Kelly Sundberg joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about sharing her story of domestic violence with the world, depicting trauma and triggering events in memoir, the alchemical value of PTSD, navigating the privacy of others, and incorporating essays in manuscripts.

Also in this episode:

-using direct address in memoir

-the publisher’s vision vs. the writer’s

-lyric essays and poetry for memoirists

Books and articles mentioned in this episode:

Somebody’s Daughter by Ashley C. Ford

The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yuknavitch

A Fortune for your Disaster by Hanif Abdurraqub 

Bluets by Maggie Nelson

“It Will Look Like a Sunset” ​​https://www.guernicamag.com/it-will-look-like-a-sunset/

“Ritchie County Mall” https://gay.medium.com/ritchie-county-mall-7b30b96731f6

“Every Line is a Scream” https://gay.medium.com/every-line-is-a-scream-3ed54c727619

Kelly Sundberg's memoir, Goodbye, Sweet Girl, was published by HarperCollins in 2018. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times Modern Love, Alaska Quarterly Review, Guernica, Gulf Coast, The Rumpus, Denver Quarterly, Slice, and many other literary and commercial magazines. Her essay “It Will Look Like a Sunset” was selected for inclusion in The Best American Essays 2015, and other essays have been listed as notables in The Best American Essays 2013, 2016, and 2018. She has a PhD in creative nonfiction from Ohio University and has been the recipient of fellowships or grants from Vermont Studio Center, A Room of Her Own Foundation, Dickinson House, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She was recently awarded a 2021 Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council, and she is an Assistant Professor of English at Ashland University in Ashland, Ohio. 

Links: https://www.amazon.com/Goodbye-Sweet-Girl-Domestic-Violence/dp/0062497685/ref=sr_1_1?crid=TOX8R2VUN9S2&keywords=goodbye%2C+sweet+girl&qid=1648689563&sprefix=goodbye%2C+sweet+girl%2Caps%2C95&sr=8-1

https://kellysundberg.com/

https://twitter.com/K_O_Sundberg

https://www.instagram.com/ksundber/

Ronit’s essays and fiction have been featured in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, The Iowa Review, 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 both the 2021 Best Book Awards and the 2021 Book of the Year Award and a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and will be published in 2022. She is host and producer of the podcasts And Then Everything Changed and The Body Myth.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com

More about WHEN SHE COMES BACK, a memoir: https://ronitplank.com/book/

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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