Writing memoir

Memoir Writing Advice to a Young and Hopeful Writer

August 4, 2021 by Lisa Tener

Javier (not his real name) contacted me for memoir writing advice because he had a story to tell. And he wasn’t sure he knew how to tell it.

This book will be about navigating my life as a black, gay man. It will address my coming out experiences, gay stereotypes, getting involved with men who are considered down low (men who sleep with men, but are married or in a companionship with women) and homophobia in the church, particularly the black church. Also, battling depression, a mental issue that affects many gay men. Basically I want this book to serve as a source of motivation for those struggling with their sexuality and wanting to live in their truth.

(Shared with permission)

I read that and knew this book needed to be written. The only question in my mind was how? So we spoke by phone.

writing memoir — Photo by Brad Neathery on Unsplash

Javier thought he wanted a ghostwriter. His goal is to become a motivational speaker and inspire others, the way he’d been inspiring his friends, the people in group therapy and an occasional stranger who crossed his path.

How do motivational speakers write their books? Don’t they hire ghostwriters?
Well, yes, many do, but that doesn’t mean it’s how to write your memoir.

My memoir writing advice? When I discovered Javier had about $2,000 in mind, I told him to save his money. As in save up. Not for a writer but for an editor.

Earlier in our conversation he’d told me about his A’s in English, the feedback that people enjoyed his writing, were moved by it.

“Write your own memoir,” I told him. And then I told him how to write a memoir:

Read great memoirs:

Anything by Augusten Burroughs
Any memoir by Mary Karr
Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward

Of course, I’m tempted to add others, Educated or The Glass Castle, or even to read more memoirs myself, memoirs that might particularly touch this young man, but I stop myself. Three’s enough for now.

We want you writing, too. Not just reading!

Read great books about writing memoir:

the art of memoir writing — Mary Karr’s raw and instructive book on writing memoir

Mary Karr’s The Art of Memoir: Karr’s humorous and confessional style come through here, as in all her memoirs, making for an entertaining read, as well as an instructional one.
Stephen King’s On Writing: part memoir and part writing instruction, this book offers some of King’s best advice on writing and shows that a memoir need not be long to be potent.
Regina Brooks’ You Should Really Write a Book, which teaches you how to write, market and sell your memoir.

Start writing. Use one of these memoir writing books as instructional: write as you read.

There aren’t many rules. Here are a few to get you started.

Don’t start at your birth.
Don’t start with where you dad was born.
Don’t start with a generic summary of things that happened often.
Instead, begin with one specific moment in time, in a particular place. In other words, ground us, your readers, in time and space.
It’s not a bad idea to have an outline. Gather some sense of the stories or scenes you want to share, in some kind of order that feels organic or juicy or potent. But know that your outline will probably change, maybe dramatically. Mary Karr so aptly calls memoir an “art” for a reason. Be flexible.
And do you need to write it in order of the outline? No. That’s the beauty of an outline. You can start wherever you feel led in the moment, whatever scene excites you right now, and yet your outline gives you a feelng of security, that you have a spot in the book to place it. Later, much later, you can spread the papers across your dining room floor, as my friend, the writer Stuart Horwitz, does in his book architecture method. But for now, rest in the comfort of your rough outline. Some structure is a good thing. It’s the bowl to pour your soup into so the soup doesn’t stain your tablecloth or burn your lap.

Get Support for Your Memoir Writing & Create Community

Find or start a memoir writing circle:
Find an accountability partner who is also writing memoir: Schedule a regular time, at least once a week, when you will answer 5 simple questions together in order to stay on track with writing. Don’t coach each other. Don’t spend time talking your partner into writing or changing. Just answer the 5 questions. It shouldn’t take more than 10-15 minutes and these 5 questions will greatly empower you to stay on track and write, write, write.
Subscribe to my newsletters and author interviews. By receiving a weekly newsletter or author interview about book writing, and by opening that email, you keep that book alive in your psyche, support making the time to write, learn more and experience being part of a writing community.
Ask questions, make comments: If a current article doesn’t address your questions or situation, search the blog for an article that meets you where you are, or ask your questions anyway, on any post, and I will answer.
Join a Group: For some people, social media can be a distraction. For others, it offers community, accountability a nd other forms of support. So, know what works for you, and if you need a little extra support and community, check out my Facebook group: Write and Create with Lisa Tener.

A few more things

Save your money: You’ll want a quality editor once your book is written—first, for developmental editing, then for line editing. Really, save up. Put something in your “for memoir editing” jar every single day. Javier is giving himself 18-24 months to write his book. You can store up a lot of money in 730 days!
Read this post about keeping your writing momentum.

Do you have any advice for Javier? Or just a few words of encouragement? Please share them below. Have questions about a memoir you’re writing? Just ask.

Finding Your Writing Voice by Taking Risks on the Page

May 22, 2017 by Lisa Tener

[bctt tweet=”Finding Your Writing Voice: from Meek to Bold” username=”LisaTener”]

rhea discovering her writing voice — Rhea at Machu Picchu

At 72, Rhea Atwood found herself in her comfortable California apartment feeling her bed was “too soft.”

“I decided to listen to my bed and waited a few days for it to tell me what to do about it.”

Rhea spent the next four years following in the footsteps of the French Huguenots across the globe, visiting 17 countries and 5 continents, and surfing on a number of couches through couchsurfing.

Previously a cautious risk taker, Rhea became, in her own words, intrepid. At times she had no money and no place to stay. Can you imagine? And yet she persisted.

Now, Rhea is writing a book about her experiences.

Although Rhea has written a walking guide and a book of historic photographs–Boston’s French Secrets and Upper Beacon Hill–her current project is her first foray into more narrative writing (the self-help memoir). With a change in genre comes the search to find her writing voice.

My advice? “Take risks on the page. In the same way you took risks by traveling alone at 72 through 76, not knowing where you’d stay or sometimes how you’d pay for it, you need to be adventurous on the page.”

How to Take Risks on the Page

Experiment with syntax: try super-short sentences or paragraphs in one chapter. Play with rhythm. Write a prose poem in one chapter. Or think jazz in Paris, African beats in Morocco.
Play with dialogue: try a whole chapter around dialogue.
Imagine: If you don’t remember how you felt or what you did, ask yourself, “What might I have felt?” You can always change it later, but this exercise can open the door to memory.
“Get Carnal” (Mary Karr‘s advice in The Art of Memoir): Keep asking yourself how something felt in your body, where in your body you felt it, how your body reacted to something, what you did with your body. These questions will help your readers experience the event along with you, as first hand.
Practice another point of view: The hotel concierge in Rome, the archivist in Transylvania, the stray dog in Nice.
Innovate around features: How about offering creative exercises, questions for reflection, sidebars, videos or cartoons?
Try on new forms: a prose poem in one chapter, a song in another.

These are experiments. Some–maybe many–of them will fail. Perhaps, miserably. Yet, in the experimenting, you will find your voice.

How Risky Should I Get?

I found myself in a related conversation just an hour later with another client, a therapist, who is about to speak with a publisher interested in his book. He admitted that he tried to retain a fairly neutral voice. After all, that’s his training.

He wondered though:

What if he didn’t hold back so much?
What if he put himself out there?
Was he doing the right thing by meeting his readers where he assumed they are?
Or should he be bolder, more vulnerable, share his spiritual orientation?
Would he alienate his readers if he shared his religious and spiritual side?

Would the more prescriptive book have broader appeal? Or should he share his deeper thoughts and experiences?

We agreed he would pick one chapter and experiment. He could always change it back. But if he never tried, he’d never know.

He can explore this question again with his acquisitions editor, once he signs a contract, but just playing with a chapter and seeing what happens is the perfect place to start, to take a risk, to see writing as a true adventure.

My Turn, Your Turn: Take Risks Together

Me in Bangkok taken with the world’s worst phone camera (Samsung J3)

In less than 48 hours I begin my second trip to Bangkok to teach another writing workshop and do some writing of my own.

Last trip was an adventure in spontaneity and trust. The same intention I brought to my travels opened up my writing. I tried things I’d never tried before. Some of it didn’t work at all. Other parts, I’m kind of excited about.

So this trip, I’m tempted to return to the places I visited. To look with more trained eyes. To go deeper. So I can write in more detail.

But I’m letting go of that.

Aside from the day I teach at NIDA Business School, I’m going to play, be open to adventure and see what happens in my travels and my writing.

I’m bringing several writing projects but planning on working on none or all or some. I don’t know. I may just journal.

I’m enjoying the sense of freedom of allowing myself to not know, to be open to infinite possibilities, to wait and see what draws my eye, my ear, my pen.

How about you? Any risks you feel inspired to take? Any adventures that helped you find your writing voice? Please share your comments.

Do You Include Backstory in Your Memoir?

April 19, 2013 by Lisa Tener

Book writing coach Lisa Tener — Your Book Coach

In a book consultation a few days ago, I suggested that a client could make her story more compelling by cutting the backstory (her first chapter was actually called “backstory”–cute in theory but ho-hum-ish in reality).

Rather than make the backstory the appetizer of her book, I suggested the author envision it as a spice to sprinkle judiciously.

In general–and there can be exceptions–when you start with the agonizing details of your drawn out illness on page 1, you lose us. We want to hear about the day it all started to change when you joined a group of strangers and struggled up the mountaintop pre-dawn, all judgmental and insecure.

Sure, as you’re headed up the mountain, give us a little backstory, but we don’t need the loooooooong version.

In fact, the term “backstory” is often used in fiction and film where the backstory helps the writer connect with a character in order to write in that character’s voice and understand the character’s actions. Backstory can also help readers understand a character or narrator– and her circumstances–more deeply. But think actively about what readers need and will keep them engaged.

Be selective. Even if you do want to start with your predicament (such as the illness I mentioned earlier), one paragraph of spot-on description can be more powerful than a whole chapter of same. And, remember, in a memoir, as in a novel, you need to grab readers with something engaging or suspenseful from your first sentence.

Ask your memoir questions here…

Joining the James Frey: Is it Okay to Lie in Your Memoir?

May 17, 2011 by Lisa Tener

a million little pieces — James Frey's Fictionalized Memoir (or Memoirized Fiction?)

Oprah’s interviews with James Frey and the recent article in Salon about his first interview with Oprah drew intense emotions on both sides of the issue. Some say memoir is fiction anyway–who can really remember honestly exactly what happened in one’s life? So what’s a little tinkering with truth? Others say James Frey is ruining it for everyone (everyone being serious writers of memoir) because as readers question the veracity of all memoirs, memoirs lose their power–why not just read fiction? And some say, “Who cares?”

I’m in the “I care” camp. While there’s no way to capture “the absolute truth” and certain conventions, like dialogue, are generally understood to be an approximation of a conversation colored by the memory and perception of the author, there’s a difference between getting as close to the truth as you can and out and out lying.

Frey told Oprah, “I don’t have a lot of respect for memoir. I think most writers of memoirs do what I do. You play around with things. You tell the best story you can.” Whoa, sounds like a bit of a sociopath to me. But it does beg the question new writers often ask me:

“What can I (and can’t I) do with the truth in my memoir?”

Here are my suggestions:

In general, don’t make stuff up about people and don’t make up characters–that’s fiction.
Which brings me to my next point. When is it okay to make stuff up? When you tell your readers up front. If you want to protect someone’s identity, have a note at the beginning of the book saying that you changed some identifying information about a person–and change a few details so they won’t be recognized.
Too many characters? I’d say it’s okay to do what Shirley MacLaine did in Out on a Limb–she offered an author’s note at the beginning that said one of the characters in the book was fictional, but was a composite of several true friends of hers. The events were real, but in the interest of narrative she made these different friends all one character. Why is it okay? Because she told us up front! If she hadn’t, it wouldn’t be okay.
Verify whatever information you can–dates, weather, whether a particular song was even out the year that you’re writing about. Anything that doesn’t fit with the truth will call your whole story into question–so research the details you think you remember to make sure you’re as accurate as can be.

What if you can’t quite remember what happened? As you write, experiment. See if you can:

1. Interview others from your past who may be able to jog your memory.

2. Visit places that may help you remember details.

3. Start writing about the parts you do remember.

What if your story includes someone else’s? One of my book writing course participants wanted to include some of her mother’s story in her memoir. She interviewed her mother but there were important gaps. She told the story, spelling out that she imagined much of that chapter based on the information her mom had given her.

Why didn’t Frey sell his book as fiction? He tried and he couldn’t.

Does it pay to lie? It seemed so when Frey’s book made him millions. But now that he’s involved in lawsuits, it seems that Karma may catch up with the uber-creative memoirist. If you really want to make stuff up, do so–just call it fiction.