You CAN handle the truth (in your memoir)
Readers seek out memoirs because they want true stories. But the truth, according to Judith Barrington in her book Writing the Memoir, is more than using Google to fact...
Bird by Bird
Finding Your Memoir’s Form
Chronological, essays, skipping through time, interspersed non-fiction — there are so many forms that memoir can take. Judith Barrington covers several in her book, Writing the Memoir, and in...
Making Your Memoir Matter
Baring one's soul in a memoir is hard work. Convincing others to care is one thing, but to engage in your life story? That's a whole other beast. In...
Truth VS Narrative in Memoir
We’re starting a NEW BOOK - Judith Barrington’s Writing the Memoir. And what better place to start than by discussing what a memoir is, what memoir isn’t, and just...
Bye Bye Birdy
How do you tackle one of the most famous writing craft books, you take it “Bird by Bird.” That’s what we’ve done with Anne Lamott’s book over the past...
Why Do You Write?
Well, why do you? The answer for most authors is to get published. But is that the only reason, or even the best reason? As we near the...
What To Do When You Have Writer’s Block
Anne Lamott (in her Bird by Bird book) says the dreaded writer’s block isn’t about being blocked, it’s about being empty. In today’s podcast we discuss Lamott’s approach to...
Metafiction, Deconstruction, and Jazzing Around
After last episode’s mother of all chapters, we get a reprieve – a much shorter and lighthearted chapter...
Interest and Truth
Moving along to Chapter 3 in The Art of Fiction. We go to war over the various dichotomies that...
Basic Skills, Genre, and Fiction as Dream
Onto Chapter 2 of John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction. We begin with Gardner’s opinions about grammar, and our...
Aesthetic Law and Artistic Mastery
We’re starting our first book – John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction. Let’s find out why writing instructors...
What’s on our bookcase?
Welcome to Words to Write by – a podcast where we discuss, chapter by chapter, those wonderful writing craft...
Musing: Memoir’s Secret Ingredient
We’ve gotten to the part of Judith Barrington’s Writing the Memoir where she covers the actual writing of in a memoir, the words on the page. In addition...