Anyone Can Write A Memoir

Memoirs are books about personal experiences significant to the author. They aren't the story of the author's entire life--that's a biography. Memoirs are constructed of the stories we all have tucked into our mind awaiting transcription. It’s when we pen those moments of our life onto paper that we begin to genuinely understand ourselves. We can pass that perception of who we truly are by passing those stories on in book form to friends, family, and readers we may never even meet.

These stories might be about your childhood, travels or adventures, a crime or injustice that happened to you, or anything you want to write about, no matter how minor it may seem. You can write it yourself or hire a ghostwriter. Either way, you have to coax the story out of your subconscious—a ghostwriter can help with that in interviews.

If you find it difficult to pin down a story to tell, then jot down a few words about your life experiences. Don’t rush yourself, take your time to recall these events, and make notes about them. Often one will stand out as momentous and captivating. If that doesn’t happen then choose any of them. Now that you have a memory to focus on, use the five Ws to draw out the information you’ll need:

·     Who was with you? Describe their appearance, personality, what they were wearing, who they were to you, and how you felt about them?

·     When did it take place? Describe the time of day or night and the time period such as the year.

·     Where were you? Describe the feels, smells, sounds, tastes, of the place and what you saw.

·     What is the point of this story and what did you feel or think at the time? Try to write the emotions you experienced.

·     Why is this story important to you? Did it change your life or someone else’s life? How?

Now, you can write the first sentence of your memoir. The opening sentence is the most important one you'll write. If that first line doesn't draw the reader in, they won't read your memoir. There is no reason at all to start from the beginning. Instead, start at a moment of action or intrigue. If you need to let the reader know something about the chronological beginning, then sprinkle that in as the backstory.

Set a daily goal of writing 200, 500, 1000, or 2000 words a day. Professional writers usually write 2000 words a day or more. So, that means setting aside one to four hours a day to write. Also, a word count of 2000 doesn’t mean much to non-writers so to be clear, most books are about 60,000 to 80,000 words. Writing a book takes a lot of time and a strong commitment. Many professional writers wake up at 4 am or 5 am each morning to write.

Don’t worry about spelling, grammar, or sentence structure when you begin, just focus on getting the whole story down on paper. Professional writers call this putting aside the inner editor. This is the best way to make sure you finish the first draft of the memoir. Then, you will rewrite and revise it numerous times.

However, some people feel they just can't make time to write their memoir or they tried to write it for years and it looks like they are never going to get around to it. If you find yourself in that situation and you still want to author a memoir, you can always hire a great ghostwriter.