Renee is Writing

I am literally sliding out of the year 2013. Today began with some feathery snow that turned to rain. On the drive home from work the rain mixed with ice and walking up the driveway to the house was like walking on shattered glass. As the precipitation dwindles the temperature drops and I am not looking forward to an icy morning. Black ice is predicted. That means a long slow drive back to work tomorrow and some treacherous walking. I will take tiny steps from the car to the school. But I am taking big solid steps into the new year! On January 22 I begin a 6 month long course on writing memoir. I've mentioned this before, but we've had the orientation and I am outlining the book now so this is really going to happen soon. I am very excited to get my story down on paper and with the help of Brooke Warner and Linda Joy Myers, getting it to a publishable stage. I will also be taking an online course through Story Circle Network with Amber Lea Starfire that will teach me how ...

Six or seven years I ago I read a lot of memoirs since I was writing my own childhood memoir and studying the genre. Then I went back to reading more fiction and poetry. Now, in preparation for writing this new memoir and taking the memoir course in January, I've picked up a few more to read and study. This evening I opened up my kindle, downloaded the memoir "Split" by Suzanne Finnamore, and found a big surprise. I had been playing around with some different formulaic structures for my memoir and came up with the idea to break it into five sections based on Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's Five Stages of Grief. I thought that was a good idea for a novel about divorce. But Ms. Finnamore beat me to it. Lo and behold, right in the table of contents, I discovered my idea for structuring my own memoir wasn't original after all. Now it's back to brainstorming some other structure ideas. She also begins her story with a scene that shows her husband downing martinis. Well...

With Thanksgiving over, leftovers packed in the fridge and freezer, and turkey soup simmering on the stove, it is time to get back to business. After 5 days of family, fun and food I need to tuck back into reality. That means going back to Weight Watcher meetings and tracking my food again. It means getting back to a routine of working out 4 to 5 times a week no matter how tired I am, or how late it is, when I get home from work. And it means setting myself up to begin the new year in writing stride. I can't believe it will be 2014 in just a few weeks. Busy weeks at that. With the new year will come the start of my "Write Your Memoir in Six Months" course. I've already set up a binder for the course materials and I've begun making some notes about how I want to write this book. A couple steps in the way of launching this journey are easy to take care of. Number one-- I just received the edits of my poetry manuscript "I am My Mother's Only Poem," ...

As usual I read a lot of how-to books. How to write novels, how to write poetry, how to write short fiction and now how to write memoir. Memoir is a touchy topic and most books will ask this question first: Why do you want to write your memoir? So after years of deliberation these are the answers I have come up with: I have a story I need to tell. It is curled into my heart and I want to expunge it. I believe my story can help other women who are in bad relationships as well as women who have lived with an alcoholic. I love to write. I've written about my happy childhood and I want to balance that with this more disturbing tale. I want to be a published writer. The story tells a transformational tale from my life. It will be therapeutic to write this. I want to share my truth. I'm sure there are many more reasons. Up front though is the fact that I am a writer and I must write. What better story to tell than my own?

There is a book titled "The Art of Time in Memoir" by Sven Birkerts. In this book he takes several published memoirs and discusses how the writers pull together events in a period of time in their lives and create a rich tale from which we can learn about life. In writing memoir time stands out as a scaffold for the narrative scenes. The writer must choose the time period she wishes to portray in the book. She must give the reader a sense of the time in history during which these scenes play out. And the pacing of the tale requires a sense of time from the eye of the reader who will either enjoy a nicely paced narrative or feel bogged down with a slow moving story. the writer needs a sense of when to speed the pace to keep the reader reading, and when to slow it down within a scene to create a deeper impact. That said, this is not the concept of time I wish to rant about today. When I speak of time in memoir I am talking about the time a writer needs in order to craft a...

What is the fear of memoir? It's a horned beast with a trident tail that threatens to stop the writer in the pursuit of her own truth. We all experience each life story we live in our own way. Why then is it so difficult to commit that truth to paper? Why do we struggle and procrastinate in starting our memoir? Why do we give up after ten pages of truth telling? What is it that we fear? Some memoirists fear writing stories that in some way degrade, insult, expose, or diminish family members or friends. They are afraid what they write will be disputed, or worse, that they will be sued for writing it. Other writers fear exposing their own faults, sins and misdemeanors. Each time we sit at our desks, pens in hand, to scribe the truth, that horned beast raises his head and swings a webbed hand that wipes the pen right out of our hands. He noodles into our minds and attempts to erase from memory the very stories that make us who we have become. The very stories that might help us ...

A worthwhile piece of advice given to all writers is to read profusely. It's particularly suggested that you read books in the genre in which you are writing. Perhaps reading is the best teacher of how to write, far outweighing how-to books and writing classes and workshops. Critique groups are great and so are editors, but in the end it's your choice and every comment is just one reader's opinion. So in order to prepare myself better to write my memoir I am starting to read published memoirs again. (Of course I'm still taking classes too!) I just rejoined the internet reading circle at www.storycircle.org . It's fantastic group of women who read and write memoir! I look forward to reading their monthly book choices and engaging in thought provoking and interesting discussions about the books. At the moment I am reading "Wild" by Cheryl Strayed. It's the story of a woman who sets off alone to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. Her experiences, both inne...