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In Reluctant Defense of Women’s Fiction
Read more: In Reluctant Defense of Women’s FictionEight years ago, Carlene Cross advised writers to read one hundred books in the genre in which they wanted to write. I read one hundred memoirs, posted them on this blog, and five long years later Plicata Press published my award-winning memoir, A Long Way from Paris. Writing a memoir is hard, excruciating at times, so […]
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Why would anyone write a memoir?
Read more: Why would anyone write a memoir?I sometimes wonder why on earth I wanted to write a memoir. Why would anyone want to delve into personal tragedies, pain, struggles. Or, be honest. Be vulnerable. Who wants that? When I first pitched my story about living off the grid in the mountains of southern France, an agent said, “Oh no. It must be more – how you […]
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One Year Later
Read more: One Year LaterI’ve reflected on the most powerful memoirs, the ones that stick like oatmeal, those memoirs I’ll always remember. I loved discovering new books for this project, like my new favorite author, Geoff Dyer. His memoir, which only loosely fits the genre, is Out of Sheer Rage: Wrestling with DH Lawrence. I like Dyers wit, and in fact, his wit and […]
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Life in the South of France
Read more: Life in the South of FranceTo my new readers, this blog reflects my reading 100 Memoirs as an exercise in writing one memoir. “To write well,” my instructor stated, I should “read one hundred books in my genre.” I’ve completed my memoir currently titled, On the Mountains of Languedoc, which I revise and revise. In the meantime, my reading continues. I’m […]
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Tahiti
Read more: TahitiWhen you notice a blogger hasn’t written from December through April, you may presume they’re in Tahiti. Or Fiji. Or some equally remote, romantic hide away. But, no I’ve been right here, mostly, at home, writing, tending my family, and watching the pages on the calendar fly by. I’ve started teaching two classes at the […]
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Old Fashioned
Read more: Old FashionedAlthough Betty MacDonald’s old homestead is virtually around the corner from my home in Washington state, I grew up three thousand miles away in Holyoke, Massachusetts where I savored MacDonald’s Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books. I read the same stories to my daughter. I laughed uncontrollably at the Fred McMurray movie, based on her memoir. So, I was a […]
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Ease
Read more: EaseWhen memoirists emphasize their childhood suffering (Lit, Glass Castle, Running with Scissors, and so on), we cheer as narrators extricate themselves from unimaginably gruesome settings. Poignant, profound, truthful, these memoirs make fascinating reads. But, it was a relief to read an equally honest story from a narrator who was neither abused nor neglected, and in […]