Your life story matters to you. If you are motivated to write a book about it, then it should matter to other people too. When writing and editing your memoir, you’d be surprised by how much fiction plays a role!
Writing a memoir
Everyone has a story within them. But writing a memoir is more than just listing your life events. Unlike autobiography, your memoir is more refined and focused to a specific set of experiences.
For example, a memoir might be about:
- Diagnosis
- Dealing with grief
- Coming out
- Coming of age
Importantly, it’s all about your memories of that experience. While you may be keen to get your facts right, it’s all about the personal experience of the situation which readers want.
Readers also want to have learnt something from your experiences to apply to their own lives. To do this, you must be prepared to set everything out on the page. The good bits and the not-so-good bits.
Although memoir is a non-fiction genre, you still need to consider a narrative or story within your writing. You’ll need a hook to draw the reader in and then you’ll need to keep their attention throughout the book. This could be through using story-like elements of dialogue and description, as well as thinking about the overall arc of your book: where do you begin, how does it end and what is the journey like?
Because your memoir is your own, you are free to use the voice that best fits you, as we’ll see later in the editing of your manuscript.
Developing your memoir
Developmental editing of memoir focuses on a few key aspects:
- Is the story strong enough?
- Is the voice consistent?
- Is the reader engaged?
- Is the reader learning something specific?
As a developmental editor, I ask these questions when reading your manuscript. From there, we are able to work together to understand where further redrafting is needed.
For example, this could be about ensuring that your original focus is stuck to and that you are leaving the reader with a clear lesson that you have learnt.
Keeping your voice consistent is key and something that a developmental edit can help you to identify. Memoirs can be as formal or as informal as you please but keeping a tone that is consistent is important so as not to distract the reader when the tone does shift. (Unless this is intentional, of course!)
Developmental editing can also be the time to identify if the overall story is working and if the intended arc is present. Maybe rewriting parts is something that is needed or you need to borrow some techniques from fiction writers is required. This is something that you will be able to identify by working with a developmental editor.
Getting a developmental edit early in the process allows you to consider all the feedback and advice you get so that your later drafts are the best they could possibly be.
Copyediting your memoir
Copyediting is the stage where your writing is polished and made ready for the reader. I take the text of your book and work with it sentence-by-sentence, addressing everything from spelling, punctuation and grammar to overall sense and flow.
I like to break copyediting down into these five C’s:
- Consistency
- Clarity
- Conciseness
- Correctness
- Conscious language
Creating a bespoke style sheet for your book, I will ensure that all style decisions, spelling variations, numbering systems, etc. are consistent across the book. This includes things like acronyms and initialisms and their definitions, italic use and punctuation styles.
Copyediting is also the stage where I ensure that your book is clear for the reader, every sentence makes sense and that your writing is concise and to the point. No one wants to wade through a difficult-to-read memoir! Copyediting will ensure that each word is working hard to achieve your goals of supporting your readers.
Because memoirs are so personal, it so important that copyediting maintains the voice of the writer, keeping their unique understanding of the events. While facts are important, ensuring that it is the writer’s perspective that is coming across is more important at this stage.
Once copyediting is complete, your text should be almost ready for your readers. After typesetting and formatting your book, a proofread will check for any last typos or errors and then you are good to go!
What memoirs have I worked on?
Here’s some of the memoirs I have worked on and that I can share with you here.
Nick (he/him) is an experienced, professional editor and proofreader, specialising in LGBTQ+ writing. Use this form to get in touch right now!
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