Author Interview: Karen Fisher-Alaniz

My guest today is Karen Fisher-Alaniz, author of Breaking the Code: A Father’s Secret, a Daughter’s Journey, and the Question That Changed Everything . I met Karen several years ago through her blog and have been interested in her book long before it was even accepted for publication. You can read my review of Breaking the Code in an earlier post.

Lillie: Welcome to A Writer’s Words, An Editor’s Eye, Karen. I’m delighted that your book is finally available. Your journey began on your father’s eighty-first birthday. Tell us what happened.

Karen: Thank you for having me, Lillie. More than 50 years after WWII, my father, a WWII veteran, had started watching graphic war movies and reading piles of WWII books. He also seemed depressed. I’d tried asking him questions about it, but to no avail. Then, on his 81^st birthday, he put two old notebooks on my lap. They were full of more than 400 pages of letters he’d written during the war.

Lillie: What is “the question that changed everything”?

Karen: Oh boy. That’s a hard one. There are a lot of questions in the book. I was always asking my father questions. I wanted to know more. But he was experiencing nightmares and flashbacks, symptoms of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder. So, I walked a fine line—wanting to know, but not wanting to push him too far. I don’t think I can choose one question that changed everything—it just depends on how you think about it. And I’m finding that people who are reading the book have great ideas about what the question is too—so, my own view is evolving.

Lillie: I’m glad to know I didn’t miss one specific question. There were so many important ones, I kept trying to figure out which was the one that changed everything. Breaking the Code is so much more than a memoir. As I said in my review, it is a story of relationships with a historical perspective of World War II that our generation never experienced, and it offers insight into PTSD. Yet it reads like a mystery novel. How did you incorporate all that into a book that can easily be read in a few hours?

Karen: The first fiction series I ever read was by James Patterson. The one thing I was in awe of was that with every chapter, something happened that made you want to read the next one. I’d find myself, past my bedtime, saying, “OK, just one more chapter.” I love books like that. I love books that when I am a few chapters from the end, I’m thinking, I don’t want this experience to end. So, it was quite consciously that I set out to create a memoir like that.

I also took a screenwriting class and applied some of those techniques to my book writing. In screenwriting, each scene has its own mini-story. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. So, I tried to do that. I was very fortunate that my editor at Sourcebooks, Peter Lynch, thinks like that too. So, when I lost that focus in some chapters, he gently guided me back to it. A good editor is priceless!

Lillie: I certainly agree on you about the value of a good editor. An author does not produce a great book entirely on her own. Writers like to say that “everyone” should read their book, but we know that the more closely authors define their target audience, the more successful they are. Describe your ideal reader—the person who would benefit the most from reading your book.

Karen: You are so right. And when you’ve put all that you have into a book, it does seem that “everyone” will want to read it. The best way to avoid this thinking and really hone in on who your audience is, is to think about who will not read your book. For me, I thought about groups of people, like children, teens, and young adults. I have kids in those age groups and couldn’t imagine them just going into a store and picking up my book to buy. Those audiences are also not big buyers of books like mine.

When I visited my publisher in Chicago, one of the marketing people asked a really important question. He said, “Who are the first 1,000 people who will buy your book?” Of course, I started with my family and my friends. And then he asked, “And then who?” After that, he asked, “After the first 1,000 people, who will buy your book?” That really got it down to the people I really felt needed my book in their hands: baby-boomers like me followed by military families.

Of course, that is the main focus, but it can still branch out from there. For example, my own son, who is sixteen, really surprised me. He started reading Breaking the Code for his English and history classes. He came home raving about it; he said that it’s like reading a history book that reads like a really good novel.

Lillie: What is the most important thing you want readers to take away from Breaking the Code?

Karen: That everyone has a story and every story matters. Everyone has someone in their circle of family or friends who has stories to tell. Maybe you’ve heard portions of their stories all your life, or maybe you’ve just had a hint at them. Whatever the case, none of us are promised tomorrow. I can’t tell you how many times someone has told me a bit about their loved one and then said, “They’re gone now. I wish I’d written those stories down.” And it’s so true. We’re waiting for the perfect time—when the kids are grown or when life isn’t so crazy. But time can run out and for some, their stories will be gone forever. I like to say of family history writing, “If not you, who? If not now, when?”

And for veterans, the message is that telling your story can be healing. When we share our stories, we honor each other. For veterans with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, the message is to create an Intentional Time of Remembrance—a time to remember. There are more details about it in the book and how we did it with Dad.

Lillie: I recognize my own family in the common lament you hear. My grandfather, who died when I was 12, was a cowboy and told marvelous stories of his experiences on the cattle trail. My parents and aunts and uncles thought they would always remember the stories they heard so often, yet just a few years after his death, all the stories were lost. That’s one reason I helped my mother and my mother-in-law write their own stories—not for publication, but for the family—and also wrote Preserving Memories: How to Write a Family History to help other families tell their own stories.

With Breaking the Code, you’ve really been on two journeys—the first to learn your father’s secrets and help him overcome his PTSD symptoms and the second to publish the book. Will you share a little about your publishing journey?

Karen: Ah, where do I start? I think I start with what every writer understands—rejection! I had plenty of rejections with Breaking the Code. It was a difficult sell for some, but I always believed in the story. I believed that when the timing was right, the perfect publisher would be there. And that’s what happened. I met my editor at a writer’s conference. If you want to be a published writer, you have to become a student of the whole process from the nitty-gritty of writing to the whole publishing industry. Education, persistence, and belief in your own abilities—those are the keys to success.

Lillie: Where can readers learn more about you and your books?

Karen:  My website, http://www.storymatters2.com is the hub for my writing life. At the bottom of the welcome page, you’ll find a list of places you can purchase my book. When I developed my website, I did something that is not recommended—I always seem to be doing that (Ha!). I created a whole website around this particular book, not just around me as a writer.

Lillie: I know you have come to believe that everyone has a story to share, and you are encouraging others to write their own stories. Tell us about Story Matters.

Karen: StoryMatters2 is my website. A WWII veteran recently told me that he has a story too, but no one has ever asked. So, I added a forum for sharing your stories—but it’s not just for veterans. My ultimate goal is to begin a story-telling revolution! Wouldn’t that be fabulous? I mean, just imagine if everyone told someone just one story. What if each story was written down? It’s time for us to talk to each other, and this is particularly true of our elders. Don’t let them pass through your life without telling their story. So, my website is a place to begin. I want to hear veteran stories, of course. But I also want to hear your stories about almost anything—nostalgia, childhood memories, and life experiences. I want my website to be a gathering place where people can share their stories and others can join in the conversation.

Lillie: November is National Lifewriting Month, so your message is timely in two ways: Today is Veterans Day, and your book honors your father and other veterans, and we’re talking about writing memoirs and family histories during the month dedicated to doing just that. Is there anything I’ve failed to ask that you would like to share with my readers?

Karen: Don’t give up. Don’t give up on the book you’ve written. Don’t give up on your loved one who seems to want to tell their story but can’t seem to get the words out. Give yourself, give others—the gift of time.

Lillie: Thank you so much for stopping by and sharing about your journey and your book with my readers. They will probably have more questions for you. Will you check in during the day to respond to comments and answer questions?

Karen: Absolutely!

Lillie: If you have questions for Karen, leave a comment below.

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Karen Fisher-Alaniz is a writer and author. She has written freelance articles for regional and teen magazines. Her work has appeared in anthologies such as Chicken Soup for the Soul II and Voices of Multiple Sclerosis. She lives in her family in the Pacific Northwest.

November is Lifewriting Month

In addition to being National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), November is National Lifewriting Month. Although you aren’t likely to find lifewriting in the dictionary, you can probably guess its meaning–writing about life, specifically memoir and family history.

I encourage everyone to write their own or their family’s life stories. In my ebook, Preserving Memories: How to Write a  Family History, I say:

After my father died, my mother became very depressed and withdrawn. I convinced her to attend a writing conference with me by telling her I didn’t want to stay in the hotel alone. She attended one conference session — a seminar on writing essays. She wanted to try her hand at an essay but couldn’t decide on a topic, so I suggested she write about our trip. After that successful attempt, my siblings and I encouraged her to write about her own life.

She wrote what she called her “stories” in longhand on notebook paper. I transcribed them, making only minor corrections in her spelling, punctuation, and grammar. I scanned family photos and added them in appropriate places. We printed the stories on my computer printer and inserted the pages in loose-leaf binders so she could give a book to each of her adult children for Christmas; each year after that, she wrote more stories to add to the book.

These stories quickly became cherished family treasures. Teenaged grandchildren put aside video games to read their parents’ copies of their grandmother’s memoirs. Siblings pointed to stories and asked each other, “Did you know that?” Family members shared laughter and tears when the stories were given as gifts, and now, years after my mother died, those loose-leaf binders filled with family stories have become treasured legacies, possibly even more valued than money or property.

The same can be true for you. Your personal memoirs or your family history can be the greatest treasure you can leave your family because you’re sharing your life and yourself.

A memoir or family history doesn’t have to be a published book to be meaningful. It can be typed in a word processor, recorded on a tape recorder, captured in a video, or assembled in a scrapbook.

Denis Ledoux, author of Turning Memories Into Memoirs: A Handbook for Writing Lifestories and originator of National Lifewriting Month, shares tips for getting started on your memoir in the article November Celebrates Memoir Writing.

A memoir or family history may seem like an overwhelming project, but Preserving Memories helps you break it down into manageable tasks so you, too, can leave your loved ones a precious legacy: your life story or the story of your family.

Have you done any lifewriting? If not, why not give it a try during National Lifewriting Month?

More Free E-Books

I have added the following short how-to e-books to Smashwords. The books are free through March 13, 2010 with the coupon code RFREE. Visit my Smashwords page to order any of my e-books. I’m also including the novels Dream or Destiny, Stroke of Luck, and Fern’s Fancies in the Read an E-Book Week promotion.

Learn how to find the information you need — whether it’s knowledge critical for your family’s health, intelligence important for the success of your business, facts useful in making buying decisions, or simply lore you want to know. Discover how to evaluate the reliability of the data you gather as well. Links to almost 100 sites useful for research.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you’re confused about e-book formats, you’ll find a handy matrix at Wordsupply showing what programs/devices read various e-book formats.

Don’t forget to visit Read an E-Book Week and Smashwords for more free e-books this week … after you’ve checked out all my free e-books.

Memoir and Family History: Part 6—Publishing and Distribution

Some memoirs and family histories will appeal to a wider audience and be appropriate for traditional publishing. If your story falls into that category, this installment won’t apply to you. Since the percentage of personal and family stories that are published by conventional publishers is small, I will focus on self-publishing and subsidy publishing in this section.

If you self-publish, you handle all the aspects of publishing yourself, negotiating and contracting with providers for work you cannot do yourself. If you use a subsidy publisher, you pay a publishing company to publish the book for you, an option if you are publishing a trade paperback or hardcover book. Learn more in the Self-Publishing Primer.

The first step is publishing your manuscript is to choose your format. Your choice will depend upon the size of your audience, your financial resources, and your method of distribution.

Your options include:

• Loose-leaf binder—If you are distributing copies only to immediate family members, you can print the pages on your computer printer or at a print shop, then insert them into three-ringer binders. This is inexpensive and easy; it also allows for additions if you write piecemeal as my mother did. You can print on high-quality paper and choose a binder with a clear plastic cover that allows you to insert a page as a book cover. If you’re printing only a few copies, you can include color photos in your book; color printing is too expensive in most other formats.
• Spiral bound—If you’re printing dozens or a few hundred copies, you can take a computer file with a camera-ready manuscript in a word processing program to a copy shop. The copy shop can print the pages (which can be either 8.5” x 11” or 5.5 x 11”) and bind the books with spiral or comb binding.
• E-book—You can convert your word processing file to a PDF file for electronic distribution. Adobe will convert up to five files for you at no cost, and there are several other free online servers to convert Word or other files to PDF. When you have your book in a PDF file, you can send it as an e-mail attachment or create a Web site where the file can be downloaded. An e-book is the most cost-effective way to deliver your book, but most people also want a physical copy of the book. You might consider offering the e-book for free and charging for a print edition.
• Trade paperback or hardcover—Trade paperbacks are larger and higher quality than mass-market paperbacks. They can be printed in small print runs (usually most cost-effective for at least 500 copies) and can also be printed digitally as print on demand (POD). Hardcover books are the most durable; however, they are also the most expensive and generally require a fairly large print run.

After your books are printed, you are ready to distribute them. This can be done in several ways:

• Gifts—If you publish loose-leaf binders for family members, you will probably give the books away because the cause is minimal. The cost is even less for e-books, so they can be freely given away as well.
• Sales—If you publish larger quantities or more expensive formats, you will probably need to be compensated for the books. Determine all your costs for writing and publishing the book and divide that number by the number of copies being distributed to determine the unit cost. You can sell the books at cost or increase the price to make a profit. Taking advance orders can help generate money to pay printing costs as well as help you determine how many books to print. Since most people tend to procrastinate, it helps to offer a discount for prepaid orders received before the specified deadline, which should be before you place the printing order. Even if you base your print run on the number of pre-orders you receive, be sure to order extra, both for late orders and for your future children and grandchildren.
• Combination—You may decide to give away books to immediate family but sell to extended family and others. Or, as mentioned earlier, you may give away the e-book and sell the print book. You might sell the book to everyone, but charge family members only the actual costs and charge other people a higher price. The choice is yours, based on your resources and desires.

No matter what format you choose or how you distribute your memoir or family history, you have created a legacy that will last—not only for your children and your grandchildren, but also for generations to come.

I hope you have found this series on writing memoirs and family histories helpful and wish you joy and success in your personal and family story writing.

Memoir and Family History: Part 5—Writing

Memoirists and family historians are not necessarily experienced writers, and they often don’t realize how many drafts it takes to achieve a finished product. The first draft will be “pure green dreck.” Start writing, and expect that you will re-write … and re-write … and re-write. But get the first draft written first.

Here are a few things to consider:

• Write in a natural style. You’re not writing an academic paper; you’re writing a story that you want people to read and enjoy. Write the way you talk, not the way you think will impress people. Readers shouldn’t pay attention to the writing; they should be wrapped up in the story and not thinking about what a great writer you are.
• In family history, you may consider it important to include facts such as birth and death dates. If you put these facts in the story itself, weave the facts into the narrative. If you find it difficult to fit in all the facts you want without interrupting the flow of the story, include these details in an appendix rather than in the story itself.
• You may be writing history, but you’re also telling a story. The facts are the basis of the story, but the people—their thoughts and emotions— make the story real and meaningful to the reader. Details and everyday occurrences turn dry history into exciting story. The story doesn’t have to start at the beginning. Open the book with a hook, action or dialogue that will immediately catch the readers’ attention and make them want to keep reading.
• Although you aren’t preaching or teaching, you can certainly share your and your family’s beliefs and values. Your story is about people and what is important to them; spiritual, social, and political beliefs and activities are important to most people. Let your readers know which beliefs and activities are integral parts of your life or your family’s history.
• Choose appropriate photographs whenever possible to make ancestors more real and memories more vivid to readers. How many pictures you include and how you arrange them will depend in part on the format you choose.

Every writer has her own way of writing. There is no formula or set of steps that you must follow in order to write your book. Use the following as guidelines, and adapt them to your own working style.

• Get the words on paper in the way you prefer—longhand, typing, recording—see Part 4: Getting Started.
• Write in an organized fashion—chronologically or categorically—if that works for you. Otherwise, write stories or chapters or scenes as you think of them.
• Correct spelling and punctuation errors as Spell and Grammar Check point them out to you, but ignore grammar errors because they are often wrong.
• Don’t edit or revise until you’ve finished the first draft unless you realize you got something wrong or you change your mind about what you want to say.
• If you have written piecemeal, assemble the stories into one document. You may organize your book into chapters or sections either by date (chronological order) or by topic, depending on your personal preference and the nature of your story.
• Edit the manuscript—see my series of posts on editing.  Check first for content and continuity. Did you leave out something important? Did you spend too many words on a particular topic? Does the order makes sense or does the story seem disjointed? Do you need to add any information to make another part of the story understandable? You may need to add, delete, or re-write material.
• Edit again for consistency. Are there any inconsistencies in names, places, character traits, and spellings? If you have fictionalized the story, do the characters demonstrate consistent values or behaviors, or if not, is the reason for any change clear?
• Edit again for factual and grammar errors. Especially in a family history, verify events and dates—anything that can be checked.
• Repeat editing the manuscript until you are satisfied that it is the best you can reasonably make it, realizing that you will never have a perfect book and that too much editing can wipe the life and passion out of your story.
• Get input from other readers. Ask one or more people to read your manuscript and give you feedback. For family histories, other family members familiar with some or all of the history can be very helpful. Someone without knowledge of your family or personal story may be in the best position to tell you if they understand what you’ve written. A professional editor will not only catch grammar, punctuation, and spelling errors but can also improve clarity and readability.
• Evaluate the feedback and use what you find helpful and ignore what you don’t. Note, however, that if several people mention the same thing, you probably need to revise it even if you are happy with what you have written.
• Read the manuscript again to ensure that no errors have crept in and continuity and flow haven’t been disrupted during revisions.

Note that a memoir or family history doesn’t have to be written on paper. In this digital age, video is becoming a popular way to record memories. I am not qualified to give any advice about creating a video of your personal or family story. However, you can use many of the tips in this series to gather and prepare the information for your video.

In the final installment of the series, we will cover publishing and distribution.

Memoir and Family History: Part 4—Getting Started

You’ve decided whether you’re going to write a memoir or a family history, the scope of the story (some aspect of your own life or a certain group of ancestors), and the genre (nonfiction or fiction).

Now you need to determine your audience.

In Leaving a Legacy, I said that most memoirs and family histories don’t have a wide appeal in the mass market. However, if there’s something out of the ordinary in your story, you may believe thousands of people would be willing to pay money to read it.

If you are like most memoirists and family historians, though, your audience will be narrower. For memoirs, people close to you—family, friends, business associates, fellow members of your church and organizations—will be the prime audience.

Depending on the aspect of your life you are writing about, you may have an audience related to that. For example, if you write about dealing with a disease or overcoming a tragedy (such as a violent crime), organizations for people suffering with the disease or people impacted by the tragedy may be interested in your story.

The audience for a family history includes the descendants of the people in the story, both those living today and future generations. Museums, libraries, and historical societies in the areas where the book is set may also be interested, especially if you include historical facts about the area along with your own family story. Individuals and organizations with similar interests to you or your ancestors might also be interested, such as a church that your ancestors founded or a professional or trade association related to a craft, hobby, or business important in the story.

Next, create a plan.

• Research—Most family historians will have already done much of their research before they decide to start writing, but you may need to do additional specific research.
• Interview—Decide who (if anyone) you would like to interview and how you will do it (video, audio recording, or handwritten notes); contact them to schedule; prepare your questions. Be sure to save the recordings if you videotape or audiotape the interviews so your family have the opportunity to see the person and/or hear their voice.
• Get organized—Some writers like to prepare detailed outlines before they start writing, and others prefer to just start writing. If you don’t outline, you probably want a notebook or a computer file to record ideas as they occur to you and to keep track of research and interviews. There’s no rule that says you have to start writing at the beginning and finish at the end. See William Zinsser’s advice in the installment on memoir.
• Decide how you will write—You can type in a word processor; write in longhand and have someone type the manuscript; talk into a tape recorder and have someone transcribe the tape; arrange for someone else to interview you and write up the interview.

 Although I expect my blog readers will do their own writing, some people who want their personal or family story written prefer to hire a ghostwriter. This is a viable option—just keep the following in mind:

• You are telling your or your family’s story, and it should sound like you. Each person has a distinctive voice, word choices and the way the words are put together. If you hire someone else to write your story, find someone who will become familiar with and use your voice.
• Ghostwriters are skilled and well-paid professionals; reputable ghostwriters typically do not write for a percentage of the income from the book because there is no guarantee the book will ever be published much less produce any income. You can expect to pay a significant fee upfront for the services of a qualified ghostwriter.
• As I wrote about in my series on copyright, written work is protected by copyright when it is put into fixed form. Be sure that any agreement you make with a ghostwriter specifies that the writing is work-for-hire and the copyright belongs to you.

 If you’re having a hard time thinking of things to write about, try some memory triggers:

• Re-read old journals or diaries—even old calendars with notes of your activities.
• Pull out and read those old letters that you stored away years ago (if you’re old enough to remember written letters)
• Review e-mails, forum and blog posts, and other electronic/online writings. Many people have documented experiences and thoughts online or in e-mails rather than hand-written letters.
• Look through scrapbooks and photo albums—do this with other family members and share memories of the people and events you see.
• Visit places and buildings from your past—your hometown, your college, businesses where you’ve worked.
• Read your hometown newspaper from years past—especially you lived in a small town. 
• Hold family heirlooms and personal treasures in your hands—remember the stories you’ve heard or the emotions you’ve felt.

Next, we’ll talk about the writing process.

Memoir and Family History: Part 3—Family History

A family history tells the story of people in your family. Most people who write family histories start out doing genealogical research. After they gather all that information, they want to share it with other family members. I’m not going to talk about genealogical and historical research in this series—the subject is far too broad, and chances are if you are interested in writing your family’s story, you have already done the research.

The first step is simply assembling the information in some way. A relative has created huge notebooks with all her research on various family lines. She includes the family tree, copies of historical documents, and photos. While the notebooks are interesting, they aren’t very exciting. They don’t tell anything about the daily lives of her ancestors. They don’t entice the reader to get comfortable and read the story, ignoring everything around her.

So many genealogists decide to move to the next step: to put all this research into a book. You will find advice on turning genealogical research into a family history in Writing Family History Made Very Easy: A Beginner’s Guide.

The challenge is to write something that people will want to read, which means including more than just names and dates and events. Readers of family histories want to know what the people in the story did, what they believed, how they lived.

For current generations, you can interview living people. Ask them why they moved across the country or dropped out of college or opened a business. Find out how they lived, what they did for fun, what motivated them. Start with your oldest living relative, even if their memory is failing. Often senior citizens who can’t remember what day of the week it is can clearly recall their childhood and early adulthood.

Ask questions that don’t require a specific answer but that guide the older person in a general direction. Asking “tell me about school” might get a better response than “what was a typical day like when you are in elementary school?” You may not get an account of everything that happened in a typical day, but you will hear about the things that are strongest in the person’s memory. Those strong memories will make your story more interesting and more authentic.

Recognize that each person’s memories are their own and may be different from other people’s memories of the same experience. Expect to hear different perspectives, and use those different perspectives to add texture to your story.

If you are writing about ancestors from earlier generations, you will have to depend on historical research. However, you may not learn enough details about your family to make the story interesting.

After years of genealogical research, my client David Bowles starting writing his family history as nonfiction. He wanted to share what he’d learned with his children and grandchildren. However, his family found the story boring. To fill in the gaps and make the stories exciting, he began writing The Westward Sagas as fiction. Although he has invented scenes and dialogue, nothing in the stories is in conflict with known history. He writes about real people in real historical situations. All the known facts, events, and dates are accurate. He may have imagined that his ancestor planted corn at a particular time and place, but he knows from extensive research that his ancestor owned a farm in that location at that time, that corn was a crop common to the area, and that the time he indicated was the right time to plant.

Some writers prefer fiction because they want to make up more elements of the story. In that case, you need to make clear to readers if the book is not historically and genealogically accurate. Descendants are reading about their family deserve to know if they are reading total fact, fact-based fiction, or pure fiction.

For more about writing family history, check out the following resources.

• 10 Steps to Writing Your Family History
• Cyndi’s List – Links to Resources for Writing Your Family’s History
• Genealogy Spot
• Genwriters

Next week, we’ll talk about getting started with your family history or memoir.

Memoir and Family History: Part 1—Leaving a Legacy

This is the first installment in a series about writing memoirs and family histories. A couple of months ago, I asked readers to take a short survey on what they would like to see on this blog. Most of the responses were split about 50-50; half of the respondents liked something, and the other half didn’t. Memoir/family history writing was the only subject with a consensus: 100% of the respondents said they would like to read a series on the subject. I am passionate about preserving personal and family memories—I encourage clients thinking about writing their personal or family story to do so, and I have written an e-book: Preserving Memories: How to Write a Family History.

I’ll start the series by talking about what memoirs and family histories are and why you might want to write one. The next two posts will focus on each genre individually, as there are distinct differences between them. Then the rest of the series will cover the process you can use to write and publish (no matter how limited) your personal or family story.

You may be wondering why you should consider writing a memoir or family history. The answer, in a word: legacy. If the one-word answer doesn’t motivate you, read  10 reasons anyone should write a memoir or 15 reasons to write a family history.

I’m not suggesting that you should necessarily write a memoir or family history with the expectation of having it published by a large publisher who will pay you a lot of money and distribute the book widely in bookstores. Unless your family is rich and famous or you have been involved in a major public scandal, the odds of your book appealing to a large publisher—or to a large mass market—are small. But just because you won’t be appearing on Oprah or seeing your book listed as #1 on the USA Today bestseller list doesn’t mean your memoir or family history isn’t important.

Ask yourself if you would like to read first-hand accounts of your great grandparents’ lives or the memoir of one of your ancestors. Then realize that your descendants will feel the same way. Genealogy has become one of the most popular hobbies in the US because people want to know about their roots. They want to know the answer to the question: Where did I come from? Your memoir or family history can help your descendants answer that question generations from now.

Writing your personal or family story can be beneficial for you and the current generation as well. When major events occur in our lives, we all think we couldn’t possibly forget any detail … but we do. By writing about them, you can experience the joy or learn the lesson all over again.

On the other hand, some things we take so much for granted that we don’t explain them to our children or our family members. How did cherished family traditions start? What event in your past changed the course of your life? Do your children or grandchildren know how you met your spouse or why you chose the career you did? Do they understand how the good and bad things that have happened to you have shaped the person you are today?

My own family has experienced firsthand both losing the legacy and passing it on.

My grandfather, who died when I was 12, was a cowboy in his early years and a marvelous storyteller in later years. Grandpa was always telling stories; no one ever bothered to write them down because they were so familiar. His children had heard the stories so many times they were convinced they would never forget them. But forget them they did, and now those fabulous cowboy tales are lost forever.

Memories of my mother haven’t been lost. She was depressed and lethargic after my father died. She couldn’t seem to get interested in anything until we convinced her to write her memories. To describe her “little stories,” as she called them, as a memoir would seem presumptuous to her. They weren’t written as a book—just as individual stories when she thought about something, in no order and with no theme. However, each Christmas, she gave copies of the latest stories to family members, who collected them in loose-leaf binders. Even the teenagers would put aside their games and cool stuff to read Grandma’s stories under the Christmas tree.

My mother-in-law wasn’t willing to write, but she dictated her life story into a tape recorder. I transcribed the recording and added photos, and she gave notebooks with her memories to family members.

Those simple loose-leaf binders have become precious to our family now that my mother and my mother-in-law are no longer with us. Family members can read the words in these binders, and it’s almost like hearing their voices once again—the words and style so familiar and so dear.

You can leave a similar legacy for your loved ones by writing your own memoir or family history.

What is a memoir or a family history? There are many definitions and many forms of each genre. Because they are so personal and individual, definitions can be elusive.

In general, a memoir is a form of autobiography, written by the person it’s about. Autobiography is often the preferred word in describing a chronological story of the author’s entire life, while memoir can focus on a specific time period or reflect on a particular topic. In trying to answer the question Memoir: What Is It, the nonprofit literary journal Memoir (and) says

We cannot confidently erect a fence and say this belongs inside, this is definitely outside.

Memoir can encompass prose or poetry, gravitas or humor, text or graphics. It is usually written in first person, and it always about the person who is writing it.

A family history is the story of a family rather than an individual. It often is written about one line of descent of a family and can cover one or many generations. Family history can be written as nonfiction or as fiction. People reading fictional family histories should be able to tell what is real history and what is fiction.

In Part 2, we’ll discuss memoirs in more detail.

Some Monument to Last: Free E-book with Print Book Pre-Order

I’m putting the finishing touches on the formatting of Some Monument to Last: Memoir of TV Journalist James Muñoz with Family Poems and Letters. I’m tweaking some of the many color photos that had to be transformed to grayscale for print. The manuscript will be going to the printer soon.

In the meantime, author James Michael Doughty is offering an incentive for pre-orders. If you pre-order the print book, you can download a free e-book immediately. You don’t have to wait to read this compelling story, and you can see the photos in color. Then when the paperback edition is ready, you’ll receive a copy autographed by James.

People watch James on the local TV news and see his success. What most don’t know is the journey he has taken to achieve his dreams – the dream of being of TV journalist and the dream of finding his father’s family. Although he will never meet his father or his grandmother in person – not in this life, anyway, he has come to know them through his father’s letters and his grandmother’s poems.

Today James uses the name Muñoz (his mother’s maiden name) on the air to honor his maternal family and Hispanic heritage and the name Doughty (his surname) in private life to honor his father and his paternal family’s legacy. I’m sure both sides of James’ family are extremely proud of him. His own life experiences lead him to seek justice for those who don’t have power and give him empathy and understanding for the people involved in the news stories he covers.

James hopes to inspire and motivate young people, especially minority and disadvantaged youth. I believe his story will inspire anyone who reads it. I’m glad to be part of it.

[tags]Some Monument to Last, James Muñoz, James Michael Doughty[/tags]