my regular writing (I was assigned 5 newspaper articles for August and am still waiting to hear about 3 ptiches), working on (paying) marketing jobs, and trying to keep up with my blogging and well, what you get is a big, fat, NGH.

I’m not necessarily complaining, it’s more that I’m facing the facts.

Not being able to write happens, but quite frankly it also stinks. I dream of being a full time writer, having an office set away from my family (tiny house anyone) where I can go to compose and not be interrupted with questions like “Where is the peanut butter?”, “Can I hang with my friend?”, and “Mom, I need two more packages of notebook dividers for school. Can we go to the store now?”

Look, I get it. You can’t be a writer until you are a writer (just like you can’t get published until you are published.) No one takes a “wanna-be” writer seriously enough to not interrupt them or to not expect them to run the house, because in the end, what’s more important, writing a story or getting food on the table?

So even though I did make incredible progress, went to the library to write more times than I thought I’d be able to, and have 78 good solid pages, I’m not where I should be and I’m not finished. It’s not gonna happen…

…by the end of this month.

But it will happen, maybe by the end of September, or even October. I’m not giving up, I’ll never give up. I know that my life circumstances are not going to change any time soon, my family is not going away (and neither do I want them to) and the responsibility of maintenance like feeding this crew rests squarely on my shoulders.  It’s a package that I signed up for (although I’m not really sure I signed up for a dog that insists on barking enough to raise the household every morning at 5:30.)  I’m here.

What I’m saying is that I’m not going to sit around and wait for the perfect circumstances so that I can write – if I did that I could be waiting for a very long time (try infinity.)  Instead I’m going to continue to pinch off a few minutes here, steal an evening away there, and as long as I stick with it, *eventually* my book will get done.

***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens). (www.simplethrift.wordpress.com)

The life of a writer is to write, stumble, brush off the dirt from your bruises, and then continue writing.

Whether or not you succeed depends on whether or not you can get up and keep writing after each of the inevitable  falls.

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Wild – huh?

 

I just finished reading Wild – the book by Cheryl Strayed about her hiking the Pacific Coast Trail in an effort to find herself after her mother’s death. Trust me, I love a good “finding yourself” story, but this one wasn’t one. I love to hear how some events or an experience changed someone’s life. What lessons they learned and how they adjusted their moral compass as a result.

 

And while Wild was well written and certainly entertaining (although there were definitely parts I could have lived with out – the insertion of a menstrual cup comes to mind) it left me at the end saying “Huh? What just happened?” It wasn’t the book that was flawed as much as it was the ending.

 

In literally the last few (3 total) paragraphs of the book she ends her hike and fast forwards to a husband and children and 9 (nine!) years later. All of which left me a little confused.

 

Where’s the payoff? Where’s the application of what she learned to her life going forward? 

 

It feels like an editor somewhere said, “Okay, you’re done, you have enough word count. Bring it home, baby.”

 

Those who read this blog know that I’m a memoir junkie. It’s my most favorite genre. I love to hear how others have overcome, how they have persevered, and become stronger. I love to see how people cope with unbearable situations.

 

But the key is that you have to include that aspect of lessons learned in your story. If you write about a terrific experience (and let’s kid no one, the adventure that Strayed went on is worthy of a book) then you are obligated to your readers to not only bring it home but to weave those lessons into the story of your life so that we can benefit from your experiences and maybe learn how to cope ourselves if we come across a similar situation. Maybe if we read your book something will resonate in us and we won’t have to go on a multi-week trek to handle the death of our mother, or child, or whomever.

 

With memoirs, it’s not the journey that matters so much as it is the ability to learn from your mistakes and experiences in order to adjust and verbalize your life going forward. If you leave your readers hanging, or even worse, guessing about those lessons then you have not only lost your credibility as a writer, you have also lost your credibility as a memoirist.

 

***

 

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

 

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens). (www.simplethrift.wordpress.com)

And yeah, when I write my memoir, you can remind me of this post if I blow it. 

 

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Writing as a form of therapy

Sometimes it stinks being a writer. You can’t take a day off (well, of course, in reality you can, but you won’t get paid) and you have to write your articles even if you don’t feel like writing.

I recently felt that way. I didn’t feel like writing – so I relied on my favorite form of personal therapy when things are not going the way I had hoped.

Photo credit: Curtfleenor

I wrote. But I wrote the stuff I wanted to write.

It sounds odd but writing to me is like a form of therapy to another. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t “see” things. When a friend of mine feels down and goes to a fabric store, she talks about how a bolt of fabric would look great as a vintage A-line dress, I just don’t see it.

What I see is a bolt of cloth.

When another friend takes her blue mood into her studio and comes out with a wave-washed beach scene that just screams overcast, I don’t know how she does it.

What I see is a bunch of paints.

I don’t understand how they get from here to there.

But when I’m in pain, when I’m low – just lead me to a keyboard. I seem to be able to channel thoughts and ideas that I didn’t even know I had.

This past weekend I had such a mood. I’ve mentioned it before, we have Lyme in the house and as a result we have some sick kids. Really sick kids. The problem with Lyme is that like the holes in a dyke, once you get one leak patched up, another one pops up.

It’s never-ending.

It’s exhausting.

So I did what I do best. I sat down at my laptop and did some writing. It was the kind of writing I felt compelled to do (not the kind of writing that will get me a paycheck.) I started a blog (yeah, I really need to be involved in another blog right now, she said sarcastically) on what it looked like to have chronic Lyme in the family.

The blog is here: What it looks like to have Chronic Lyme and in it I used the language I had to explain what couldn’t be explained to anyone who hasn’t been there and who doesn’t “get it.”

While I don’t know where the blog will go and I don’t even know how long it will last, like my friend’s dress or painted scene, for now, it fills a need that I am able to very clearly see.

***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens). (www.simplethrift.wordpress.com)

And, trust me, I’ll keep writing about Lyme disease until everyone understands how important it is to know about it. 

//

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The unbearable reality of writing about your kids

I know that we’ve touched upon this topic before, but as a writer who writes personal memoir type stories, there is always a careful line to walk when writing about your kids.

In a recent blog post on my site, I wrote about one of my daughters having a hard time at school with some “mean girl” bullies (I know, the worst, right?) I wanted to show how it’s tough being a mama hen when one of your chicks is struggling (I write about chickens, remember?) I was careful to keep the focus on my view and not to misplace feelings of mine onto her.

I try at all times to be respectful of my children’s privacy.

In that same post I mentioned how another one of my kids is really suffering right now. And I mean really.

He’s got chronic Lyme and though he’s been on meds for several months, it was undiagnosed for so long (even though we went to 11 Doctors) that he’s having a rough time of it. Walking is difficult, holding a pen is difficult, his skin is breaking down, he’s got severe fatigue. He should be home but instead he is finishing out his freshman year at college.

My son is nothing short of an inspiration.

As a writer, I want to use his experience (through my eyes) to both inspire people who have this disease and also to warn others about the dangers. Lyme disease is not just a flu you get in the summer that goes away with a dose of medication. If left to proliferate, it can devastate your body.

My son is a living testament to that.

It’s tough because he’s very private, as he’s gotten sicker and sicker he wants less and less people to know.

But as his mom, as he gets sicker and sicker, I want to yell louder and louder.

LISTEN PEOPLE!

ESPECIALLY YOU MORONIC DOCTORS – KIDS ARE DYING BECAUSE NO ONE KNOWS HOW TO DIAGNOSE OR TREAT LYME DISEASE.

LISTEN UP BEFORE ANOTHER PERSON HAS TO UNNECESSARILY SUFFER.

And just as the Whos told Horten -

WE ARE HERE!!!!

But instead of yelling about it, I write about the disease and its impact. I’ve managed to place a few articles on Lyme disease (highlighting other families) and I continue to write, I write, I write material that may never see the light of day but I write.

My son finds an outlet in his studies, each class, each assignment, each test, gives him a goal for which to reach.

I find an outlet in my writing and like it or not, my kids’ stories are, like a beautiful tapestry, woven so tightly into mine that if one were to remove their individual threads, there would simply be nothing left to tell.

***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens).

They say that anger fuels passion. Consider me passionate about Lyme. 

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Build it and they will come – the power of seeing your book before it’s published

I subscribe to many writers’ newsletters. Sometimes I have the time to take a look at them, more often than not, I end up deleting them (and feeling a little guilty about it.) I just don’t have the time to read them all.

But it was the post title (and the recommendation from a friend who told me to “build it and they will come” ) from Writetodone.com that intrigued me enough to open a particular email during a lull one weekend.

The title was “How to Make your Ebook a Run-Away Success: An Interview with Jim Kukral.” I’ve been paying a lot of attention to the marketing of ebooks lately what with all the hype around 50 Shades of Grey – the Twilight fan fiction that went nuts based on word of mouth. When done effectively, there is some potent mo-jo around emarketing of ebooks.

In a nutshell, Kukral defines these steps for your ebook:

Step 1: The very day when you have the idea of the book in your head, sit down, give the book a title, and write down who the book is for.
Step 2: The next step is to create a book cover. You can get that done  on Fiverr.com for only $5.
Step 3: Place the image of your bookcover on your blog, on Facebook, or wherever you tend to hang out. You can say, ‘Hey, I’m writing this book,’ and build anticipation. It’s like the way big movies do it. You can see the trailer long before the film is ready for viewing.
Step 4: Create a short video or blog post about your book idea with an email signup form. Six months down the track when you’ve actually written the eBook, you’ll already have a group of customers waiting for it.

Here’s the funny thing. These are pretty much the same steps you would take if you were writing a hardcopy book.

I have a book in mind, I’m trying to pitch it. It exists. The only problem is that, right now, at least, it’s not real to others.

So I followed the article’s advice and I went over to fiverr.com to get a book cover for my idea. Why not right? It certainly couldn’t hurt. After signing up and doing a search on book covers, I found someone who would create a cover for me (along with a 3-D cover for, you guessed it 5 dollars total.)

I filled out the designer’s form and waited the 3 days. Sure enough, I got an email message telling me that my book cover was done. I opened the file and what I saw took my breath away.

Not because it was so magnificent, in fact we ended up making a few small changes to the design, but because it took the book from my mind and turned it into a reality.

I’ve printed out this cover and I have it on the wall in my office. The psychological difference in “I’m writing a book” and “this is the book I’m writing” is HUGE. I liken it to those vision boards where you paste pictures of the things you want to happen in your life.

So here’s my advice to you. Even if the thought of a book is just a gleam in your eye, figure out a title, go over to fiverr.com, and spend 5 dollars turning that gleam into something that is concrete. Print out that cover and post it on your office wall, as well as by your bed, so that it’s the last thing you see at night and the first thing you see each morning.

And then go out and tell all your friends that you are writing a book.

***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens).

Look at me, I’m building. 

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What is Truth?

I find that when I am wrestling with a question the universe challenges me by adding fuel to my musings. Not answers, really.  Just more angles to consider.

A few months ago a good friend asked me to read his WIP, a memoir. I read the first few chapters, and then slowed down and started again. His writing made two things very clear. First, that this is a painful mining of his past. And second, that he is a very talented writer. But, in my opinion, telling the truth was getting in the way of telling the story.

And then I heard an interview of an author who had written a novel that was based on the death of his wife. When asked why it wasn’t a memoir, he said that it was his truth but that others,  including and especially his wife’s mother, would disagree with his truth. Deciding to make the book a novel freed him up to go to dark places, and tell the story completely.

And then the Mike Daisey/This American Life story broke. And truth v. storytelling, theater v. journalism and other points of discussion were parsed in many forums, and with high emotion. As a theater person I have had a number of conversations about this in the last week. But is it is the idea of memoir v. novel that I’ve been wrestling with as a writer.

Now, I value truth as much as anyone. And quantifiable truth should be respected. But to tell a good story (not a piece of journalism, a story) I think the truth gets in the way. Feeling that you have to adhere to a timeline, when condensing scenes or rearranging them would make it more powerful? Fiction wins. Having all five of your aunts in your story, when you could compile one composite aunt character to help the reader keep track? One aunt wins. Making those changes and still considering your work memoir? Doesn’t work.

And here’s the other reason I advocate making it up. You become braver. You make those emotional leaps you may avoid for fear of hurting feelings. Or you face your own truth, and spin it a bit so that you can tell it without panic.  Or you can be harder on yourself, or easier. You can use your truth to inform the story, and use your craft to tell it the best way possible. And that may mean playing with the facts. Which makes it fiction.

And in fiction, truth is overrated.

***************

J.A. Hennrikus is the Executive Director of StageSource. She is a mystery writer who has her story “Her Wish” published in DEAD CALM, an anthology by Level Best Books. She is a huge social media fan, and tweets under @JulieHennrikus. She wrestles with allusions of athleticism, is an avid theater goer and a proud member of Red Sox nation. Her website is jahennrikus.com

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Hooking your reader with your first line

“I hold them gently and whisper a soft apology before I slit their throats.”

Photo credit: L. Marie

When I put that on my facebook page, one follow-up response said that it would make a great first line to a murder mystery. In reality, my comment wasn’t that exciting, I was actually talking about our roosters and it described the routine I perform before we harvest them. With background knowledge, the line turns from being macabre to well, one that is sort of sad. It loses all of its power.

But the fact is, it would have made a GREAT first line to a book because without that background knowledge, it allows one’s imagination to create all kinds of scenarios (of which harvesting a rooster probably doesn’t even make it into the top ten.)

It got me thinking about how incredibly important that first line of a book is.

In my role as a reporter, I am trained to put who, what, when, where, and how right up front. Just the facts mam. People are in a hurry and they want to know what it’s all about. Now.

More Granite Staters continued to find jobs last month, according to the most recent figures released by the state on Monday.

No surprises here, the reader knows exactly what to expect. Trouble is, if you start a book off that way, people will close the cover sooner than you can say – Edward R Murrow award. There’s no magic, no suspense, no slitting of the throat, and certainly no reason to make anyone turn the page.

When I’m writing features, I’m given a little more leeway. I’m allowed to start with a lede or a hook, something that will pique my audience’s interest, as long as I don’t break the rule that all the missing information bits will come later (but not too much later) in the story.

Enjoy having things that go bump in the night with your dinner? If so, then you might want to check out the Common Man Restaurant in Merrimack long known for its stories of haunted and unexplainable happenings.

Although there is still information in that beginning (the understanding is that you will read something about ghosts and a restaurant) the article hints at a longer story that will be told. Feature articles are the bridge between reported articles and full fledged book stories.

When you begin writing a book, you have the absolute freedom to not supply any background information. Instead, you need to dramatically hook your reader in whatever way you can in order to make them turn that all important first page. Do this by using all your tools – you can be vague, you can shock, heck, you can even give human emotions to the brush that is sitting on the counter. You just need to catch someone’s eye.

That is the only goal of a story’s hook. It is not to introduce a character, or to plant a clue to the murder, its sole reason, like the tantrum of a 3 year old in the grocery store is simply to get someone’s attention. It is only after the hook is introduced that you can then, sentence by sentence, begin to let your story unfold.

Most people begin their memoirs with a life changing event, a traffic accident, a debilitating disease, or an obstacle that needed to be overcome. Mine begins with a warning from my husband before I left the house that Saturday morning.

“Don’t bring home any more chickens.”

With the beginning of a book, unlike an article, there is no promise that you’ll know everything right away (indeed the best books are the ones where on the final page, you end up smacking yourself on the forehead and saying “NOW, it all makes sense!”) Memorable books begin with a vague promise that although you might not understand everything immediately, if you stick with the author, eventually all will be made clear.

You just need to give your readers enough reason at the beginning to make them stay until the end.

So go ahead, give it a shot, go all out and create your best first opening sentence for a story in the comments below and let’s just see how many would be able to hook us into the literary nets of your story with just that one line.

 ***

Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens).

“This is my favorite book in the world, though I have never read it.”

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So you want to write a memoir?

As a journalist, I’m often assigned stories where I have to interview an individual. 

Guess what? The people I’m told to interview are not being written about because they are boring, “do-the-same-thing-everyday” people, they are chosen because they have done something extraordinary, something that is considered news-worthy. They have risen above life circumstances and they’ve done something that people want to read about.

I actually love these assignments. They tend to inspire and renew my faith in the condition of man.

But one thing that comes out all the time is that when I interview these people, invariably they say “I should write a book about all this.” Sometimes they should, sometimes they shouldn’t, that’s not my call but from my experience, if you want to write a memoir, at a minimum, this is what you will need for your story.

A story line
A good story line has a beginning, a middle, and an ending. It also has a plot with tension. Your experience shouldn’t be a breeze, we want conflict, we want to hear about getting a wrong diagnosis, being caught in an elevator when it’s time to deliver your baby, having your arm stuck between a rock and a hard place. If your experience doesn’t have a little bit of drama, a moment or two of “I don’t think she’s going to make it.” then it’s not going to be read by too many people.

Winning a multi-million dollar lottery is not going to make a good memoir. Winning that lottery and then spending all that money until you go into debt so that you have to work at a fastfood restaurant in order to feed your family and make ends meet, but learning there is honor in work – now that might be a story.

Just the facts ‘mam
Your memoir shouldn’t be your life story (unless you are incredibly famous and people might want to know everything about you) limit your story to the beginning, middle, and ending of your specific life adventure. This doesn’t mean that you can’t pull in relevant experiences from your past, by all means if faith kept you alive for 23 days on a raft then mention your Sunday school experiences as a child.

My point here is to limit the information. Make sure that everything supports the main experience, if it doesn’t then consider not keeping it in the story. Consider the extraneous the gristle on the steak, if you don’t get rid of it, your readers are going to have to work too hard and will probably end up leaving your book on the plate.

A memoir has to have an ending
A beginning, a middle, and an end. I talk to a lot of people who might have a good story but there is no ending yet, they haven’t finished chemotherapy, they haven’t risen above welfare, their child has finally gotten the medical help they’ve needed but have not fully recovered yet.

If you’re in the middle of an experience that you think might be good for a memoir, keep constant notes, maintain a journal, and hold onto all documents. You might even want to blog about it as it happens, the point is, you can’t write your memoir until there is some sort of closure to your experience (think a recovery, or rescue.) And please, if you have anger about your situation, let it cool off a bit before you write your memoir. Anger is a great motivator but it can also be quite the poisonous pill to writing making you seem bitter instead of victorious.

Could I do it?
The reason we read memoirs is because we want to learn from them. How did that guy find the strength to cut his arm off to survive? (and could I?) How did another mother battle illness while raising her large family (and could I?) What exactly does Daniel Craig do for his daily workout? (and can I pretend that I could? – see what I mean about famous people?)

Rise above
The point of a memoir is to show how you endured a terrible or unusual situation and you lived to tell about it. We want you to be a better person for having gone through what you did.

We do not want to hear about how chronic illness stinks, what we really want to know is how despite chronic illness stinking, you were able to overcome and persevere. Inspire us to become the better person you’ve become because of your experiences.

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 Wendy Thomas is an award winning journalist, columnist, and blogger who believes that taking challenges in life will always lead to goodness. She is the mother of 6 funny and creative kids and it is her goal to teach them through stories and lessons.

Wendy’s current project involves writing about her family’s experiences with chickens (yes, chickens).

And yes, I am currently working on a memoir about living with the children and chickens. 

Photo Credit: Chris Friese

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