Writing fiction and writing memoirs have a few things in common. Both have characters; a POV, setting, narrative and dialogue. But there is something very different about them, that you need to remember. In fiction, you make up your plot and characters. In memoir you are telling your truth, your life (or parts of it as you remember). And the people in a memoir are real people from your past and/or present – even if you change the name to protect the guilty. However, in both fiction and memoir, emotions and feelings are very important.

As mentioned in last week’s post, I am teaching a memoir writing course at the Toronto Reference Library. And again like last week I put a snippet of what we cover this week on my other blog Only Child Writes. Like last week I’ll refer to it and this time will include the link here.

In this post I excerpt a small part of a chapter from my memoir. The excerpt is shortened even more. And yes, I change the people’s names. But the excerpt shows how you can write memoir, fiction style. The main character here is of course, me (or in your memoir, you).

Cheers.

Sharon A. Crawford

Author of the Beyond mystery series. More info about  Beyond Blood here.