Just Write: Good Advice for Memoirists?

Just write, but have a purpose.

Just write.

Don’t think, just write.

Just write and see where it takes you.

First-time writers (and would-be published authors) often ask for advice on social media as they wrestle with creating their first-draft manuscripts. Just write is the #1 comment I see. I always chime in that to write a long-form piece (such as a memoir), you really need to have a sound purpose in mind when you begin. A direction. A compass heading.

I’m always in the minority.

I decided I needed to re-evaluate my position. Maybe I’m being too rigid, too narrow in my advice. So I pondered. . . .

Where to Begin?

As I am a writing coach and as I specialize in memoir, I have had to give a lot of thought to how to help newbie writers get started with their memoir, or improve existing work. I have read innumerable first-draft manuscripts (and one or two first-draft chapters). They are often the product of the just write school of manuscript development. A few show immediate promise; this writer understands where they ultimately want to take this book. But most, sadly, suffer from what I refer to as being all over the place. When you just write, it shows in how your narrative jumps from one subject to another, one time period to another, one argument to another.

Let me be clear—I do not enjoy dashing a writer’s dreams. Seriously. It takes a ton of tact and empathy for me to objectively critique a piece of writing that someone has poured their heart and soul into for months or years, but it just doesn’t fly. My defense is putting on my coaching hardhat and remaining objective and professional to offer my guidance as to how this draft can become a successful published book.

Where are You Going?

I feel like a vinyl record with the needle stuck in a groove. I have offered the same advice in every article I’ve written about memoir. So, I apologize. But if this is the first one of my blog articles you have read, I will repeat the two questions I ask of everyone I work with:

1. What is the personal transformation story you want to share in this memoir?

2. Who is your audience for this story; who are you writing this for?

In my article Memoir is a Journey Story, I discuss this in detail. So, there’s no point in repeating myself. Is there?

Oh, heck! Let me ask you—why are you writing this memoir? If it is for yourself, to get clarity or catharsis about some particular aspect or experience in your life, that’s okay. But that’s not a memoir. (See my article Is it Time to Write Your Memoir? for more about the transition from journaling to writing memoir.) If you are writing for your personal legacy or to leave a record of your life or specific experiences for your family, that’s okay too. But that’s not a memoir either.

People who fall into one of these categories rarely intend to publish their writings. “It’s just for me,” they say. Or “It’s something I want to leave for my family.” I applaud anyone who puts the time and effort into such an endeavor.

But a memoir—a real memoir—that you hope to publish must be more than this. If you hope to publish, I assume you hope to sell. I have been told, “I don’t care if it sells. I don’t care if anyone buys it.” That's your choice. But maybe—just maybe—if we focus the message, carefully detail your journey, and highlight your transcendence, this could be a story that helps others. In the way author Caroline Knapp used her memoir Drinking: A Love Story to describe her journey from alcoholism (and one alcohol-soaked bad choice after another) to recovery, sobriety, and taking control of her life, your memoir could potentially be a game changer for someone else.

Just Write—Good Advice?

Far be it from me to tell anyone that they should not follow the just write advice for memoir. Just write certainly makes the process feel less intimidating, less daunting to a new writer. Just write can kickstart a manuscript when the thought of knowing exactly where you’re going with the writing eludes you. But I wouldn’t be much of a writing coach if my coaching consisted of, “Just write. Don’t think, just write. Just write and see where it takes you. Here’s my bill.”

Go ahead. Just write. But know this: You must just write with the knowledge that you will definitely—100 percent—have to just rewrite extensively if you want to produce a book that people will read, enjoy, and recommend.

In addition to working as a nonfiction and creative nonfiction editor and writing coach, I am co-author, with Dr. Terri Lyon, of the book Make a Difference with Mental Health Activism: No activism degree required—use your unique skills to change the world. Visit my website page Make a Difference and Dr. Lyon’s activism website Life At The Intersection to learn more about Make a Difference with Mental Health Activism, including how to place bulk orders. Also available at Amazon.com.

The Developmental Edit: Shape Your Manuscript

A developmental edit lets your manuscript bloom

Way back in June 2018, I wrote a blog article about developmental edits. I have just read it for the first time since I published it and it’s held up well. In December 2021, I wrote an article for my blog defining five levels of editing: developmental, substantive, line, copy, and proofreading.

Even though I have defined a developmental edit in two other articles I’ve written, I have a few new insights I want to share.

What is a Developmental Edit?

Developmental edits are often what finished first-draft manuscripts need. Why? Because a DE is done to have another pair of eyes give your manuscript a big picture review. DEs are organizational and structural edits, since the editor will look at your entire manuscript to evaluate how effectively and thoroughly the material is organized and presented.

For nonfiction, a DE checks to see if the chapter arrangement is logical, the text has a cohesive flow, jargon is defined (or eliminated), and tone and word usage are appropriate to the purpose and audience.

For creative nonfiction, such as memoir, the DE looks at how well the writer has established a theme, how well the plot develops the theme, how well characters are presented, and whether the tone and pace (tempo) of the writing is right for the subject and audience.

What are the Benefits of a DE?

There are several reasons you should have an editor do a DE on your finished first draft:

• Offer an objective point of view

• Bring a beginner’s mind approach

• Fill the experience gap

Let’s look at these three benefits.

Objectivity

I, too, am a writer. I know from my own experience that the more time and effort I put into a piece of writing, the less objective I am able to be about it. I either fall in love with my writing and grimace at the thought of changing a single word, or I hate everything I’ve written and want to delete the Word doc and throw the printout into the wastebasket!

The importance of objectivity cannot be overemphasized. I think it is almost impossible to be completely honest about the quality (or effectiveness) of our own writing. What we create—whether a blog article, essay, memoir, novel, or textbook—is like our baby. As an editor, I have found that critiquing a manuscript is like criticizing someone child—it can cause offense.

That is why it is imperative to keep an open mind when working with an editor during a DE.

Beginner’s Mind

Simply, beginner’s mind means adopting the mindset of a beginner.

It means you approach everything you write as if you are hearing it, thinking about it, or describing it for the first time—free of preconceptions, expectations, and judgments.

With nonfiction (self-help, how-to, educational, etc.) writing with a beginner’s mind forces you to present your material using these three old-school guidelines:

1. Known to unknown

2. General to specific

3. Simple to complex

I talked about these in my blog post Three Simple Rules to Clear Writing. The purpose of these rules is to create a piece of writing that builds your material by starting on familiar ground and slowly slipping in new or more complex ideas.

With creative nonfiction, such as memoir, a beginner’s mind forces you to realize that your reader does not know you or anything about you, your family, your life’s experiences, and so on; therefore, you must take the reader by the hand and gently ease them into every aspect of your journey.

Filling the Experience Gap

This is the most basic benefit of having a DE done on your manuscript—editors know stuff you don’t. Stuff about how to identify a theme and stick with it, how to identify the most appropriate audience for your theme, how to be clear and concise, and how to present your material in a way that will inform, entertain, teach, and support.

In a blog post from May 2020, Overwriting, the Death of Clarity, I quote English and Rhetoric Professor Richard Norquist: Overwriting is a wordy writing style characterized by excessive detail, needless repetition, overwrought figures of speech, and/or convoluted sentence structures.

These kinds of issues jump off the page at me. Fixing them are part and parcel of what I do for a living. Chances are excellent they are not what you concern yourself with on a daily basis. Hence, filling the experience gap.

The Benefits are Worth the Investment

Yes, I know, I'm an editor so, of course, I would tell you that the money you spend on editing is worth every penny. But honestly, it's true.

Think of writing with the goal of being published as a business. Be a professional throughout the process. Being in control means being responsible. Take each step in

the process seriously.

In addition to working as a nonfiction and creative nonfiction editor and writing coach, I am co-author, with Dr. Terri Lyon, of the book Make a Difference with Mental Health Activism: No activism degree required—use your unique skills to change the world. Visit my website page Make a Difference and Dr. Lyon’s activism website Life At The Intersection to learn more about Make a Difference, including how to place bulk orders.

Memoir Theme vs. Memoir Plot

Let the light shine on your memoir!

I’m going to say something controversial, so stick with me. Here goes.

Many of the problems that first-time memoir writers struggle with are the result of a simple truth—they don’t fully understand what memoir is!

There. I said it.

Many people writing memoir don’t actually understand what a memoir is supposed to be or do. The formula for writing a good memoir is relatively simple, but most novice memoirists make it more complicated than it needs to be.

I am a writing coach and editor who specializes in memoir. I chose memoir as my specialty because I had read that it is an oft-misunderstood subgenre of an oft-misunderstood genre, creative nonfiction. I took that as a challenge!

Through my years of learning what memoir is and isn’t (it’s not autobiography, for one thing), understanding its intricacies, and mastering the art of its structure, I always begin by asking a potential client the same simple-sounding question:

What is your memoir about?

But the question is at once simple and complex. The correct way to answer this question is the concept that trips up most of my memoir clients. Why? Because people always answer this question by telling me their plot, not their theme.

“Huh? Plot. Theme. What’s the difference?”

Understanding the difference is essential to writing a good memoir with minimal anguish and maximum success. I talked about this in my post Thinking About Writing a Memoir? Read This First.

Memoir Theme and Plot are Different

Get ready. This will be on the test.

Theme is what a memoir is about.

Plot is how the theme is conveyed.

Clear as mud? It must be, because despite many books and articles being written about the distinction, it is a confusion that persists among memoir writers and, I’m sorry to say, even many memoir editors.

So here is another explanation of theme in a nutshell.

What is the theme of your memoir? It is your argument.

In writing, an argument is the claim you make that you then have to support. (In academic writing, it’s called a thesis.) An argument is a line of reasoning, backed by evidence, that proves a point.

Knowing where to begin your memoir and where to end it is easy-peasy to decide if you know what argument you will present in your memoir and include only the stories that illustrate that argument.

Any clearer? I hope you’re nodding your head vigorously.

Why does having a theme matter in a memoir? Why can’t you just write about your life and talk about whatever is weighing on you, or gnawing at you, or that you want to brag about? You absolutely can! But then it’s not a memoir.

If what you want (or need) to write about is some aspect of your life that has caused you trauma, pain, or grief, or brought you happiness, joy, a clearer sense of self, success, or true love, then, by all means, do it. Write it. But what you are writing is likely more of a therapeutic journal or a series of interconnected personal essays.

If you really want to write a memoir that people will read all the way through, there must be a point to the story you’re telling.

Your personal story must impart a universal lesson that others can relate to, and reveal something you learned that you share with readers to enlighten, soothe, or benefit them.

The Definition of Memoir

Here’s a great time to restate, for the umpteenth time, the ultimate definition of memoir, according to Memoir Maven Marion Roach Smith:

Your memoir is not about you. It’s about something and you are its illustration.

My blog post How to Choose a Memoir Theme states this clearly, and I’ve repeated it in one or two (or three) other blog posts. And yet, I feel the need to say it again, because it is the single most important aspect of writing a cohesive, enjoyable memoir.

Common Memoir Stumbling Blocks

When I begin to coach a memoir client, these are the comments I hear most often:

• I don’t know how to start. When (or how) should I start my story?

• I can’t decide which stories to include. How much of my life should I write about?

• I don’t know how to end the book. When (or how) should I finish my story?

These questions are easy to answer when you understand the purpose of a memoir and have a clearly defined theme.

When I’ve been hired to edit a memoir manuscript, these are the two questions my clients most often ask:

• Is it too long?

• Is it too short?

These, too, are easily answered questions when you have a clearly defined theme.

Writer: Is my memoir too short?

Me: Did you share all the stories that illustrate the theme of your memoir? Did you start by setting up the memoir and showing the reader what’s at stake for you to deal with? And then tell the stories that explore this thoroughly? And conclude by bringing the journey to a resolution?

If you answer no to these questions, your memoir is incomplete. If you can answer yes to these questions, then your memoir is (probably) just right!

Writer: Is my memoir too long?

Me: Did you share stories that have nothing to do with your theme? Did you include stories that start long before the genesis of your theme? Did you include stories that go beyond the point of the resolution of your theme?

If you answer yes to these questions, then the memoir is too long. If you answer no to these questions, then your memoir is (probably) just right!

It’s Not About Memoir Word Length

You see, too short or too long is not about word count. It’s about exploring your theme by including stories that show your struggle, failures, successes, and growth, and ending by showing the reader that you will be OK. Maybe your problem isn’t actually fixed—your marriage still ends, despite your efforts you can’t help a loved one deal with their mental illness, because of your health you will have to close your business after all. But your resolution demonstrates that you have accepted your situation and you can move forward, stronger, wiser, and with a clear purpose.

Are you ready to write your memoir? Let me help you make that happen.

In addition to working as a nonfiction and creative nonfiction editor and writing coach, I am co-author, with Dr. Terri Lyon, of the book Make a Difference with Mental Health Activism: No activism degree required—use your unique skills to change the world. Visit my website page Make a Difference and Dr. Lyon’s activism website Life At The Intersection to learn more about Make a Difference, including how to place bulk orders.