Six tips to start your memoir
You want to tell your story. You’ve lined up the ghostwriter and set aside the time and money to do it. Now, where do you start?
It can seem like a daunting prospect, even when you are not the one doing all the writing, to extract all the meaningful elements from your life.
A good ghostwriter should be able to lead you through the process painlessly but you could get a head start and prepare for the journey ahead.
After all, not everyone has a photographic memory of all the salient details of their years on the planet, or the major interactions that influenced their lives.
Here are SIX tips on starting your memoir:
Speak to your family and loved ones. Bring people on board!
It is useful in any case to lay the groundwork with the important people in your life to let them know you are writing your life story. As well as giving them a chance to mentally prepare they can be very helpful to the process. When it comes to family, they may be able to supply information about your past. Siblings and parents, for example, may be able to share their impressions of important moments or events in your life. Perhaps they know more about certain members of the family or about crucial things that happened and can help to unlock areas that have been closed off to you until now. Many of my authors have been brilliantly assisted by family members, some of whom have kept records, letters and mementoes.
2. Raid your photo albums
So many moments in our lives we think we will remember forever are quietly banked by our minds, rarely revisited. Old photos can be a helpful reminder of holidays, special occasions, people and situations. They can also be very useful for your ghostwriter to ground their descriptions in reality. Of course, we do our research but there is no substitute for the real thing. Old photos show the clothes you wore, the places you visited and the things you did. I look at everything in these pictures – what is on the walls, how people are arranged, the weather, the ornaments in the background. Small details can help bring a story to life. Frequently, pictures can also spark old forgotten memories and help my authors to reconnect with people from their past.
3. Dig out old reports, CVs, certificates, letters and other admin
Sometimes it feels like I’m an investigator, delving into the past to piece together an accurate record of life events. Every little bit of information is useful in this quest. Old school reports, writing assignments, local paper cuttings, CVs, assessments from work, letters from old lovers, postcards from friends or family. If you have been involved with the authorities through the years and they are relevant to your story– for example, social services, the police or the courts - it is also helpful to connect with them to see if they have records they can share. Every little titbit will help to build up the picture, adding colour, texture and detail, allowing me to tell the story authentically. Sometimes, old admin can even unlock crucial elements to the story so get up into that loft or attic and start rummaging!
4. Diaries are invaluable
These are like gold dust to the ghostwriter. Whatever you wrote contemporaneously will give your ghostwriter an accurate idea of what you were thinking at the time. They are literally a window into the mind!
5. Think about a timeline
You really don’t have to do this yourself and I realise it’s a big task - that’s why you hire me! One of the first things I will do when starting a new book is create a timeline. I can’t tell a story if I don’t know the order of events. But it would really help if you had a rough one in mind. Timeline-wise, the broadest of brush strokes can be incredibly useful to your ghostwriter.
6. Finally…. clear the calendar!
It is vital that you carve out enough time to work with your ghostwriter. Most of my authors fit their ghostwriting services around their job or other full-time commitments, but it is intense nonetheless, and it does take time. At first we will need to do lot of interviewing – up to 25 hours for the average full-length manuscript. This can be done in one big burst – five hours a day for a week. Or small two-hour segments over a number of weeks. It’s up to you but either way, there’s a lot of talking involved. Then there is the reviewing stage where you look over and amend the chapters as they are written. Again, this takes a lot more time and commitment than many realize so be prepared to clear the decks for a while.
And that’s it…. now you’re all set you can relax and leave the rest up to us.
Good luck!
Katy Weitz