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memoir writing

A Lifetime Can’t be Summed Up in One Letter

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A Lifetime Can’t be Summed Up in One Letter
“As I near age 80, I feel that the story I have carried in my heart since childhood should be written,” begins a letter to the Chicago Tribune published last week. The letter goes on to summarize the writer’s happy childhood, which takes a total of eight paragraphs.
It’s nice that a major newspaper gives people the opportunity to relate their memories, but this also made me sad. The letter-writer is 80 years old and bursting with the desire to share the story she’s has carried in her heart all these years. So why has she waited until age 80? You can never be sure that you will be physically and mentally capable of sharing your story if you wait. Also, why limit your reach to one letter in one newspaper when you can write a book to have forever or list on amazon.com?
One of our WriteMyMemoir authors who asked us to publish his memoir started out last summer with 20 books. He’s already twice asked us to print up 20 more, because people see the book and want a copy for themselves. It’s so special to have a memoir available! As the New Year approaches, think about what you want your life to represent. You can shape the concept people have of you by crafting it in a memoir, and you don’t have to wait until your golden years or limit yourself to eight paragraphs when you have a whole book in you to write!
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-vp-1224voicelettersbriefs-20111224,0,5671839.story?page=3

“As I near age 80, I feel that the story I have carried in my heart since childhood should be written,” begins a letter to the Chicago Tribune published last week. The letter goes on to summarize the writer’s happy childhood, which takes a total of eight paragraphs.

It’s nice that a major newspaper gives people the opportunity to relate their memories, but this also made me sad. The letter-writer is 80 years old and bursting with the desire to share the story she has  carried in her heart all these years. So why has she waited until age 80? You can never be sure that you will be physically and mentally capable of sharing your story if you wait. Also, why limit your reach to one letter in one newspaper when you can write a book to have forever or list on amazon.com?

One of our WriteMyMemoir authors who asked us to publish his memoir started out last summer with 20 books. He’s already twice asked us to print up 20 more, because people see the book and want a copy for themselves. It’s so special to have a memoir available! As the New Year approaches, think about what you want your life to represent. You can shape the concept people have of you by crafting it in a memoir, and you don’t have to wait until your golden years or limit yourself to eight paragraphs when you have a whole book in you to write!

For Memoir Research, You CAN Go Home Again

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For Memoir Research, You Can Go Home Again
We’re all so mobile these days! Many of us have moved several times since birth and today live nowhere near what we’d identify as our hometown. As seniors, we often relocate to wherever our children’s whims have taken them! Maybe as you write your memoirs, it’s time to go home again.
“If you are tracing your family’s history, few activities are more thrilling than traveling to your ancestor’s village or gravesite,” claims the “senior travel” section of about.com. “Standing where your forebears walked long ago is an amazing experience.” Calling this research a “genealogy vacation,” the piece has a few suggestions:
Schedule enough time to just wander.
Spend enough time there to soak up the culture by doing things like eating in a family-owned restaurant, attending a worship service, visiting the area’s historical museum and chatting up the locals.
Talk to everyone about your memoir. You may find someone who knew your family or who has a colorful anecdote to share about the town.
Take a GPS or map so you don’t get lost! If the townspeople do not speak in your native tongue, also bring a good dictionary for their language.
The obvious: take tons of photographs.
The not-so-obvious: keep a journal of your experiences and a written log of the photos, in order.
Next week, between Christmas and New Year’s, is a great time to schedule this type of visit. You probably have some time off work, and the town will be decorated and cheery.

We’re all so mobile these days! Many of us have moved several times since birth and today live nowhere near what we’d identify as our hometown. As seniors, we often relocate to wherever our children’s whims have taken them! Maybe as you write your memoirs, it’s time to go home again.

“If you are tracing your family’s history, few activities are more thrilling than traveling to your ancestor’s village or gravesite,” claims the “senior travel” section of about.com. “Standing where your forebears walked long ago is an amazing experience.” Calling this research a “genealogy vacation,” the piece has a few suggestions:

  • Schedule enough time to just wander.
  • Make sure to soak up the culture by doing things like eating in a family-owned restaurant, attending a worship service, visiting the area’s historical museum and chatting up the locals.
  • Talk to everyone about your memoir. You may find someone who knew your family or who has a colorful anecdote to share about the town.
  • Take a GPS or map so you don’t get lost! If the townspeople do not speak in your native tongue, also bring a good dictionary for their language.
  • The obvious: take tons of photographs.
  • The not-so-obvious: keep a journal of your experiences and a written log of the photos, in order.

Next week, between Christmas and New Year’s, is a great time to schedule this genealogy visit. You probably have some time off work, and the town will be decorated and cheery.

An Outline Can Organize Your Memoir

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An Outline Can Organize Your Memoir
A comment prompted by last week’s blog asked for more advice in getting started on a memoir. Creating an outline is an effective strategy because it’s an easier first step than writing a chapter, and the structure will guide you throughout the entire writing process.
Any decent word processing program will help you to format the outline. One common design uses, in order: roman numeral, capital letter, arabic number, lower-case letter, arabic number in parentheses, lower-case letter in parentheses and lower-case roman numeral in parentheses. You probably won’t even need to get into that level of detail. The idea is to trigger your memory and organize your thoughts so that you know where you’re going next. When applied to a memoir, it might look like this:
I. Childhood
A. Parents’ background
B. Siblings
C. School
D. Friends
E. Teen Years
II. Early Adulthood
A. 20s
1. First jobs
2. Meeting spouse
a. Courtship & marriage
b. Spouse’s family background
3. Birth of first child
B. 30s
1. New career
a. Night classes
b. Job at Company X
(1) Promotions
(a) Supervisor
(b) District manager
(i) Incident in New York
(ii) Company growth
c. Job at Company Y
2. Children
You can fill it in with a lot more—entire sentences if you like. You also don’t have to go in chronological order; check this page for other organizational options. When you become a WriteMyMemoirs member and go through our helpful interview process, a time line is created that serves as a type of outline for you. It provides cues to notable dates in your education and career, and we are working on a second time line that will organize your family life in the same way. We’re here to help, so please ask if you still have questions.

A comment prompted by last week’s blog asked for more advice in getting started on a memoir. Creating an outline is an effective strategy because it’s an easier first step than writing a chapter, and the structure will guide you throughout the entire writing process.

Any decent word processing program will help you to format the outline. One common design uses, in order: roman numeral, capital letter, arabic number, lower-case letter, arabic number in parentheses, lower-case letter in parentheses and lower-case roman numeral in parentheses. You probably won’t even need to get into that level of detail. The idea is to trigger your memory and organize your thoughts so that you know where you’re going next. When applied to a memoir, it might look like this:

I. Childhood

A. Parents’ background

B. Siblings

C. School

D. Friends

E. Teen Years

II. Early Adulthood

A. 20s

1. First jobs

2. Meeting spouse

a. Courtship & marriage

b. Spouse’s family background

3. Birth of first child

B. 30s

1. New career

a. Night classes

b. Job at Company X

(1) Promotions

(a) Supervisor

(b) District manager

(i) Incident in New York

(ii) Company growth

c. Job at Company Y

2. Children

You can fill it in with a lot more—entire sentences if you like. You also don’t have to go in chronological order; click here for other organizational options. When you become a WriteMyMemoirs member and go through our helpful interview process, a time line is created that serves as a type of outline for you. It provides cues to notable dates in your education and career, and we are working on a second time line that will organize your family life in the same way. We’re here to help, so please ask if you still have questions.

Good Week to Start Your Memoir

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Good Week to Start Your Memoir
Lately we’ve been getting a lot of new members at WriteMyMemoirs, and we want to welcome all of you. However, we notice that many of you who have signed up recently have not yet gotten into the nitty-gritty of the writing. This is a great week to start—especially for Americans—for several reasons:
1. Today is a sad anniversary in the U.S. You’ve probably compared notes many times about “Where were you when JFK was shot?” So you already have that scene of receiving tragic news burned into your memory. You were at school or at work or at home, or maybe serving your country. You can start a chapter just describing what life was like for you at the time, and then go back to earlier in your life as well as crafting chapters on what happened next.
2. Thanksgiving is a holiday of traditions. What are yours? Think about all of the Thanksgiving dinners you’ve cooked and attended, and how they’ve changed over the years. Begin with the one you liked to write about most. You even could use this as a theme and start each chapter with the scene of a special holiday or tradition to makes a truly unique memoir.
3. Get your memoirs underway now, and when the year ends you’ll have a six-week head start on what is sure to be one of your New Year’s resolutions!
We at WriteMyMemoirs wish all celebrants a Happy Thanksgiving!

Lately we’ve been getting a lot of new members at WriteMyMemoirs, and we want to welcome all of you. However, we notice that many of you who have signed up recently have not yet gotten into the nitty-gritty of the writing. This is a great week to start—especially for Americans—for several reasons:

  1. Today is a sad anniversary in the U.S. You’ve probably compared notes many times about “Where were you when JFK was shot?” So you already have that scene of receiving tragic news burned into your memory. You were at school or at work or at home, or maybe serving your country. You can start a chapter just describing what life was like for you at the time, and then go back to earlier in your life as well as crafting chapters on what happened next.
  2. Thanksgiving is a holiday of traditions. What are yours? Think about all of the Thanksgiving dinners you’ve cooked and attended, and how they’ve changed over the years. Begin with the one you’d like to write about most. You even could use this as a theme and start each chapter with the scene of a special holiday or tradition to make a truly unique memoir.
  3. Get your memoirs underway now, and when the year ends you’ll have a six-week head start on what is sure to be one of your New Year’s resolutions!

We at WriteMyMemoirs wish all celebrants a Happy Thanksgiving!

Online Research Supplies Memoir Details

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Online Research Supplies Memoir Details
To write your memoirs, you probably rely primarily on your own memory. But no one remembers everything accurately. If you and your sibling compare notes about an anecdote from your early family life, you’ll likely find discrepancies with no way to tell whose description is closer to what actually happened.
But some facts are verifiable. When and where was that uncle born? In what year did that neighbor die? What was the weather like that day? What street did that friend live on? All of these details add texture to your writing even if they’re not essential to the core of your story.
Today, you can locate many of these facts from the comfort of your computer desk. Most ancestral websites—ancestry.com and archives.com are two—require payment to get to the records. But they also tend to offer a free seven-day period to try out the site. You will have to register, but you won’t have to pay. As you write, leave the dates and places in question blank. When you’ve finished the rest of your memoir, make a list of all of the people you need to research, and try to fit that research into the free seven-day period. Weather on a day in history is easy—and free. Try almanac.com, farmersalmanac.com or weather.org. Finding an old address is trickier, and your best bet for that, as well as some birth, death and marriage records, is to go through local resources. Check out the tips at howtoinvestigate.com.

To write your memoirs, you probably rely primarily on your own memory. But no one remembers everything accurately. If you and your sibling compare notes about an anecdote from your early family life, you’ll likely find discrepancies with no way to tell whose description is closer to what actually happened.

But some facts are verifiable. When and where was that uncle born? In what year did that neighbor die? What was the weather like that day? What street did that friend live on? All of these details add texture to your writing even if they’re not essential to the core of your story.

Today, you can locate many of these facts from the comfort of your computer desk. Most ancestral websites—ancestry.com and archives.com are two—require payment to get to the records. But they also tend to offer a free seven-day period to try out the site. You will have to register, but you won’t have to pay. As you write, leave the dates and places in question blank. When you’ve finished the rest of your memoir, make a list of all of the people you need to research, and try to fit that research into the free seven-day period. Weather on a day in history is easy—and free. Try almanac.com, farmersalmanac.com or weather.org. Finding an old address is trickier, and your best bet for that, as well as some birth, death and marriage records, is to go through local resources. Check out the tips at howtoinvestigate.com.

The Elements of Style: Still Relevant?

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The Elements of Style: Still Relevant?
Writers unsure of their grammar often ask me to recommend a reference. After all these years, I still mention The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr., and E.B. White. Yes, that’s the same E.B. White who authored the children’s classic, Charlotte’s Web. If you ever took English 101 in college, you may have The Elements of Style sitting on a bookcase somewhere. First published in 1959, it was at one time a standard required text and, while some points are dated, I find that it has mostly stood the test of time.
When you think of a grammar or style book, you probably envision a huge, hardback, doorstop-worthy tome, but Struck and White’s soft-cover, 71-page booklet can fit into a coat pocket. Yet it covers everything from fine points of grammar to broad suggestions on style. Here’s one example of the more general advice, found under the topic, “Avoid fancy words”:
“Avoid the elaborate, the pretentious, the coy, and the cute. Do not be tempted by a twenty-dollar word when there is a ten-center handy, ready and able….If you admire fancy words, if every sky is beauteous, every blonde curvaceous, if you are tickled by discombobulate, you will have a bad time with [this reminder]….There is nothing wrong, really, with any word—all are good, but some are better than others….The line between the fancy and the plain, between the atrocious and the felicitous, is sometimes alarmingly fine.”

Memoir writers unsure of their grammar often ask me to recommend a reference. After all these years, I still mention The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr., and E.B. White. Yes, that’s the same E.B. White who authored the children’s classic, Charlotte’s Web. If you ever took English 101 in college, you may have The Elements of Style sitting on a bookcase somewhere. First published in 1959, it was at one time a standard required text and, while some points are dated, I find that it has mostly stood the test of time.

When you think of a grammar or style book, you probably envision a huge, hardback, doorstop-worthy tome, but Strunk and White’s soft-cover, 71-page booklet can fit into a coat pocket. Yet it covers everything from fine points of grammar to broad suggestions on style. Here’s one example of the more general advice, found under the topic, “Avoid fancy words”:

“Avoid the elaborate, the pretentious, the coy, and the cute. Do not be tempted by a twenty-dollar word when there is a ten-center handy, ready and able….If you admire fancy words, if every sky is beauteous, every blonde curvaceous, if you are tickled by discombobulate, you will have a bad time with [this reminder]….There is nothing wrong, really, with any word—all are good, but some are better than others….The line between the fancy and the plain, between the atrocious and the felicitous, is sometimes alarmingly fine.”

Twitter Watch: What You’re Missing

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Twitter Watch: What You’re Missing
You probably don’t tweet. That doesn’t mean you can’t join the twittersphere at twitter.com and follow other people’s tweets. Eventually you’ll pipe up when you have something to tweet about. Meanwhile, you can find out a lot in a short period of time, since each tweet is limited to 140 characters. WriteMyMemoirs does tweet, and we also follow others. Looking over the latest tweets from those we follow, we thought we’d share.
From GothamWriters, we learn that Anne Tyler once said, “For me, writing something down was the only road out.” TIMECulture recommends Backward Ran Sentences: The Best from Wolcott Gibbs. TheBookMaven supplies a link to an article promoting the universal practice of reading on the potty. BookReviews12 links to a review of Successful Executive’s Handbook. RandomHouse mentions that—who knew?—today is World Pasta Day. To retweet that post: “Holy Ravioli!”
Use Twitter as just another tool to guide you to sources and keep you motivated to write your memoirs. Do a search on twitter.com for “books,” “memoir,” “autobiography,” “life story,” “author” and anything else you think may pull up tweets you can follow for information pertaining to your memoir. Your own tweets can trace your journey of writing your memoir and link to online sources that help you. And don’t forget to follow WriteMyMemoirs on Twitter!
http://twitter.com/#!/writemymemoirs

You probably don’t tweet. That doesn’t mean you can’t join the twittersphere at twitter.com and follow other people’s tweets. Eventually you’ll pipe up when you have something to tweet about. Meanwhile, you can find out a lot in a short period of time, since each tweet is limited to 140 characters. WriteMyMemoirs does tweet—typically to alert people to the latest published or rumored memoir—and we also follow others. Looking over the latest tweets from those we follow, we thought we’d share.

From GothamWriters, we learn that Anne Tyler once said, “For me, writing something down was the only road out.” TIMECulture recommends Backward Ran Sentences: The Best from Wolcott Gibbs. TheBookMaven supplies a link to an article promoting the universal practice of reading on the potty. BookReviews12 links to a review of Successful Executive’s Handbook. RandomHouse mentions that—who knew?—today is World Pasta Day. To retweet that post: “Holy Ravioli!”

Use Twitter as just another tool to guide you to sources and keep you motivated to write your memoirs. Do a search on twitter.com for “books,” “memoir,” “autobiography,” “life story,” “author” and anything else you think may pull up tweets you can follow for information pertaining to your memoir. Your own tweets can trace your journey of writing your memoir and link to online sources that help you. And don’t forget to follow WriteMyMemoirs on Twitter

http://twitter.com/#!/writemymemoirs

You May Live On Digitally

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Publishing a memoir is one way to create a record of your life that lives on after you die. For many people, that’s the main motivation for writing one. Now consider this: you’re also creating a record, and possibly a less deliberate one, if you’re involved with social media. Every time you update your Facebook status or issue a tweet on Twitter, you’re leaving a written account of a piece of your life. Emails contribute to this, too.

Adam Ostrow, editor-in-chief of mashable.com, takes a closer look at the possibilities of the digital afterlife on a ted.com post. He speculates that people who miss you ultimately may be able interact with a hologram of you that communicates thoughts developed through a computer-generated guess at what you might say next based on what you’ve posted and tweeted in the past.

By that time, of course, it will all be out of your control. Such futuristic possibilities provide an even more compelling reason to write a memoir that you craft with purpose. Your own written account of your life will stand as a sort of “last word” on what you wanted to say and, ultimately, how you wanted to be remembered. It trumps a tweet that you may have issued in an emotional moment. So continue writing your memoir! Still, it’s interesting to contemplate what else will represent your life in years to come.

Beware the “Tell-All” Fallout

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Beware the “Tell-All” Fallout
If you’re planning on writing a memoir that dishes dirty family secrets, you might want to think it through. Be prepared for your family to be angry at you, because seeing their actions through your critical eyes does not tend to create harmony.
Moms haven’t had a good year in memoirland. There was Ashley Judd’s exposé of her famous country mama Naomi, which had both Naomi and Ashley’s half-sister Wynonna hopping mad. Next we heard about Katy Perry’s mother, who was not the subject of a memoir but, rather, the one who wrote her own memoir. In it, she lamented that Katy’s fashion taste and music were too risqué for her taste, an opinion that created what Katy’s father referred to as “tension” in the family.
The latest tell-all, set to hit stores on October 18, is Whateverland: Learning to Live Here, by Martha Stewart’s daughter Alexis Stewart. Reportedly, the book gives ample evidence supporting Alexis’s conclusion that her mom “was not interested in being kid-friendly.” But Alexis has hedged her bets by dedicating her memoir to none other than Martha dearest and proactively using the dedication to more or less ask forgiveness. The dedication reportedly says: “Thanks in advance to my mother for not getting angry about anything written in this book.” If your memoir trashes a family member, you might want to try that approach. Let us know if it works.

If you’re planning on writing a memoir that dishes dirty family secrets, you might want to think it through. Be prepared for your family to be angry at you, because seeing their actions through your critical eyes does not tend to foster harmony.

Moms haven’t had a good year in memoirland. There was Ashley Judd’s exposé of her famous country mama Naomi, which had both Naomi and Ashley’s half-sister Wynonna hopping mad. Next we heard about Katy Perry’s mother, who was not the subject of a memoir but, rather, the one who wrote her own memoir. In it, she lamented that Katy’s fashion taste and music were exceedingly risqué, an opinion that created what Katy’s father referred to as “tension” in the family.

The latest tell-all, set to hit stores on October 18, is Whateverland: Learning to Live Here, by Martha Stewart’s daughter Alexis Stewart. Reportedly, the book gives ample evidence supporting Alexis’s conclusion that her mom “was not interested in being kid-friendly.” But Alexis has hedged her bets by dedicating her memoir to none other than Martha dearest and proactively using the dedication to more or less ask forgiveness. The dedication reportedly says: “Thanks in advance to my mother for not getting angry about anything written in this book.” If your memoir trashes a family member, you might want to try that approach. Let us know if it works.

Memorable Memoir Titles

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Memorable Memoir Titles
Let’s look at some titles that aren’t just of the “My Life” variety but truly reflect the personality of the author/subject. To capture humor, many people go for a pun. We’ve already covered a lot of those in a previous Write My Memoirs blog.
I know that you can come up with something catchy for your memoir, because some of the most famous titles are those of memoirs. Cheaper By the Dozen recounted Frank B. Gilbreth Jr.’s years growing up in a big family. The full title of Frank McCourt’s best-seller is Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir, even though people refer to it by only its first two words. The quintessential Holocaust story, Elie Wiesel’s Night, is autobiographical, as are Maya Angelou’s iconic I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and the newer Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. The shortened titles of Barack Obama’s two autobiographical tomes, Dreams of My Father and The Audacity of Hope, already have become everyday phrases.
Your title does not have to be long. Even a one-word title can say a mouthful, previewing for the reader the key components of the contents. The currently popular Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali and comedienne Tina Fey’s Bossypants are good examples. If you want to make sure people know that your work is autobiographical, you can tack on the explanation after a colon, as in Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. Give it some thought! Your life deserves better than “My Life.”

Let’s look at some titles that aren’t just of the “My Life” variety but truly reflect the personality of the author/subject. To capture humor, many people go for a pun. We’ve already covered a lot of those in a previous Write My Memoirs blog.

I know that you can come up with something catchy for your memoir, because some of the most famous titles are those of memoirs. Cheaper By the Dozen recounted Frank B. Gilbreth Jr.’s years growing up in a big family. The full title of Frank McCourt’s best-seller is Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir, even though people refer to it by only its first two words. The quintessential Holocaust story, Elie Wiesel’s Night, is autobiographical, as are Maya Angelou’s iconic I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and the newer Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. The shortened titles of Barack Obama’s two autobiographical tomes, Dreams of My Father and The Audacity of Hope, already have become everyday phrases.

Your title does not have to be long. Even a one-word title can say a mouthful, previewing for the reader the key components of the contents. The currently popular Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali and comedienne Tina Fey’s Bossypants are good examples. If you want to make sure people know that your work is autobiographical, you can tack on the explanation after a colon, as in Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. Give it some thought! Your life deserves better than “My Life.”

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Then just set up a chapter and start writing your memoir. Don’t worry about rules. There are no rules to writing your memoir; there are only trends. These trends are based on techniques and features identified in current top-selling memoirs. At best, they’re the flavor of the month. If you’re capturing your life in print for your family, for your own gratification or to inspire readers, rather than aiming to set off Hollywood screenplay bidding wars, these trends don’t even apply to you. You’ll write the memoir that suits you best, and it will be timeless, not trend-driven.There are no rules, but there are four steps:

1. Theme/framework
2. Writing
3. Editing/polishing
4. Self-publishing

You’ve researched this, too, and you’ve been shocked at the price for getting help with any one of those steps, much less all four. That’s because most memoir sites promise to commercialize your work. They’ll follow a formula based on current memoir trends, because they want to convince you that they can turn your memoir into a best-seller. These sites overwhelm you with unnecessary information not to help you, the memoir author, but to address Search Engine Optimization (SEO) algorithms so they can sell more.

That’s not what we do at Write My Memoirs. Our small community of coaches, writers and editors are every bit as skilled as any you’ll find, and we charge appropriately for their expertise and the time they’ll spend helping you craft a compelling, enjoyable read. But you won’t pay an upcharge for other websites’ commercialization, the marketing that follows, and the pages of intimidating “advice.” You can sell your book if you like—we have ISBNs available for you—but our organic process of capturing your story takes a noncommercial path.

If you want help with any or all of the four steps above, choose from our services or save money by selecting one of our packages. If you’d like to talk about what’s right for you, schedule a call. One year from now, you can be holding your published memoir in your hand. And at that point, it will be a big deal!

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