Ep 244 Memoir Writing with guest Deborah Lucas
Pencils&Lipstick podcast ·
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Transcript
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Hello
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everyone, welcome back to Pencils and Lipstick. I am Kat Caldwell and this is episode 244 of the show. We are going to talk about memoirs today and I have a wonderful guest with me to talk about writing memoirs and then how she wrote memoirs. Deborah Lucas
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is her name and we are going to get into that in just a little bit. So we are already in November and things are moving along and if you're in America this sort of starts the really crazy season. We have Thanksgiving this month and then a month later we have Christmas and we usually have a lot of parties and all that and I know once December hits even Europeans and South Americans and Australians you're all, you know, doing the holiday thing. And so if you are planning to write this season, some of you are probably still wanting to get things done before the end of the year, I think that's totally possible as long as you have a little bit of grace with yourself. One reason that I never wanted to do nano, nano Raimo was because it was almost impossible for me to do. I've said this before in November. It's just so, so hard and so stressful, honestly. But it is not impossible to get some writing done. So you can go, you can scale back a little bit, maybe scale back on your expectations or just scale
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back on the stress. You know, if one day goes by without you getting it done, it's okay. I know that we all have deadlines, things that we want to get done, I do as well, but you know enjoy your season, your holiday season as well. If you're looking to do a little bit of writing but not necessarily on a project it's always a great idea to maybe write some stories or try your hand at poetry or maybe write the Christmas cards. I mean all of this includes writing right? So maybe you write down some memories or maybe you can gather your memoir thoughts if you want to write your memoir in 2025. Writing a memoir is really not as easy as some people think. Well, and I think some people actually have a talent for it and it's much easier for them than the average person,
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but every single time that I'm working with a client on their memoir it's actually quite a lot to work to gather your memories and your journal notes and to decide how you're going to organize it and all that. So that is what we're going to get into today because I know quite a few of you are either working on a memoir or want to work on a memoir. And so there are some things that you should probably think about as you go through the process and, you know, think about even before you go through the process. So we are going to talk with Deborah Lucas today. she is a memoirist and she's also a book coach. And we're just going to have a frank conversation about what writing a memoir includes. Hello, Deborah Lucas. It's so good to talk to you. We always have a good time talking, so I'm glad to have you on the show today. I can. I wanted to have you on because you are kind of my go -to when it comes to memoir in our coaching circle. I know there's a couple others out there as well. But though, let's talk
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from the beginning. You've done so many things, not just being a writer. So could I ask you first, like, how did you come to, like, the writing part of art?
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My family were storytellers, and they all died way too early. I lost my brothers before my parents. And my first memoir was triggered by my brother's illness and then his death. And those kinds of life events, but I didn't start writing it for about, let's see, 2008, 13 years later, because of life events and other things still going on. But that was a story I really wanted to tell about how he had impacted my life and how my husband had impacted my life. And
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so that's about a painter, right? So your art, was it just not enough to have it in art form? You wanted it in ink, kind of to be able to share it with people, you think?
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It's interesting because a lot of times when people have, I've moved 50 times in 45 years before I got here. Oh, my God. And we've lived here almost 30 years, the same place. And this is, when we moved here, is where my book ends. But it's like, you want to tell somebody your story, but it's too complex. How do you do that?
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And so that's basically it. But the challenge with memoir is pairing it down to being not autobiography, but a slice or a section or a point or, you know, one container so that you can tell a story that's not all over the place.
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Yeah. So did you know that when your brother, like your brother's story, I'm sure is very intricately woven with yours, with your parents, with all that. Did it start out like, I want to tell this whole story with my brother included? Or did you know that you wanted it niched down to your brother first? Like, how? Oh, much later, much later. As
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a matter of fact, it was Jenny Nash that helped at a retreat that triggered that, because she kept
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pushing me about the container and the present timeline, instead of all, you know, the backstory and all the other
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things.
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So I've split my book twice, almost in half, because I'm a long writer and I needed to get the words down, but I also needed to get that, what's it about? If you can't answer that in a couple of sentences, you don't know yet what your book is about, but that doesn't mean you can't start writing.
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Right. Oh, that's a good point. Yes. So you were writing and then you found this. Well, I had 130 ,000
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words.
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Oh my gosh. If you can't see me. It's for me. No, I mean, that's just it. Like, words are not difficult for me either, but I feel, I'm trying to encapsulate this for people who might be like I was, and it sounds like maybe you were of like, I have this story to tell and words are not actually difficult to get on the page.
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But as you said, you went to a retreat where she kept pushing you with this question, some sort of question usually comes up when you really start digging, if you don't give up. And you say, well, I want to get this out, but it's not right, what's the point? And I feel like memoir people are gonna say, my life is the point, so is that not enough?
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No. And Jenny said some things about that shocked me at first, but I totally get it now. She would say, you know, about somebody would tell her that somebody died in their life, and she would, okay, so what?
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Oh, that's harsh.
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It's very harsh. But it makes the point, how many, who hasn't had somebody die in their life? So what makes your story worth telling and worth reading? You're asking your readers to take a chunk of time out of their life to read your story. What are they gonna get out of it? What are you going to share with them? How are you going to help them in their own personal journeys and struggles?
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So then how did you find that point? Because that feels very uncomfortable.
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You go to a writing retreat and she's like, But what's your point? Because I can see the point of maybe even, maybe if you already knew that you're writing about your brother, like, let's say, let's make something, like, if I'm writing about my parents' divorce. Like you said, like, a lot of people have this, this history, and you go, okay, but my point is I'm, I want to help others process the divorce. Like, how do, but that too is not enough. So how, how was that process for you of, like, that discomfort of that continual question, I'm like, this is my life.
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As Jenny would say, it's iterative. In
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words, you
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would start in one place and
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then after a
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while, after you would tell people or somebody would read your writing or whatever, then you'd say something else. It's like, oh, okay, that's a better what's it about, right? And then you would write and revise and have somebody else read it. and then they'd ask you questions, and you'd answer them, and like, oh no, that's what it's about. So it's really not about my brother. He's the trigger and the framework or the container for the story. But the story is about me overcoming an unstable childhood and gaining the confidence to claim my life of creativity and with horses, and finding home, finding home. See,
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that's very interesting.
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Along the way, I was having to make hard choices between what my dream was and my brother's needs. Right.
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So an example is when I had just gotten my undergraduate degree in Indiana with my husband, and I had signed up for grad school, and it didn't get the one I wanted. I was waitlisted, but I was going to go to Purdue and then, you know, switch the next year or whatever. But I was, like, eager. I going to do this. And I wasn't a kid at that point. I was 37 when I got my undergraduate degree. And so, and also I studied another area of architecture before that, but I came back to art because it was my true love. So, I found out that my brother was ill, and I talked to my husband, and we dropped our whole life. We sold our lovely little home, and he got a transfer, and somehow I got into grad school in LA, and we just picked up and moved within a couple of months, just totally.
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And those are the kinds of things that the hard choices that I was facing and how did I cope with that? How did I deal with that? And that's the story, you know? And you can persevere, you can find the life of your dreams even with a lot of stuff going on in your life or your family or illness or death or whatever. Hang on to it, persevere, you will get there.
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Yeah, that sounds like a big love. Like you could almost, this is what I find hard about memoir is you don't necessarily understand how to find that context until you really have been pushed by someone. Like very few people come to this naturally. There are some natural memoirists who, I mean, and I would almost call them essayists. Like they somehow have put their personal life and they're just very good about being introspective and vulnerable, you know. But for the most of us, we have maybe one, maybe two memoirs that we want to write because something impactful has come. But a lot of times, we don't really know how to be introspective, like when we're writing it. And so at first it becomes, it's about our brother, right? But about, like, I gave up something to go, you know, and my brother impacted me. But that only really gets so far and so deep, right? So how were you introspective at this point at 37 where you were like, were you living it in that thing in such a way that was like, I know what I'm doing? or was it just about, like, my brother's sick, I'm gonna go, I love him so much, I'm gonna go,
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and I don't know what I'm trying to ask. Like, how aware were you that, like, you were giving up a lot in your life to go be with him?
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I was aware of it, but it wasn't that big of a thing, because you gotta remember how much I moved.
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How many
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times I moved, from very young all the way up until, really until I met Greg in my early 30s. And then we still had a few moves in us after that.
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But that for me wasn't hard. And the hard part is to be able to share with a reader why I would make that choice. And they need to know a little bit about me, but they can't know about my 50 moves, right? So that's
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where it's hard for writing a memoir. How
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do I help them understand why that's not so hard for me and why I tend to be impulsive like that and confident that I'll figure it out? Because I built this muscle, emotional muscle growing up, I didn't have a choice. I had to figure out how to start over, how to find friends, you know, and how to feel like a sense of belonging. And I had to do it over and over and over
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again.
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So, but how do I help them to understand? And then, how is it different now? What changed in me to make the memoir worth telling? How did I get that introspection as a whole to have my emotional chart? How did I, after moving 50 times, move and stay in one place for 30 years?
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Yeah, yes, yes. That's what it's about. Right, and that's like, I feel like that's about the age when women, we tend to take a breath and look around us and go like, wait, what am I doing, maybe? So when you decided to write this, because you've worked with horses, you're an artist, you're a painter, are you a sculptor as well? Yes, I
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have two degrees in clay and ceramics.
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So you have this many mediums in which you express your emotions and you express what you're thinking and feeling and doing all that. But you said that it took you a couple years to decide that you wanted to write about your brother, I guess, at first. So how many years past this experience
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of picking up and moving did you actually put pen to paper or words to a computer?
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Actually, I was writing with the intention of writing his story when he was dying, basically. And I was talking, I would be traveling across the country and I'd run into people and I talk easily with people. And I ran into this guy that was a writer and he was asking me about it and I already knew. I already knew I
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was writing
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the book. Yes, I knew that I had to do that, but I wasn't sure what kind of envelope or what it would look like or why it mattered. I didn't know any of the substance of it. I just knew that I have an exceptional family and basically I could write a book about all four of them easily, easily. They each have a special story. So material has never been a challenge for me.
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It's how to focus in on one story, stay with that, and work it to where it's within a container, but it's also deep. You've got to go deep. And the other challenge that I gave myself, I first wrote this in memoirs first person, but I wrote it in past tense, and then I rewrote it in present tense.
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Oh, and why did you do
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that? Because there was something about the immediacy. And I think it was something that I wanted to do originally, but I was, you know, instructed by people who because I didn't know what I was doing. You know, you should do it this way. Right. So you listen to them. And, but that makes it a little more difficult for the reflection because you are living each of those scenes at the age of that scene,
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of that protagonist in that scene.
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So,
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you know, the reflection all comes at the end. So how do you communicate what's going on internally? You know, it's a real challenge.
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It is a journal, this sounds like anyone who's listening is like, oh my gosh, okay, so how then you're, I mean, and this happens, right? You live a life, you might be writing or journaling or whatever, and you think I'm going to write a book. And I don't think a lot of us think, you know, that's not too hard until they sit down in front of the blank screen, or maybe they, you know, maybe it's a blank screen, or maybe Maybe it's getting a lot of words like you
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and being like, okay, but, you know, where am I going with this? So how did you find the container of this book as you call it? How did you come to this conclusion of like, cause you got to leave so much out, right? If you're like, once you find that container, so how?
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Yes, and actually, as I'm finishing it to, you know, like final draft to get ready to publish,
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there's still some things I need to trim. And because there's so many places where I wanted to go deeper in terms of the emotion of the scene and the details of the scene. And you do that, your word count gets a little high. So it's like, okay, is there something that I can pull out that's not as important? That's a little bit of a duplication in terms of what it's communicating to the reader.
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Okay, so when you're going deeper, you're adding more words, which might force you to trim.
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Yes, yes. And that's the breathing of a manuscript. I think any writer goes through that. You know, once you get the first draft, then it's a matter of you go in and you cut and then you add. Sometimes in the same, you know, in terms of revision, all within one. But then a lot of times you'll, okay, so you'll show it to somebody. They say, I've been going to conferences since 2008, and I've been pitching since 2008,
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because they were kind enough to help me, to teach me what it is that helped me to speak clearly about what the story was about, and as that did that, that refined. And then I was finding my teachers, and so finding Jenny Nash was huge, finding Alison K. Williams was huge, finding my critique groups have been huge. And as a writer, if you want to write, the most important thing you can do is start looking for a community, whether it's online or in your community,
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especially for memoir writers, because we are so different from all the others. Different and yet we are similar because it's nonfiction to be memoir, but it's written like a novel. I mean, this is contemporary memoir. This is contemporary memoir. Dialogue, all of that. So you draw from all those different directions. So you can learn from just reading anything or talking to any author.
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So you're saying specifically a memoir critique group, like where the other writers are writing memoir?
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Doesn't have to be, but it's helpful if you at least have one other person
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that's writing memoir so they get
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what you're doing. They of get what they, and that's, that I think is one of the, one issue I see with memoir every time I'm asked to edit it is, it's hard to trim it because I think sometimes they think everything needs to be there for the writer, for the reader to understand, but you, you've said a few times, like, it's more about going deeper than kind of giving the whole life and that is, I agree with you, I think it is just iterations of learning the craft almost more than anything because the story you already have, like unlike fiction writers, you don't have to find the story, the story is already there, it's finding like almost like how to get it across to the reader without banging them over the head day to day.
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So don't tell.
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It's so hard, though, because it is because you
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are telling a story, right? So it? No, you're not. You have to think of it as a movie. This is the best thing
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that I've heard. It's a movie. Okay, movie of your life. And as in movies, they jump from one scene to the other, they leave out a lot in between. And as long as they do it in such a as we can go with them, it's fine. No big deal. And the way to bring your reader with you when you make a jump is to anchor them in time and place, and who's in the scene when
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you
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start, and then you can just go. And whether you fill in some of those things from in between or you don't, doesn't matter. So can, but you can do that as that next But you got to know what the scene's about. Just like the book overall, you need to know, OK, what is this scene for? What is it doing for the entire story? What piece is it?
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So that without it, the puzzle doesn't fit, right?
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Right, right. So do you teach? So you're a long writer, as you call yourself. I call myself an overwriter. I think it's the same thing. When you're teaching people to write, Do you teach them to know what the scene is, to like analyze if the scene is needed or not before they write it? Or are you kind of more on like, write and then we'll reanalyze if the scene needs to go? How do you teach that when you have your students?
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Well, I do use the author accelerator tools, at least the heart of them about, you know, about, you know, what's it about? Why is it important? And then knowing the key tent poles, as we call them, three or four or five scenes that give you a sense of where the story is. And then the hard part about that after that is, is there a beginning and end change for the protagonist, for you? What kind of emotional change is there?
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Arc change. Yeah,
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arc of emotional change.
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But you have to be able to know that so that you can put the right scenes in. Because if they're not supporting that part of the story, I mean, you can fill in other things later, but you've gotta have those tent poles about that story. So I try to get them to do that, and if that's really a struggle for them, I go, okay, tell me a story that's within your manuscript. And they start talking about it. I go, okay, write that in scene. And that's where I start them. And is a hard lesson for a lot of people because we weren't ever taught to write in scene unless somebody was a, you know, a movie maker in our family.
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Right, right. So I'm finding a lot, I love working with women over 55 because they kind of, they have a story to tell, a lot of it. I mean, I live outside of DC and I wish I could grab every woman around here and be like, please tell your story. Because our society does not respect women enough once they're retired, I think, in my own opinion, to ask them about their story. but I mean, there are amazing women around here. So I do think there's so many women now, thankfully, wanting to write their story. And I have seen one struggle for women, for my clients, and I've only had a couple,
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but to organize either the journals or things, or just to organize their life and then to sit down and write it. So what do you tell women like that? Because they could be executives, they could have been ambassadors, and they had a certain way to organize all that, right? And their family or whatever else they were doing. So how did you learn how to organize the writing, which is sitting and getting the words down there? How did you do it or how do you help your clients do that?
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Number
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one, I'm not sure leaning on the journals at the beginning is effective, at least for me. I think it's more resource material. I think that if you don't know your story on top of your head, the basics of it, then you know, you haven't found your story yet.
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I mean, if
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you need to read your journals in order to remind yourself of where you were and then you can look at where you are and you can see what big change there is. Then that's great, you know, if you need that inspiration. Most women know what their story is, just like you were
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saying.
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So it's a matter of starting with what the story is, a paragraph of what the story is, right? That's part of the blueprint.
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And that, it's like, okay, where would it start? Where are you? What year it is? How old are you? What's the description of the place? Who's there? And what's that scene? What's happening?
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Write that for me. Right, just getting them to write then.
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Yeah, and that can be tough, but they get really excited once they have a beginning place.
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Yeah,
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yeah. And so sometimes, you know, we ask him to do the end, but sometimes that's a little bit tough. So just say, okay, so, you know, to tell the story that you've told me, this is what your story is, what are the key points that got you there?
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Just kind of tell me in a sentence or two what this chapter would be, what this chapter would be, or scene that would be in this one would be. And if I can get that out of them and written down on paper and I'll help them if I need to, They're good to go because then it'll all just fill itself in.
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Yeah. Yeah, I wonder sometimes if the journals and the memorabilia is sometimes just a procrastination tool because it's scary. I mean, you're about to write your story for like anyone who wants to pick it up can read it. right? Like, so I want to acknowledge like, that is a little scary. But gosh, like, the girls to come need your story. They need these like, you know, the the new generation thinks that they're the first to like, do things. It's just like, no, you're not there. Like women have done amazing things. we were not all barefoot in the kitchen. I know some of your story, so I know for sure. But I think they think women's history is like far away from them. Oh, those are like the unicorns of the history. Those women got in the history books, but the truth is the women are like the everyday woman has done a lot of stuff. There's at least one to many stories in her. I mean, just amazing things that women have gone through in this country alone. I could go on and on. I
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write your stories. So I do wonder if sometimes the journals, so I like how you have them just sort of write that first thing, because then I think it is a muscle to be worked, right? Like the more we work out a certain muscle, the more comfortable we are. But I want to ask you about structure. How important is it to know the structure of your memoir? Like, is it, do you sit and think about, like there are many ways that you could, I mean, you could write letters to your dad who's deceased, or you could write like the three -act structure, or you could write, you know, beginning at the end and then go forward. Like, so how important is that at the beginning, I guess? Or at what point is it important?
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I think with memoir, there's often different timelines. Like there's this contemporary timeline that kind of triggered the story, right? Something happened to me as an adult and it made me think about back when I was younger. And so then there's that timeline. And so the structure is, how do you want to integrate those? Do you want to tell them sequentially? Do you want to weave them? And the other part that's really hard is, when you tell me what you think you want to do, I'm going to ask you why.
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What
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is that structure doing for your story? What does that give you? And so,
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but
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see, structure is, there's usually easier to start with a simpler structure. Mine is, well, okay, so Alison Kay Williams has this, this, I'd never heard it before her, is the E structure, where you start someplace in the present or in the middle, and then you go back and tell all of the story that came before, and then you continue from that point and finish the story.
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Interesting. Yeah. I could see how that would help some people, absolutely,
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because I think that we can get caught up in the structure, the organization, however you want to call it. I mean, as coaches, we call it structure. it can be a little debilitating, right? To be like, where do I start? Where do I go now? Like, how should it be? How many
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times have we rewritten our first chapter?
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Yes! Yeah! Yes! So, and then how, when we go back to like getting critiques on it, because if you haven't been a writer your whole life. Let's say, I mean, we all write, right? Like, we are all writing. But maybe it was a different kind of writing that you did, and now you're doing memoir. And like you said, it's kind of fictionalized in the sense, like, you add dialogue and you're looking for the story arc and stuff.
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And theme.
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And the theme. Like, that's, that's a lot to learn, right? So when you're coming to critiques, how, like, how wide should you cast your net? How personal should you take it? How much should you follow the critique? Like, what has been your experience and the good, the bad, and the ugly of getting? Getting
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feedback on your
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own work?
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On your own work, yeah. I
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think the one thing you have to look out for is when somebody starts telling you how they would write the story.
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Oh, that's a good point. Just discard that, right?
SPEAKER_01
00:33:44
The important thing is for them to give impressions of what they are seeing, and when they fall out of the story, when it's like, you know, all that backstory. And so they're just, you lose interest, right? and you want to go do something else. The other thing is, is for them to ask questions. Those are the gold. Do
SPEAKER_00
00:34:05
you have a question? No, no,
SPEAKER_01
00:34:08
I let them, do you have any questions? You is there any missing? And oh, they're ready with the questions. Well, why did you do this? And well, what's this mean? And you know, what's really going, and they've got all, who's this person?
SPEAKER_01
00:34:21
Oh, I can see how that's helpful. Yes, and it keeps triggering you having to answer that you answer it a little bit to them, but more so in the writing. And then you have to step back and look at it and say, Okay, is that the story I want to tell? Is that working for me? Because if not, toss it out?
SPEAKER_00
00:34:42
Oh, okay. So you ask them a question? Do you have questions? Yeah,
SPEAKER_01
00:34:47
yeah, just let them read it. Let's let them read something of your writing, the first 50 pages. I mean, that's the goal, right?
SPEAKER_00
00:34:54
And then
SPEAKER_01
00:34:55
everybody says, usually you have to chop off the first 30 or something. Oh man. Because we have all that backstory stuff that we're trying to get into. And again, that's why we write more like fiction, because the audience is a little more impatient these days.
SPEAKER_01
00:35:13
Some a lot, we were talking about that this morning. And so how do you get into the action? If you're stuck in backstory, you're not in the action. So you've got to figure out what action you're gonna start with. And that's gotta tell them what
SPEAKER_00
00:35:33
this story is about. Is about, right, right. Cause there is a difference between memoir and biography.
SPEAKER_01
00:35:40
Oh, huge. Okay,
SPEAKER_00
00:35:41
so what is the difference?
SPEAKER_01
00:35:44
Biography
SPEAKER_01
00:35:44
is your whole life, and biography is this happened, and this happened, and this happened, and this happened, and this happened. And it's like a chronological thing. There's no impactful connection between one and the other. And we talk about this all the time, you know, you write a scene, what's it about? And then, you know, why does it matter? And And because of, or and so, what happens as a result of some of those actions? And they could be just internal struggles, but you know, you make a choice or you don't make a choice or, you know, whatever. But those choices that you make in your life, those are the important transitions from one scene to the next. And if they have no connection, or it's not evident in the writing, then it's not memoir.
SPEAKER_00
00:36:41
Interesting, okay. Because I was obsessed with biographies when I was a teenager of the old black and white Hollywood. But I can see how a biography of someone famous kind of makes sense. Because you kind of want to see, they were born here,
SPEAKER_00
00:36:57
this is what their childhood was like, this is this, this, this. that. But I might not know Debra Lucas. And so going from the moment that Debra was born might not... It's too much. You're like... It's much for me. So for the memoir, what we're still looking at is that hook, almost like, like you said, a fiction book where we're, we're still... So are the readers fiction readers as well? Pretty like they are they know what they're looking for when they pick up the memoir book
SPEAKER_01
00:37:31
You know, it's funny I mean I know nonfiction is kind of separate there are people that just love nonfiction They don't like anything else
SPEAKER_01
00:37:39
But and there are people that have a prejudice against memoir and I'm not really sure that they realize what memoir is like these Days, they might think it's biography No, if they think it's biography, it's trouble. If they think it's fiction, because that's the thing. I could take my book and I could take it into the Women's Fiction Writers Association and say, oh, this is fiction.
SPEAKER_00
00:38:01
It
SPEAKER_01
00:38:01
would work. It would totally work, because
SPEAKER_00
00:38:05
I've written
SPEAKER_01
00:38:05
it like a fiction story. It's just that it's all true. And I want to claim that it's all true, that that happened to me. And that's why I am a dedicated memoir writer. I have written fiction, I've written, I've got two manuscripts, from stories from my own life, but I kind of recreated a protagonist other than me and, you know, gave her similar challenges. It's that same thing of a lost girl who gets saved by horses. That's kind of my favorite theme.
SPEAKER_00
00:38:36
Yeah, I like that thing. Because it's true. But yeah, so memoir, you're you're kind of you're kind of looking for the same grabbing attention as anybody who would read fiction, but you're claiming it as your own. I like that definition.
SPEAKER_00
00:38:53
Do you think a memoir writer, or writer, if you're wanting to write a memoir, then you're a memoir writer, should they read memoirs? Or should they just write? I think
SPEAKER_01
00:39:03
it's important to read memoirs.
SPEAKER_00
00:39:04
I
SPEAKER_01
00:39:05
think it is, yeah. And there's some really fabulous ones out there. And I think it is because I had this too, my first conference, I went in and I said, you know, so if I tell everybody the truth, then they might not like me, you know, should I do that? And he goes, you know, get over that now, get over that now, put it all in there. Because if if skip over some of the stuff, your reader will see the whole and know that you left it out. So just get over that now. You're gonna put it all in there. You're gonna cry your eyes out while you're writing, you know, typing and all that. Well, that's great, you know, because you are reliving each scene as you're writing because you're getting into that self that was living that. That's the best way to write. Just like with a fiction, you get into your character's head and you become that character and you respond to things based on... I mean, you're living in story land, right? Yes. When you're writing, which is a great place to live.
SPEAKER_01
00:40:17
It is. So, yeah.
SPEAKER_00
00:40:19
So you just get over... I do agree that... Just get over it, yeah. The best memoirs are the memoirs that really make you... They're so vulnerable. Like, I think crying in H -Mart is one of those memoirs where I was like, she's so brave. Because it's not that you aren't going to have, like, your struggles with your mother don't go away just because she's dying of cancer. Like, that is like one of the, you know, like, you still have to work through all this, but she's so brave. And so many, most memoirists are very brave to, like, show their humanity.
SPEAKER_00
00:40:55
Yeah. Right?
SPEAKER_01
00:40:56
And Cheryl Strayed is a classic of that for a while because she showed all of her huge mistakes and all of the things that, you know, would be really easy to be embarrassed about. And she just laid it all out there and, you know, how she ruined her marriage and how, you know, she got in, just all of the things. and the core of the story is how she came to terms with all of that and her mother's death. Yeah, yeah. And she even threw the death of a horse in there, right? Yes,
SPEAKER_00
00:41:31
but I mean, that's so real, you know? Like a lot of us are just walking through life and the minute that it smacks us, like to be able to find your mistakes and to be able to write it out there because the reality is some, I won't swear, jerk is going to write a bad review because, oh gosh, I can't believe that you were mean or whatever, you didn't forgive your mom right away or what, like who cares? That person has issues that they're not
SPEAKER_00
00:42:06
willing to deal with. Bad
SPEAKER_01
00:42:07
reviews are a badge of honor.
SPEAKER_00
00:42:09
Exactly, because most people are going to see the like the I feel like you're as you're writing the memoir you're getting even more healing and then as somebody reads it they're getting healing and it's like this beautiful connection you know you might not ever meet your readers but that they're getting a healing that you got as you wrote it it's just so it's pretty
SPEAKER_01
00:42:32
it is it's really cool and also I want to let people know that even though there's the some really intense stories out there as memoir, there's also the softer, gentler ones. I mean, it's like the difference between a Natasha Trethewey Memorial Drive about the her stepfather killing her mother. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, that and it's very visceral. And and the abuse that she went through at the hands of her stepfather. And, and then there's like Joyce Maynard, who, I mean, you know, the best of us and at home in the world. And of course, she has that one. It's her time with J .D. Salinger, which is kind of interesting. It's how she got into memoir. But one of her recent novels, Bird Hotel, I just love it, because it's, it's, it's got a lot of stuff in it, but it's, it's, it's easier access for everybody. We did it in the book club
SPEAKER_01
00:43:39
and everybody liked it. Right. And that's the way she writes her memoirs. You know, the old classic Jeanette Walls, Glass Castle, when I started writing, everybody goes, Oh, Glass Castle, Glass Castle. So I mean, that was my first count. Yeah,
SPEAKER_00
00:43:59
yeah, yeah. I mean, that anyway,
SPEAKER_01
00:44:02
there's but there's, you know, one of my favorites is about a woman who is a horse woman. And she goes into this prison. That is not really in the prison. It's separate. It's a ranch with horses, and prisoners are taking care of the horses. And they're really screwing up a lot. And the horses that they get are also really broken emotionally and physically and all of that. And it's this amazing story. Here, let me see. It's Ginger Gaffney half -broke, and how she relates the stuff that she's helping them with and seeing, both the horses and the people, to her own life.
SPEAKER_00
00:44:49
Wow. And there's this,
SPEAKER_01
00:44:51
I mean, there's, I haven't read it in years, but there's this pivotal scene in a, in a little like, um, quick shop and, and it's so visceral, but it's like she's in this little store, right?
SPEAKER_01
00:45:08
It's not like there's a shooting or anything going on. And that's when you really are grabbing those emotions and, and, you know, just, you got reader in your hands like that. That's what you
SPEAKER_00
00:45:19
would
SPEAKER_01
00:45:19
like to do. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00
00:45:20
Well, you make a really good point that a memoir doesn't have to be about death. It doesn't have to be about something really, you know, or you've done something horrible or somebody else has done something horrible. A memoir is really a reflection on something that you've gone through, right? And that can, that has touched you and changed you significantly. Exactly. Exactly. It's going to change the reader. So I really want, you're correct, we got to make sure people know that. I don't want you to like throw away your manuscript, somebody who's listening, thinking, oh, there's not like some crazy thing. That's not true. I think it's also really important to understand those, I guess, quote unquote, quieter stories or not so like heavy traumatic stories. But there are a lot of women probably listening, or maybe this is being shared among them, and they... I work with a lot of women hitting retirement age or past retirement age, and they want
SPEAKER_00
00:46:23
to get this done. And I have heard some women saying, you know, well, I don't know if it's really worth it to get it done. And Nobody wants to hear my story, the kind of different iterations of this, or maybe I won't have enough time, maybe I won't get it done in time, you know, you never know what's going to happen. I hear many things and, you know, I still encourage them. But what do you encourage people with when you when you hear women saying, you know, trying to maybe make up excuses not to not to write their memoir?
SPEAKER_01
00:46:56
Well, as Jenny said in this conference that I heard, she was a the speaker, and she said, a keynote speaker, and she said, if you can quit writing, quit right now, quit, because it's way hard. But if you can't quit, if you are compelled to write, and you have a story to tell, it's like, you know, come along with me. And the important part is, is to just not give up. Just, and keep problem solving. If somebody says they have a problem with something, start searching for a solution, how, you know,
SPEAKER_01
00:47:34
and about, there's so many women publishing at 80, so many, at 80, first memoir, debut memoirs. And one of my favorite authors, Abigail Thomas, she's been writing for a long time, but her book, Still Life at 80. Yeah, it's great. I mean, I love women who are telling their story with clarity and passion and they didn't stop because of their age. They didn't let anybody stop them. Another thing about letting people stop you is they'll people say, they'll give you rules, right? You can't do this, you can't do that, or that's wrong. Don't listen to them. There is, you can do anything if you can pull it off well. There's somebody out there doing breaking every single rule, right? And so if you have a reason for how why you're doing it that way, stick to your guns and then look for somebody that can
SPEAKER_01
00:48:37
help you along that way to, you know, make it stronger, clearer, whatever. But coaches are great. But if not that a writing group is wonderful.
SPEAKER_00
00:48:47
Yeah, absolutely. I love that. Where can people find you? Do you talk about memoir and writing somewhere where they can sort of follow you and continue to? We will have links to your website in the show notes and I'll put some of these books in there as well, but how can they keep following you?
SPEAKER_01
00:49:10
A great way is to sign up for my newsletter. Well, there's actually kind of two versions of that. One is my monthly, which is longer. And I use pictures in that. And pictures, you were talking about pictures earlier because they are so helpful to be able to trigger a story in you. So, you know, I start my newsletter, I pull out some pictures and I go, oh, okay, I'll write that. And just comes out, right?
SPEAKER_01
00:49:34
So pictures are very useful. So that, you sign up for that on my website, which is deborahannlucas .com. And I also have coaching pages in there if you're interested, but there's also just a lot in there about my art and my life on the ranch, my life with horses and all of that. So I'm just all out there, I memoir all the time. The other place that I write is for Substack, which is DebraAnnLucas .substack .com. I
SPEAKER_00
00:50:09
like that you're easy to find.
SPEAKER_01
00:50:12
If you can spell my name right, it's the old -fashioned way of spelling Debra. And there's no E on the end of Ann.
SPEAKER_00
00:50:19
Oh man, okay, never mind. All these rules. We will have the links in the show notes.
SPEAKER_00
00:50:25
But I love how you're also a great example of you don't have to set aside maybe who you were or who you are outside of writing and only be a writer here. I love how you incorporate all of your loves and your passions in not only your writing but your newsletter and your website. I think that's a great example, right? We don't have to compartmentalize just because we've decided to write a book.
SPEAKER_01
00:50:54
Well, especially with memoir is how you find your readers is by telling your story. And so people are gonna be drawn to me because they like me, right? And those are gonna be my readers. And it's a slow way to build a readership, but it's a solid way to do it. And so I'm just out there being me. I don't worry about being right anymore. I'm just being authentically me as much as I possibly can. And it took me 60 years to figure that out. Maybe a little more.
SPEAKER_00
00:51:28
It takes us all a little bit longer, but I mean... Hopefully We're going
SPEAKER_01
00:51:33
to try and help folks, you know, read some of these memoirs, and it won't take them quite so long.
SPEAKER_00
00:51:38
Exactly.
SPEAKER_00
00:51:39
I love that. So, we will have the links in the show notes. Thank you so much, Deborah. We'll probably have to have you on again because we might get questions even more about memoir, but I hope that we helped...
SPEAKER_01
00:51:50
I'd love it. ...help
SPEAKER_00
00:51:51
people. Thank you. This has been
SPEAKER_01
00:51:53
delightful, Kat. You are great to just chat with. anytime. That's
SPEAKER_00
00:51:56
why I bring you on, so that you can just compliment me. Oh,
SPEAKER_01
00:52:01
come on. You're the best. We all know that.
SPEAKER_00
00:52:03
We'll talk to you soon, Debra. Okay,
SPEAKER_01
00:52:06
thanks.