This guest post is by Linda LaRoche. Linda LaRoche is a writer, editor and teacher. You can visit her website lindalaroche.com or read her blog The Quill.Someone asked me the other day if I’d be interested in writing their memoir because they can’t remember a thing. I said, “No, I can’t invent a life.”
The thought of memoir writing reminded me of when I started out as a columnist for The Pasadena Star News in Southern California. I met celebrities both young and seasoned. It was the year 2000 and my reporting involved attending charity events.
My primary interest was serving organizations that had been under-represented. But if a cause caught my attention that was noteworthy, whether or not it had celebrity philanthropists, I covered it just the same.
My second month on the job, I met actor Robert Stack, famous for his television role in the Untouchables. It was Fat Tuesday. He asked me if I knew the series that was on the air when I was a toddler. I told a half-white lie, I said I did. Truth is I vaguely remembered his voice, not the series.
During the reception, they were serving apple martinis on trays, no doubt for their green color. When they held one up to me, in a gracious attempt I accepted. But I have a hard time not making a face when I drink alcohol. He laughed at my facial contortion. Needless to say I quickly got rid of it. I didn’t remember meeting him or the apple martini until last weekend, when at a restaurant I saw a woman drinking one.
All of which made me think how much memory is inside all of us, just waiting for someone to prod us and make it come out.
In my creative writing class when students are required to write a short-story, they often write about themselves. It’s a good idea to write what you know, and I’ve encouraged some to turn their story into a memoir. Character-driven stories make for a good read, however, memoirs in today’s market are written by a ghostwriter for a celebrity, so the competition is stiff.
Here are seven tips for writing a memoir:
1. Make it about a particular time in your life, keep in mind it’s not an entire life-time, that’s an autobiography.
2. Ask yourself—what is this about?
3. Make an argument—it’s crucial that we like your character. Your prose must read more like fiction (recollections) versus non-fiction (dates and facts) for the reader to care.
4. Keep it light—its’ personal reminiscing and we don’t need every single detail.
5. Have the character change—the experience may prove therapeutic for the writer but the reader has to witness an evolution.
6. Be open to rewrites. Don’t think with a first draft you have finished! If you want to be good at writing, then write, write and write!
7. Keep a word count—don’t focus on numbers until you are revising and editing. While there isn’t a magic number, a good range for a book is between 65,000 to 90,000 words.
PRACTICE
Write for fifteen minutes, without stopping, on a memory.
Remember the first day of school? What smells remind you of summertime?
Please share your comments in the practice section.
Joe Bunting is an author and the leader of The Write Practice community. He is also the author of the new book Crowdsourcing Paris, a real life adventure story set in France. It was a #1 New Release on Amazon. Follow him on Instagram (@jhbunting).
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