Let’s Talk Memoir

The Vulnerability of Writing About Difficult Motherhoods featuring Karen DeBonis

Karen DeBonis joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about the obstacles and medical gaslighting she faced trying to uncover what ailed her son, postpartum depression, writing about difficult motherhoods, learning how to deal with conflict, sharing our pages with partners, promoting our work, a happy social media story, how she overcome her people pleasing ways to become a warrior mom and her new memoir Growth: A Mother, Her Son, and the Brain Tumor They Survived.
 
Also in this episode:
-Munchausen by Proxy
-marketing angles and memoir
-highlighting our patterns in memoir
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Raising a Rare Girl by Heather Lanier
Motherhood Exaggerated by Judith Hannan
The Opposite of Certainty by Janine Urbaniak Reid
 
Karen DeBonis writes about motherhood, people-pleasing, and personal growth, inspired by the experience of raising her son, Matthew. Her debut memoir Growth: A Mother, Her Son, and the Brain Tumor They Survived was released by Apprentice House Press in May 2023. Karen’s work has appeared in The New York Times, Huff Post, Today.com, Newsweek.com, and others. A happy empty-nester, Karen lives in upstate New York with her husband of forty years. 
 
Connect with Karen:
Website: www.karendebonis.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/karen.debonis.3
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KarenDeBonis
IG: https://www.instagram.com/karendeboniswriter/
Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karendebonis/
Amazon purchase link: https://www.amazon.com/Growth-Mother-Brain-Tumor-Survived/dp/1627204350/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1672427791&sr=8-1
Bookshop purchase link: https://bookshop.org/p/books/growth-a-mother-her-son-and-the-brain-tumor-they-survived-karen-debonis/19468474?ean=9781627204354
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
 
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Loving and Writing About an Imperfect, Magnificent Child featuring Cathy Shields

Cathy Shields joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about the role guilt and grief have played in her experience parenting a unique child, how she has navigated her daughter’s diagnosis of severe cognitive disability, writing about complicated mothers and complicated mothering, protecting children in our work, critical mothers, living in the contradiction, and her memoir The Shape of Normal. 
 
Also in this episode:
-not giving up
-social anxiety
-forgiving ourselves
 
Memoirs mentioned in this episode:
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan DIdion 
Educated by Tara Westover
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Raising a Rare Girl by Heather Lanier
To Siri with Love by Judith Newman
 
Catherine (Cathy) Shields, M.S. Ed., is a retired early childhood teacher. She writes about parenting, disabilities, and self-discovery. In her debut memoir, The Shape of Normal, Cathy explores the truths and lies parents tell themselves. Her stories and essays have appeared in NBC Today, Newsweek, Bacopa Literary Review, Grown, and Flown, 
Brevity Blog, Write City Magazine, The Manifest-Station, and elsewhere. Cathy lives in Miami, Florida. In her free time, Cathy likes to hike, kayak, and explore the Everglades National Park with her husband, to whom she’s been married forever.
 
Connect with Cathy: 
Website: https://www.cathyshieldswriter.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cathyshieldswriter
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/cathy-shields-88487711b
X: https://twitter.com/Catshields1
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cathy.p.shields.3
Substack: https://cathyshieldswriter.substack.com/
Get Cathy’s Book: https://www.vineleavespress.com/the-shape-of-normal-by-catherine-shields.html
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Self-Declared Spiritual Gurus, Secret Mantras, and Yoga Cults featuring Joelle Tamraz

Joelle Tamraz joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about yoga cults and self-declared spiritual gurus, searching for something outside ourselves, mind control, transcendental meditation, capturing the emotional vulnerability of our memoir characters, the many drafts in our manuscripts, and the story of how she pried her way out of the decades-long spiritual emotional, financial, and physical abuse she writes about in her new memoir The Secret Practice: Eighteen Years on the Dark Side of Yoga.
 
Also in this episode:
-critique groups
-standing by our story
-writing as a relationship with ourselves
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Writing Hard Stories by Melanie Brooks
Love Sick by Sue William SIlveman
The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls
When She Comes Back by Ronit Plank
 
Joelle is a memoir and life writer who's been putting thoughts to paper ever since she learned about journaling in her eighth-grade English class. Before pivoting to writing full-time, she held senior roles in technology companies for over two decades and owned a yoga studio for ten years. She earned an Honors BA degree in social studies from Harvard and an MBA from INSEAD. She is also a certified life coach and a youth mentor. She has lived in the US and France and now resides in the UK with her husband and two dogs. The Secret Practice: Eighteen Years on the Dark Side of Yoga is her debut memoir.
 
Connect with Joelle:
Website: https://joelletamraz.com
X: https://twitter.com/joelletamraz
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joelletamraz
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joelletamraz1
Get the book: https://books2read.com/joelletamraz
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Realizing You’ve Actually Been Writing Your Book featuring Rona Maynard

Rona Maynard joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about allowing ourselves to get lost in our writing, realizing you've actually been writing your book, observing our animal companions keenly, embracing surprises in our work, discovering joyful moments, looking for a narrative arc, using Scrivener, going more deeply, writing from the heart, and her memoir Starter Dog.
 
Also in this episode:
-taking in the world around us
-photographs as writing aids
-learning who we are
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck
What Comes Next and How to Like It by Abigail Thomas
Truth and Beauty by Ann Patchet
In the Key of New York by Rebecca McClanahan
 
Rona Maynard found happiness at 65—a story she tells in her new memoir Starter Dog: My Path to Joy, Belonging and Loving This World. She first broke into print at 14 with a short story about bullying and still receives fan mail from teens who are reading it in class. Rona capped a stellar career in magazines with a decade at the helm of Chatelaine, Canada’s leading magazine for women. Her editor’s column garnered a loyal following. When she disclosed a struggle with depression, she helped kickstart a national conversation about mental health. When Rona stepped away from corporate life, she had to learn to unwind. Her best teacher was a rescue mutt who had received his basic training in a prison. She has been married more than 50 years to her best friend, tech advisor and driver on a cross continental art adventure that took them to 49 museums in five weeks. Rona says road trips go better with a dog in the back seat.
 
Connect with Rona:
Website: https://ronamaynard.com/
Medium: https://ronamaynard.medium.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rona.maynard/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronamaynard3278/?hl=en
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ronamaynard/
 
Get Rona’s book:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Starter-Dog-Belonging-Loving-World/dp/1770417230/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1690986860&sr=8-1
Bookshop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/starter-dog-my-path-to-joy-belonging-and-loving-this-world/18908036?ean=9781770417236&ref=https%3A%2F%2Fronamaynard.com%2F&source=IndieBound&title=Starter+Dog%3A+My+Path+to+Joy%2C+Belonging+and+Loving+This+World
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Understanding How to Let Go featuring Ann Batchelder

Ann Batchelder joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about using myth as a jumping point for interpreting ourselves, trusting intuition, the idea of mother failure, regret and letting go, addiction and recovery in loved ones, mental health stigma, deciding when to show loved ones the manuscript, and her memoir Craving Spring: A Mother’s Quest, a Daughter’s Depression, and the Greek Myth that Brought Them Together.
 
Also in this episode:
-how stories save us
-Alanon
-mother guilt
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Beautiful Boy by David Sheff
Wild by Cheryl Strayed
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City by Nick Flynn
Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer
H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald
Eating in the Light of the Moon by Dr. Anita  Johnston
Work by Pema Chodron
Work by Tara Brach
 
Ann Batchelder is the author of Craving Spring: A Mother’s Quest, a Daughter’s Depression, and the Greek Myth that Brought Them Together. She served as Editor of FIBERARTS Magazine, was guest curator for the Asheville Art Museum where she designed and developed three major contemporary art exhibitions featuring artists such as Louise Bourgeois, Ann Hamilton, Sally Mann, Maya Lin, and Laurie Anderson, and was Director of Special Events for the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Ann earned an MSW in psychotherapy and is the mother of two adult children. 
Connect with Ann:
Website: https://www.annbatchelder.com
Facebook: https://facebook.com/ann.batchelder.9
Instagram: https://instagram.com/annbatchelder  
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

The Very Good News About Publishing featuring Brooke Warner

Brooke Warner joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about nontraditional publishing, the massive sea change we’re seeing in memoir, how for authors visibility and marketing work is never done, protecting our memoir worlds, accountability groups, what all memoirs require, the genesis of She Writes Press, balancing her multiple roles, the project she is working on now and the many resources she offers memoirists.
 
Also in this episode:
-when creativity merges with our working life
-carving out time to write
-Substack and content-creation
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Heavy by Kiese Laymon
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamont
The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr
In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado
You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith
 
Brooke Warner is publisher of She Writes Press and SparkPress, president of Warner Coaching Inc., and author of Write On, Sisters!, Green-light Your Book, What’s Your Book?, and three books on memoir. Brooke is a TEDx speaker and the former Executive Editor of Seal Press. She’s the current Board Chair of the Bay Area Book Festival, and sits on the Board of the National Association of Memoir Writers. She writes a weekly Substack newsletter @brookewarner, and a regular column for Publishers Weekly.
 
Connect with Brooke:
Website: www.brookewarner.com
She Writes Press: www.shewritespress.com
SparkPress: https://gosparkpress.com
 
Brooke’s memoir courses:
www.writeyourmemoirinsixmonths.com
www.magicofmemoir.com
 
About Ronit
Subscribe to Ronit's Memoir Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank?utm_source=profile-page
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Following Creative Hunches and the Magic of Revision featuring Joni B. Cole

Joni B. Cole joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about following our creative hunches, what to look for in workshop groups and writing teachers, the power of positive reinforcement, the magic of revision, the right to tell our stories, her approach to teaching, the writer’s center she founded in White River Junction, Vermont and her new book of essays Party Like It’s 2044: Finding the Funny in Life and Death.
 
Also in this episode:
-connecting with other writers
-checking in on our expectations
-celebrating ourselves
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Growing Up by Russell Baker
One Writer’s Beginnings by Eudora Welty 
Spare by Prince Harry the Duke of Sussex
Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay
Shrill by Lindy West
 
Joni B. Cole is the author of seven books, including the new release "Party Like It’s 2044: Finding the Funny in Life and Death," and two acclaimed writing guides: "Good Naked: How to Write More, Write Better, and Be Happier" (listed as a “Best Books for Writers” by Poets & Writers magazine) and "Toxic Feedback: Helping Writers Survive and Thrive" ("I can't imagine a better guide to writing's rewards and perils than this fine book,” American Book Review). For over twenty-five years she has taught creative writing to adults through her own writer’s center in White River Junction, Vermont, through the Dartmouth Writer’s Society, and at a diversity of academic and nonprofit programs across the country. She is a contributor to The Writer magazine and Jane Friedman blog, and hosts the podcast “Author, Can I Ask You?” 
 
Connect with Joni:
Website: www.jonibcole.com
The Writer’s Center of WRJ: www.thewriterscenterwrj.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joni.b.colewriter
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/joni.cole.9
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

How to Capture a Feeling: the Specific and Particular featuring Jane Wong

Jane Wong joins Let’s Talk memoir for a conversation about the challenge of reflection in memoir, writing that teems with the specific and particular, capturing the experience of being a chinese american woman on the page, writing about exes and domestic violence, keeping ourselves safe while creating, constellations in our lives, avoiding sentimentality, and her new memoir which she calls a love song to her mother, Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City.
Also in this episode:
-how she’s never funny in poems
-the super secret Jane Wong’s been keeping
-finding your people
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Seeing Ghosts by Kat Chow
Tastes like War by Grace M. Cho
Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner
Dictee by Theresa Hak Kyung Cha
The Grave on the Wall by Brandon Shimoda 
Jane Wong is the author of the debut memoir, Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City, out now from Tin House (2023). She is also the author of two books of poetry: How to Not Be Afraid of Everything from Alice James (2021) and Overpour from Action Books (2016). 
 
She holds an M.F.A. in Poetry from the University of Iowa and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Washington and is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Western Washington University. Her poems can be found in places such as Best American Nonrequired Reading 2019, Best American Poetry 2015, The New York Times, American Poetry Review, POETRY, The Kenyon Review, New England Review, and others. Her essays have appeared in places such as McSweeney's, Black Warrior Review, Ecotone, The Common, The Georgia Review, Shenandoah, and Want: Women Writing About Desire (Catapult).
 
A Kundiman fellow, she is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize and fellowships and residencies from the U.S. Fulbright Program, Artist Trust, Harvard’s Woodberry Poetry Room, 4Culture, the Fine Arts Work Center, Bread Loaf, Hedgebrook, Willapa Bay, the Jentel Foundation, UCross, Mineral School, the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, Loghaven, and others. She grew up in a Chinese American restaurant on the Jersey shore and lives in Seattle.
 
Connect with Jane:
Website: https://janewongwriter.com/
Get Jane’s Book: https://tinhouse.com/book/meet-me-tonight-in-atlantic-city/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paradeofcats
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Working with Developmental Editors and Book and Proposal Coaches featuring Lisa Niver

Lisa Niver joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about disagreeing and then agreeing with your agent, her career in travel, accountability groups, working with developmental editors and book and proposal coaches, divorce, all the non-writerly jobs being a published memoirist requires, and her new book Brave-ish: One Breakup, Six Continents and Feeling Fearless After Fifty.
 
Also in this episode:
-taking time to rest
-switching where our memoirs begin
-asking for help
 
Books mentioned in this episode:
Getting Stones with the Savages by Maarten Troost
The Henna Artist by Alka Joshi
Super Survivors by David B, Feldman and  Lee Daniel Kravetz
Group by Christie Tate
BFF by Christie Tate
Maybe You Should Talk With Someone by Lori Gottlieb
 
Lisa Niver is an award-winning travel expert who has explored 102 countries on six continents. This University of Pennsylvania graduate sailed across the seas for seven years with Princess Cruises, Royal Caribbean, and Renaissance Cruises and spent three years backpacking across Asia. Discover her articles in publications from AARP: The Magazine and AAA Explorer to WIRED and Wharton Magazine, as well as her site WeSaidGoTravel.
 
On her award nominated global podcast, Make Your Own Map, Niver has interviewed Deepak Chopra, Olympic medalists, and numerous bestselling authors, and as a journalist has been invited to both the Oscars and the United Nations. For her print and digital stories as well as her television segments, she has been awarded three Southern California Journalism Awards and two National Arts and Entertainment Journalism Awards and been a finalist twenty-two times.
 
Named a #3 travel influencer for 2023, Niver talks travel on broadcast television at KTLA TV Los Angeles, her YouTube channel with over 2 million views, and in her memoir, Brave-ish, One Breakup, Six Continents and Feeling Fearless After Fifty.
 
Connect with Lisa:
Website: https://lisaniver.com/braveish/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lisaniver
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lisaniver
Twitter: https://twitter.com/lisaniver
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lisa.niver
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/wesaidgotravel/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisaellenniver/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LisaNiver
We Said Go Travel: http://wesaidgotravel.com/
Lisa’s Series of articles:
Navigating Book Promotion: Expert Tips from PR Pros
https://www.wesaidgotravel.com/book-promotion/
Unlocking Book Promotion Success: Insider Strategies from PR Experts (Part 2)
https://www.wesaidgotravel.com/book-promotion-2/
Mastering Book Promotion Strategies: Proven Insights from PR Experts (Part 3)
https://www.wesaidgotravel.com/book-promotion-3/
 
—
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Sign up for monthly podcast and writing updates: https://bit.ly/33nyTKd
 
Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
https://twitter.com/RonitPlank
https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank
 
Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Depicting Complex Relationships and Calibrating Metaphor in Memoir featuring Rosa Lowinger

Rosa Lowinger joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about growing up in Cuba, her storied career in art restoration, taking a closer look at the complicated and evolving relationship she’s had with her mother, sending manuscripts to family and exes before they go to press, protecting loved ones in our work, how much metaphor is too much, and her new memoir Dwell Time.
 
Also in this episode:
-finding community
-working with book coaches
-approaching writing like a job
Books mentioned in this episode:
Educated by Tara Westover
Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
Blow Your House Down by Gina Frangelo
Little Failure by Gary Shteyngart
The Year of Magical Thinking by Jon Didion
H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald
Liar by Rob Roberge
The Distance Between Us by Rayna Grande
Avid Reader by Robert Gottlieb
When She Comes Back by Ronit Plank
 
Rosa Lowinger is a Cuban-born American art conservator and founder of RLA Conservation of
Art + Architecture, LLC. (www.rlaconservation.com), the U.S.’s largest woman-owned materials
conservation practice. She is also a published author, most well-known for Tropicana Nights:
The Life and Times of the Legendary Cuban Nightclub (Harcourt, 2005), a book on Havana’s
pre-Castro nightclub era. Other fictional works by Rosa include The Encanto File, a play produced off-Broadway by the Women’s Project and Productions and published in Rowing to America and Sixteen Other Short Plays, edited by Julia Miles (Smith & Kraus, 2002), and The Empress of the Waves, a short story published in the anthology Island in the Light/Isla en la Luz (Trapublishing, 2019).
 
Rosa’s academic and professional distinctions include the 2008-09 Rome Prize at the American Academy in Rome, where she researched the history of vandalism, graffiti, and street art; and Fellow status in the American Institute for Conservation and the Association for Preservation Technology. She holds an M.A. in Art History and Conservation from NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts, lectures regularly at numerous universities around the country, and serves on the boards of the Amigos of the Cuban Heritage Collection at University of Miami, Florida Association of Museums, the Partnership for Sacred Places, and the Florida Association of Public Art Professionals. Rosa co-curated the exhibits Promising Paradise: Cuban Allure American Seduction (Wolfsonian Museum, 2016) and Concrete Paradise: Miami Marine Stadium (Coral Gables Museum, 2013). She writes regularly for academic and popular media about conservation, the arts, and Cuba. Her 1999 cover story on Havana for Preservation spawned a career in cultural travel that has taken her to Cuba over 100 times since 1992. She lives in Los Angeles and Miami and is married to Todd Kessler.
 
Connect with Rosa:
Rosa’s Website:www.rosalowinger.com
Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/rosa_Lowinger
RLA Conservation’s Website: www.rlaconservation.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rlaconservation
Purchase Dwell Time: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/dwell-time-rosa-lowinger/1143192800
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Dwell-Time/Rosa-Lowinger/9781955905275
 
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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and lives in Seattle with her family where she teaches memoir workshops and is working on her next book.
More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
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Background photo credit: Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash
Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography
Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers