top of page
Search

So You Want to Write a Memoir

string of cartoon pictures with paperclip and text "writing your memoirs"

It's finally happened. The words are spilling forth, ink's spraying everywhere and/or keys are clicking at a pace too fast to hear as singular sounds. You're writing about something that started last year on a gray, rainy Friday and has just now (earlier this afternoon in fact) finished with an explosive finale! You were in the midst of it and it was a life-changing experience! Pearls were clutched, lips were bit, and gasps were... well, gasped. Reading over your manuscript, you decide that it's official. This is going to be your next work and it's going to be an amazing story! What exactly is this hodgepodge of words and experiences? Can it all be swept under the autobiographical label?


Congrats! You're most likely writing a memoir! 



What's a Memoir?


A memoir is a book written based on an author's personal memories. 


- So like A Million Little Pieces by James Frey.


Hmm... Almost, but not quite. While it's true that A Million Little Pieces was first classified as a memoir, later on the author admitted that he made up several parts of it for "obvious dramatic reasons" and it's now listed as a semi-fictional novel since only some parts are true. Let's try again.


A memoir is a nonfiction book based on an author's personal memories. 


- Wait, that sounds like an autobiography! Does this mean that The Story of My Life by Helen Keller is a memoir? 


Well, The Story of My Life usually goes through a person's entire life (or in the case of this book by Helen Keller, the first twenty years of her life). In this case it's correct to say that this book of hers is more autobiography than a memoir. Let's try a third time. 


A memoir is a nonfiction book written based on the author's personal memories written as a collection of intimate and expressive experiences, emotions, feelings, or events at an important time in their life. 


Does Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong count? 

Absolutely! And Eat, Pray, Love is a memoir as well! If it helps, the word "memoir" itself comes from the French word mémoire meaning memory. Usually memoirs are written as a collection of experiences, emotions, feelings, and events from a certain period of their lives. 



So, All I Need to Do to Write a Memoir is Jot Down Memories? 


Like most genres, when it comes to writing in them there are common structures; memoirs aren't an exception. 


  • Theme - collecting memories around a specific theme, usually focused on something the author feels is important, or wants to convey a message about (

  • Struggle & Strength - writing about a struggle and how it affected their life (family problems, finding a job, homelessness, addictions, loss, etc.)

  • Chronological - having everything happen in the timely order that they happened in 

  • Flashback - time travel is real and you can see it in memoirs! These flashbacks are written in a way that has the reader jumping to the left and stepping to the right between the past and present.


These aren't everything you can do with memoirs, and don't feel that you need to stick to only one way of writing. Mix and match to find out what works best for the message or information you wish to convey. Do you want your theme to be in chronological order? How about arranging your struggles by theme; family problems, workplace worries, relationships and repairs. 



Writing a Memoir is Similar to Writing Genre Fiction 


You're still trying to hook your reader, which means you'll need strong starting sentences reeling them in, and there's still the overarching plot of your book. If you start with your ending, make sure to give readers a reason to continue reading; if you finish with your ending, your readers should be on the ride with you the entire way.


Don't forget research! Sure, you have your memories, but what about what you wrote down during those times (diaries, journals, notes to yourself, etc.) and even what others have written about you (yearbook entries, medical notes, pieces in the local newspaper, old school records, etc.). 


Start with your thoughts, that idea that sparked and drew energy. Then move onto your one-sentence explanation. That single thought can help you narrow down your experiences to focus on the message you want to share in this book (and if you have more memories, why not write a second book?). For your sentence, try to include your character (you), your theme, and what you want to tell people. This is supposed to be an intimate dive into the emotions and feelings that you experienced, not a drier account of what happened. 



Why Write a Memoir? 


Why not add to all the ones already out there? If there's something on your mind, a message that you wished you could have heard when you were younger, or you have an itch to write about your time traveling in a foreign country, those are all great ideas! 


Also check out these great videos:

Telling Your Story with Patti Procopi



About the author: Coffee Quills is a quaffer of coffee, a hugger of hedgehogs, and a slinger of ink. Writing under flickering neon lights, they take inspiration from a range of media and enjoy mashing together genres as they write. Post-nuclear apocalypse cozy mystery? Working on it! Detecting in a steampunk/magic ocean-side fantasy? Sounds good too! Most of their writing has an optimistic slant to it with found families, protection, and love wins being found in most (if not all in varying degrees) of their writing. Describing Coffee is akin to describing one part of a patchwork cloak, and that can be seen in their writing. Spells, Snow, & Sky is a polyamorous paranormal romance, but they also write for 4thewords (an online RPG for writers) and have horror drabbles published with The Horror Tree and Black Hare Press, not to mention a few post-apocalyptic books. Coffee runs on ink and is a friendly person, so feel free to say hello on BlueSky, Twitch, or in 4thewords!

Comments

bottom of page