I stumbled across this video of Mary Karr and wanted to share, especially for all my fellow creative nonfiction writers. This is an excerpt from her keynote at the 2010 Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference. (p.s. I promise to share authors other than Mary Karr. Or this that a trick? Happy Halloween.)
This question is directed at the writers here: do your friends and family call you nosey? Mine do—and always have. Even as a child, my favorite one-word question was “why?” and I liked to eavesdrop on conversations. I always wanted to know the story and what happened behind the story. Sometimes, when I’m watching movie or reading a great article, I want to know how the director got that shot or how the writer secured that tidbit of information.
While I know when to keep it in check, there’s no question that I am endlessly curious. One reason I love writing is because I’m always learning something!
With that, I give you my reading picks for the week, most of which focus on the story behind the story.
Your turn. What story or behind-the-story piece did you read this week that you’d like to share here?
On the corkboard directly in front of my desk—visible every time I look up—is a quote from Mary Karr. She was writing about the late memoirist Frank McCourt and stated, “A memoir voice is the diamond in a sack of glass.”
Karr, a memoirist and poet who’s written The Liar’s Club, Cherry and the recent Lit, is one of my literary heroes. When I attended her reading at Denver’s Tattered Cover in November, she was also emphatic that memoir is about voice and, if you have an original voice, you will get published.
In contrast, I caught several comments on Twitter last Friday. According to a recent WSJ article, the slush pile is dead. Several agents I follow on Twitter declared just the opposite, with agent Janet Reid posting this rebuttal on her blog: “What I mean by the phrase ‘slush works’ is that sending a good query with good pages will get you the attention of an agent. You don’t need anything more than that if you write compelling fiction.”
While I have to admit that I felt a twinge of skepticism when I heard Karr’s comment about your voice being the key to publishing, I don’t want to believe that the slush pile is dead. Call me Pollyanna, but I want to know that talented, hard-working writers without big literary connections can secure an agent and be published.
Maybe that’s why I follow so many agents on Twitter and read so many of their blogs. These agents are offering insight and tips to aspiring authors. On January 14, several agents let readers peek behind the curtain with #agentsday, with agents posting their tasks as they went about a “typical” workday. This LA Times article is a great resource for more about #agentsday, as well as a links to several participating agents. One correction: the article states that popular blogging agent Nathan Bransford did not participate; he did once he overcame computer issues.
Okay, what’s my point with all of this? My dream is to publish a memoir. It’s not something I discuss much and very few people know that I’ve been working on it. But I’ve been chipping away at it for a while and have even taken several writing class that made enormous differences. Then the economy tanked, so I decided I would focus on writing the book, rather than selling it. One of my goals this year is to get serious movement with this and write a full draft. I went the route of developing a proposal and earning a few rejections.
So that’s me being really person. And I want to believe that Karr is right.
What about you? What keeps you motivated and positive when headlines are screaming the demise of publishing? Is there an author, friend, mentor or teacher who keeps you going? Please share your experiences in the comments below.
Photo attribution: http://www.flickr.com/photos/austinevan/ / CC BY 2.0
If it’s fall, it must be memoir season—at least for me. There’s something about the crisp air and bright leaves of October and November that always inspires me to write. I just seem to be a little better about carving out time for more personal work, like essays and creative nonfiction.
And it also means I’m hungry for memoirs. I’m always on the lookout for a great, true tale—even more so in the fall.
Here’s what I’ve got on my list, at least so far. (Book links go to the authors’ websites or publishers’ websites.)
Counting the Days
The book I can’t wait to read is Mary Karr’s new memoir Lit, which follows her descent into alcoholism and madness. The publisher’s description of the book says that Lit is “also about getting drunk and getting sober; becoming a mother by letting go of a mother; and learning to write by learning to live.” I am especially interested in reading more about Karr’s relationship with her mother and how it evolved. To be released November 3. (My birthday. I know what I’m doing that day!)
Okay, your turn. What are you reading as the leaves fall?
