January Member Teleseminar

Writing Your Family Story in Your Memoir

Laura Hedgecock

January 22, 2016

11 AM PST 12PM MST   1PM CST   2 PM EST

 

Our story isn’t simply the things that stand out in the vivid technicolor of our memory or the signposts that mark turning points in our lives. Our personal story also includes chunks of our family—even ancestral—story.  Information is only part of the experience you want to offer your readers. You want them to connect to you, the writer, as well as any of the “characters” of your past. When the facts alone live up to their cold, hard billing, memoirists don other hats to bring the past alive—research and creativity.

Join Linda Joy and Laura as they discuss writing strategies that add context, texture, and meaning to your story, allowing it to connect with the present.

We’ll examine:

1. Why there’s no such thing as an individual story.
2. How to research the past to add context and texture to stories
3. How to write about what—or who—you don’t know.
4. Using different voices to tell other people’s stories—putting yourself in someone else’s story.
5. How to address unanswerable questions, such as What would my ancestor think of me?

 

Bio

Laura Hedgecock is an author, speaker, blogger, and genealogy nut passionate about helping others tell their personal and family stories. Her book, Memories of Me: A Complete Guide to Telling and Sharing the Stories of Your Life, stems from a gift left by her grandmother. Shortly before her death, Hazel Crymes passed on an old spiral notebook filled with a lifetime of memories and stories, which she dubbed her “Treasure Chest of Memories.” MEMORIES OF ME guides and empowers memory collectors with down-to-earth, practical advice and creative ideas.

Laura blogs and posts resources for preserving memories and personal stories http://TreasureChestofMemories.com.

When she’s not writing, she enjoys spending time with her husband and two newly adult. sons, (and her Springer Spaniel), playing soccer, nature photography, and finding her roots—which might explain her messy house.

Connect with Laura: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest, Linked In, GoodReads