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Happiness is Reading Alice Munro

12/27/2010 By Leave a Comment
Munro Too Much Happiness

Alice Munro is one of the few authors I have read who so artfully relates the throes of the human condition through her characters’ active and reactive thoughts revolving around people with whom they are intimate and others whom they’ve simply met on their path through life. Having just devoured Too Much Happiness, Munro’s book of short stories, I am reeling from the power of her words. I have the habit, when reading brilliant authors’ works, of writing down certain passages that strike me with their eloquence or bite me with their awful truths. The following are several extracts, in italics, from the ten stories in Munro’s newest book (short thoughts from me tagged on without italics). While reading these clips, as they flow down the page and with the characters’ thoughts out of context, I’m hoping the effect will not be too strange. If you take your time with each, and I believe the protagonists’ inner thoughts will grab hold of you like they did me so you’ll be

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Who’s Who?

12/17/2010 By 2 Comments

I’m nobody! Who are you?Are you – Nobody -  Too?Then there’s the pair of us!Don’t tell! They’d advertise – you know! How dreary – to be – Somebody!How public – like a frog –To tell one’s name – the livelong June –To the admiring bog!                         Emily Dickinson

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Make it Personal – Give the Gift of Story

12/06/2010 By Leave a Comment

Most of us have given our mothers cards on various holidays, complete with pat phrases, often via Hallmark, extolling the virtues of millions of moms.  This year take a good look at her—go deep down inside of her and yourself to write a “Mother Memoir” as only you can—one that fits her precisely.  Make it a short memoir, a bio-vignette. This story will be better than any other gift you could possibly imagine giving to her.Yes, she’s your mother, maybe your grandmother, or another woman to whom you felt like a daughter or a son. Have you ever actually stopped to think about who she really is as an individual, as a woman unto herself? What aspect of her being, what quality, action, or anecdote could you draw upon to bring the essence of her character to light in a short memoir?At times she is mysterious, other times transparent. But of this you can be sure, she’s not the same woman to anyone other than you.  Her character is multifaceted, her inner make up complex, but for

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Question Assumptions Memoir Labyrinth No.11

11/22/2010 By 2 Comments

Close to a dozen times now I’ve asked you to walk the memoir labyrinth as an extraordinary way to clear your mind and take a new look at people and events.  It is hard to back away from life’s events and experiences to see them clearly. The honest attempt to put our ego and emotions aside is something we, TellTale Souls, constantly work on when writing our bio-vignettes that capture the character and spirit of our mothers or other significant people in our lives.The best way to begin writing memoir is to look closely at your most significant relationships, so it makes sense to begin at the beginning with Mother – Mom – Mama. After all, she was your first relationship, the closest one possible. Like it or not…How often do you give deep thought to the hidden secrets that make mom tick, let alone write down the resulting discoveries? You have certain things, ideas and impressions, stuck in your head about your mother, but are these thoughts, which you hold to be true,

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San Francisco Writers for Change Conference

11/11/2010 By Leave a Comment

This weekend...click here for all the information on the 2010 SF Writers for Change Conference.Attend this conference and you'll see that I'm not the only one who believes writing can change your life and your words can change the lives of others. Will Your Book Be The One ThatChanges The World...this year?Headliners include: Dan Millman, John Robbins, Jean Shinoda Bolen,  Alan Rinzler, Cami Walker, Rosemary Daniell, and so many more...Just added: ALL-DAY PRECONFERENCE--All About eBooks--with industry leaders Rob MacDonald (Scribd) and Mark Coker (Smashwords) on Friday, Nov. 12th.The StoryWoman says, "Write Mother Memoir to change your life; become a TellTale Soul."

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Memories in Gray of a Mother and her Daughter

10/31/2010 By 2 Comments
Brain

Grey some say. I always spell it gray, so I guess that means I'm one of those wayward Americans, which I am proud to be!—I’m told the King’s English uses an “e” to spell gray. Either way, gray or grey can be dispiriting. Would Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue have connected so powerfully with music lovers if it had been Rhapsody in Gray? Some of us cover the gray in our hair with coats of many colors, and when I hear "the graying of America," I can't help but visualize old, bent folks trudging along into oblivion, and I don’t think that’s the way people in their “Golden Years” ought to be portrayed. I revel in the eerie grayness of fog, and I dream of gray, rainy days when it’s okay to curl up with a book and not feel guilty. And then there are the early morning hours and those at dusk when the world seems to stand grayishly still for a time before giving us the day or the night. Those are often moments of forgiveness, even promise. Treasure to be sure. Gray

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Making a Memoir Teacher Blush

10/18/2010 By 2 Comments

What's a memoir teacher to do when a student makes her blush with humility and delight? Well, this one is going to share Marlene's kind words with you hoping you will follow her lead and write memoir: Dear Lynn,  Your workshop, Keeping Spirits Alive, was just an amazing experience!  Not only did my grandmother’s spirit come to life within me, you, dear heart, suffused my spirit with the passion, joy and unbound excitement to travel in time and space to converse with the many spirits who’ve touched my life over the years and to invite them to be heard and remembered. Your invitation to “look through their eyes;” to see, to hear, to viscerally experience my grandmother as if I were her was a profound experience for me.  What a rare gift you are.  I am so amazed that three hours could so change my life, my perspective and my journey here on this planet.    Thank you for the safe space you created to share myself.  Thank you for the wonderful teachings, tips, and

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The Good Daughters: Perils of Husbandry

10/11/2010 By Leave a Comment
The Good Daughters-Maynard

The Good Daughters—Two sides of the same coin, or should I say strawberry plants? (Once you read the book, you’ll know what I mean.) Through Joyce Maynard’s insightful writing, I found the off-shoots, Dana and Ruth, to be not only good daughters, but also strong women, each with a powerful belief in herself that held true through times of duress as well as triumph. I would have welcomed both of them as my daughters and loved each girl expressly for the very uniqueness of her character and spirit. At times, I wanted to look directly into the faces of the girls’ mothers, Connie and Val, and ask, “What the heck are your problems? Can’t you like your daughters if they aren’t the spitting image of you?” From the beginning, however, I admired and genuinely liked Connie’s husband, Edwin Plank, the solid farmer, with his knack for plant propagation, for his seeming fair mindedness and acceptance that things were as they should be. But were they? Who was the elephant in the

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Expand Your Comfort Zone by Writing Memoir

10/06/2010 By Leave a Comment

Are you toying with the idea of writing a memoir? Are you unsure or fearful of venturing out of your comfort zone to become the author of your true tales? You’re thinking: I’ve never written anything before.  I‘d like to write a memoir, but I don’t think I have the talent to make my experiences come alive. I’m thinking: Take a chance. Try something new. Trust your voice. You do have what it takes to write. I believe you’ll find a new friend in memoir. First of all, ask yourself if you believe your memories are important and worth sharing? Then think about the last time you told a friend or relative an anecdote about a significant memory of someone in your life. Did your telling the story peak the listener’s interest? More than likely it did. Finally, are you comfortable leaving significant memories stuffed away in your head rather than writing them down on paper for future generations to discover and glean insight into their heritage, or will you let

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Memory: The Conscious Currency

09/25/2010 By Leave a Comment

Memories are currency in more ways than one. What are we without memory? And what will happen to the important memories of our lives and the lives of those around us, if we don’t write them down? On a scrap of paper I recently came across on my cluttered desk, I’d written down a thought about memory I’d picked up somewhere, though I neglected to make note of where. I guess I thought I’d remember who said it—but can’t, so I’ll just say it, anyway. It went something like this, Memory was all I had, the only currency, the only proof that I was alive. I can see why I jotted it down—food for thought, certainly. It got me thinking about some of the elements involved in memory creation. Feelings are imprinted to memory. Often, when a memory is recalled, the exact feelings we felt at the time the memory etched a pathway in our brains is felt front and center. Our personal feelings about an incident or individual, then, are integral parts of each memory. Some memories fade

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