Magical Memoir Moments
Review of Ander Monson's Vanishing Point: Not a Memoir
Lanie Tankard is back! This time she has read and reviewed a memoir that challenges the boundaries of the genre–and in the process tells a life story (indirectly). I think you will find her review fascinating. I know she would love your comment, no matter what you think. Anyone teaching the genre, and brave…
Defining Memoir–With Tongue Firmly in Cheek
Thanks to Richard Gilbert, whose wonderful blog Narrative I highly recommend, I can include a link guaranteed to induce a chuckle. One of the goals of this blog focuses on the quest to understand memoir as a genre. What differentiates it from other forms? Why is it both popular and maligned in the contemporary literary…
The Power of Memoir Giveaway: Just Around the Corner
I am looking forward to a week of reading, writing, exercising, meditating, and blogging–another wonderful “staycation” like the one I described last summer. On Wednesday of this week, writer, teacher, and therapist, Linda Joy Myers will be doing a guest blog about the memoir writer’s relationship to family and friends–“How to Write Your Memoir and Still Go…
Laughter and Family in Memoir Writing: Guest Blogs and an Upcoming Giveaway
“What makes us laugh out loud?” is the question I am asking as I re-read Mennonite in a Little Black Dress. Next week I will try to answer that question for a guest post I plan to send to Matilda Butler at the great website Womensmemoirs.com. If you have not discovered this website, I recommend that you…
Six-Word Memoir Contest
Have you tried to tell your life story in just six words? Smith magazine discovered a gold mine with this concept a few years ago and now has published several popular books listing these short narratives. The whole concept derives from a single story. Supposedly Ernest Hemingway was challenged to tell a story in six words and…
Ben Yagoda's Memoir: A History on the Kindle–A Double Review
Ben Yagoda’s history of the memoir genre should make any other survey redundant. He’s performed a great service, not only to readers and writers but also to the new field of nonfiction/memoir studies. As promised previously, I will describe not only what I learned from reading the book but also from reading it on the Kindle. First,…
Why I am Loving My Kindle: And a Request for Readers to Report on Their Own E-book Experiences
A few weeks ago I posted a list of 18 books I had blogged about in the last six months. At the end of the list I included two books I have not yet read, pictured here. Today I got out my six-month-old Kindle and spent 20 seconds ordering the two books–Mary Karr’s Lit and Ben Yagoda’s Memoir:…