What does it really mean to be an adult? Guest author John Mitchell Morris’s haunting story challenges us to consider.
Memoir Notebook: Three Summers, Part 2: Bucking Hay
Richard Maxson continues his boyhood farming tale, reflecting on the harvest of transcendent memories cultivated in an alfalfa field.
Memoir Notebook: Three Summers, Part One: The Seed
A city boy goes to spend the summer on a farm in rural Ohio, and the experience stays with him into his golden years, still surprising him with the way it reveals plain and not-so-plain truths.
Memoir Notebook: A Courtyard in Queens
Dheepa Maturi reflects on her little Queens, New York, courtyard and its open-minded, open-hearted embrace, which welcomed and encircled and protected her.
Memoir Notebook: Kate DiCamillo’s Newbery Medal Acceptance Speech
Kate DiCamillo listened to the approaching siren and thought it was the first time in her life she had heard that sound and not wondered who it was for.
Memoir Notebook: Waterfall of Sweet Dreams—Conclusion: Bird on a Wire
In this final installment of his Waterfall of Sweet Dreams Memoir series, Richard Maxson leaves Hollywood to pursue new dreams imparted by an English professor.
Memoir Notebook: Waterfall of Sweet Dreams—Part III: Disenchantment
The disenchantment of the acting life sends Richard Maxson toward the greater question of what will really bring him happiness.
Memoir Notebook: Waterfall of Sweet Dreams—Part II: Bummer and the Rat
Richard Maxson struggled to embrace his Hollywood dream of becoming an actor until he befriended a stray cat he named Bummer.
Memoir Notebook: Waterfall of Sweet Dreams—Part I: The Call
That is exactly how he thought of acting—as just another job. One day Richard Maxson looked up the number of Columbia Pictures Studios and made the call.
Memoir Notebook: In the Jingle Jangle Morning, 1965
A young Richard Maxson takes off in the Jingle Jangle Morning of Bob Dylan’s “Tambourine Man” on a cross country road trip and into his own Tomorrowland.
Memoir Notebook: Harp Dreams and Good Vibrations
Sandra Heska King writes a new story for her life by taking up the harp … again.
Memoir Notebook: Searching for Arkansas
Rick Maxson and his family have lived many places, but their search for home ultimately led them to the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas.
Memoir Notebook: My Moveable Feast
In our latest Memoir Notebook, Michelle Rinaldi Ortega travels to Paris and encounters Ernest Hemingway and his Moveable Feast.
Memoir Notebook: Molly and the Thieves
In our latest Memoir Notebook, Richard Maxson remembers his beloved German Shepherd Molly, in a tale of love, loss, and a band of thieves.
Memoir Notebook: Sweet Talk
In this Memoir Notebook, Darrelyn Saloom recalls watching her stepfather raise his right arm. This time, his open hand curled into a fist.
Memoir Notebook: Too Close for Comfort
Darrelyn Saloom reveals childhood fears, both macro–the Cold War–and micro–her stepfather’s anger–in this entry in the Memoir Notebook.
Memoir Notebook: Writing the Fragile
In memoir, how do you write what is fragile? Maybe first you have to live it. Courageously remember it. Then tap the fragile in yourself.
Memoir Notebook: The Worst Kind of Luck
Darrelyn Saloom recalls her mother, Billie Burnside and the Circle Inn lounge in this poignant entry in the Memoir Notebook.
Memoir Notebook: Voices (or, How to Write Spiritual Memoir)
Heed the voices, says Wm. Anthony Connolly, for they are the memoirist’s own rising from the soul.
Memoir Notebook: Advice for New Memoir Writers
I asked two online nonfiction writers’ groups: What’s the one piece of advice you’d like to give new memoir writers. The following are their responses.