Let’s Talk Memoir

Victoria Buitron joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about the power of flash and lyric creative nonfiction, when chronology doesn’t work, accountability partners and writing mentors, the trauma of being a women in the world, knowing our writing will be there for us even when we stop for a while, and her memoir in essays A Body Across Two Hemispheres.

Also in this episode:

-writer work-life balance

-considering autofiction and fiction

-lit mags like Brevity and The CItron Review

Books mentioned in this episode:

Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy

My Mother’s Funeral by Adriana Paramo

Into Thin Air by John Krakauer 

Victoria Buitron is an award-winning writer who hails from Ecuador and resides in Connecticut. She received an MFA in Creative Writing from Fairfield University. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Normal School, SmokeLong en Español, Southwest Review, The Acentos Review, and other literary magazines. A VONA fellow, her work has been selected for 2022’s Best Small Fictions and Wigleaf’s Top 50. Her debut memoir-in-essays, A Body Across Two Hemispheres, is the 2021 Fairfield Book Prize winner and available wherever books are sold.

Connect with Victoria: 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vic_toriawrites/

Website: https://victoriabuitron.com

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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

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

Maya Golden joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about extensive complex childhood trauma and the repercussions of sexual abuse, recovering from addiction, approaching memoir writing with authenticity and vulnerability, the effect of religious and societal pressure on women, telling a story from the safety of adulthood, and her memoir The Return Trip.

Help shape upcoming Let’s Talk Memoir content - a brief survey:  https://forms.gle/ueQVu8YyaHNKui2Z9

Also in this episode:

-setting boundaries

-self-care and taking breaks

-protecting early drafts

Books mentioned in this episode:

The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr

The Liar’s Club by Mary Karr

What my Bones Know by Stephanie Foo

Heartberries by Terese Marie Mailhot

Not My Father’s Son by Alan Cumming

Maya Golden is an Associated Press-winning and Emmy-nominated multimedia journalist. She is the winner of the Excellence in My Market Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and the founder of the 1 in 3 Foundation, a non-profit organization that provides recovery and counseling resources to survivors of sexual trauma with little to no income in East Texas. Maya has been featured on Bally Sports, Fox Sports College, ESPN 2 and 3 and other broadcast mediums including Blackgirlnerds.com, Salon and Insider. She speaks as a survivor for organizations such as the Children’s Advocacy Center, Court Appointed Special Advocates and Kids Aspiring to Dream. The Texas A&M alum’s career includes experience as a sports anchor/reporter and television production editor, newscast writer, field producer and print writer. She is a member of the Writer’s League of Texas, Women’s Fiction Writers Association and the East Texas Writers Guild.

Connect with Maya:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Maya_Golden

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goodasgolden

Facebook: facebook.com/MGBWrites

Website: www.goodasgolden.com

Get Maya’s Book:

Amazon: https://a.co/d/gXivHue

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-return-trip-maya-golden/1143537245?ean=9781990253669

Blackstone Publishing: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-return-trip-maya-golden/1143537245?ean=9781990253669

BookShop.org: https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-return-trip-a-memoir-maya-golden/20099457?ean=9781990253669

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards and the Housatonic Book Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award and the Page Turner Award for Short Stories. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Sherry Sidoti joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about memoir in present tense,  reckoning with the complexities of transgenerational trauma, dysfunctional families, the effect writing memoir can have on our significant others, mother-daughter-sister relationships, self-care practices and engaging with our bodies while working on charged material,  vulnerability hangovers, and her memoir A Smoke and a Song.

Also in this episode:

-broken backstories 

-making material digestible

-reprocessing our lives through the act of writing

Books mentioned in this episode:

Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls by T. Kira Madden

All of This by Rebecca Woolf

Clarity by DIana Estill

When She Comes Back by Ronit Plank

Sherry Sidoti is an author and the founder and lead director of FLY Yoga School, a yoga teacher training program, and FLY Outreach, a not-for-profit that offers yoga and meditation for trauma recovery on Martha’s Vineyard. A certified Labor Doula, Addiction Recovery Coach, and Somatic Attachment Therapy Program graduate, she leads spiritual courses, teacher training, and retreats globally. Her musings, infused by twenty years of practicing and teaching yoga, healing arts, and mysticism have been published by The Martha’s Vineyard Times, Heart & Soul Magazine, Elephant Journal, and Anthropology and Humanism Quarterly. Her essay “Mosaics” is featured in the 2022 She Writes Anthology: Art in Times of Unbearable Crisis. Sherry is most devoted to her greatest teacher, her son Miles, whose love, sensitivity, humor, and wisdom illuminate her path. A Smoke and a Song is Sherry’s first book. She currently resides on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.

Connect with Sherry:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sherry.sidoti/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sherrysidoti/

Website: https://www.sherrysidoti.com

A Smoke and a Song: https://www.amazon.com/Smoke-Song-Memoir-Sherry-Sidoti/dp/1647425093/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1691880496&sr=8-1

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Estelle Erasmus brings her 30 years of experience to Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about what it takes to break through submission slushpiles, the key to exemplary essays, honing our writer’s voice and giving editors what they need, pitching story vs. topic, the art of companion pieces, conveying our passion and investment, and her new book Writing That Gets Noticed.

Also in this episode:

-podcasts as a way to reach readers

-the pace of online outlets 

-researching before you pitch

Books mentioned in this episode:

On Writing Well by William Zinsser

The Situation and the Story by VIvian Gornick 

When She Comes Back by Ronit Plank

Estelle Erasmus, author of Writing That Gets Noticed: Find Your Voice, Become a Better Storyteller, Get Published (June 2023), is a professor of writing at New York University, the host of the Freelance Writing Direct podcast, and former “All About the Pitch” columnist for Writer’s Digest where she also teaches classes on pitching, personal essay writing, and getting started in writing. She has written about a variety of subjects (health, beauty, fitness, publishing, business, travel) for numerous publications. Her articles for the New York Times and Washington Post have gone globally viral (with more than 500 comments on her New York Times piece, “How to Bullyproof Your Child”). She has appeared on Good Morning America and has had her articles discussed on The View. She has also taught, coached, and mentored many writers who have gone on to be widely published in top publications. She received the 2023 NYU School of Professional Studies Teaching Excellence Award, is an American Society of Journalists and Authors award winner, and was a cast member in the inaugural New York City production of the Listen to Your Mother storytelling show. Learn more at www.EstelleSErasmus.com and register for her latest classes. Also, follow Estelle on Instagram, TikTok, and X, and sign up for her Substack

Connect with Estelle:

Author of WRITING THAT GETS NOTICED  Available to order now.

www.estelleserasmus.com (sign up for her newsletter)

Sign up for her substack

Adjunct Instructor, NYU (Sign up for my latest classes)

Recipient 2023 NYU SPS Teaching Excellence Award

Freelance Writing Direct Podcast (iTunes) (She speaks to Cheryl Strayed, Ann Hood, Noah Michelson, Alan Henry, and more)

Freelance Writing Direct Podcast (YouTube)

Follow me: Twitter, Instagram, TikTok

Writer's Digest: What to Do to Maximize Your Launch Week And Get Your Book Noticed

https://estelleserasmus.com

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Lena Lee joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about unresolved grief and permission to acknowledge our losses, sibling relationships over time, how memoir can bring us closer to loved ones, emotional distance in our narratives, taking care of ourselves when writing, and her memoir Girl Uprooted.

Also in this episode: 

-writing into vulnerability 

-paternal estrangement 

-connecting the dots in out stories

Books mentioned in this episode:

Crying in the H Mart by Rachel Zauner

Aftershocks by Nadia Owusu

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park

A Dutiful Boy by Mohsin Zaidi

Lena Lee was born in South Korea but grew up moving countries every three years. As a Third Culture Kid, she has lived in Seoul, Paris, Oslo, Kuala Lumpur and New Jersey. After studying Human Sciences at Oxford University, Lena has been working in finance. Girl Uprooted is her first book. She lives in London, a place she now calls home(ish).

Connect with Lena

Website: thelenalee.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelenalee

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thelenalee

Get Girl Uprooted: https://mybook.to/girluprooted

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Martina Clark joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about her personal journey with HIV, the toll shame can take, the difference each of us can make, writing a braided memoir, staying a step ahead of the reader, keeping the material that matters, and her memoir My Unexpected Life.

Also in this episode:

-getting everything onto the page 

-surviving two dangerous viruses

-living a life of service

Books mentioned in this episode:

So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Iluo

You Don’t Look Like Anyone by Heather Sellers

Madman in the Woods by Jamie Gehring

Hell and Other Destinations by Madeline Albright

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall

Self-Portrait in Black and White by Thomas Chatterton Williams

Martina Clark (mar-tee-nah clah-rk), she/her, is the author of My Unexpected Life: An International Memoir of Two Pandemics, HIV and COVID-19. She worked for more than 20 years for the United Nations system and now teaches writing and critical reading for CUNY. She’s been living with HIV for more than half her life – 30 years and counting – and survived COVID-19 in 2020. Martina has traveled to more than 90 countries and conducted condom demonstrations in at least 50 of them. She's traveled by boat, bus, and plane, but never by elephant or camel. My Unexpected Life is her first book.

Connect with Martina:

Website: martina-clark.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/MartinaClarkWriter

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MartinaClarkWriter

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@martinaclarkwriter

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MartinaClarkPen

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martina-clark-2735719/

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Priscilla Gilman joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about parentification and hypervigilance in children, toggling between the child character and adult narrator, confronting and capturing the complexity of parents on the page, negotiating our inner critic, and her new memoir The Critic’s Daughter.  

Also in this episode:

-writing about close family members

-good writing is rewriting

-negotiating feedback and reviews

Books mentioned in this episode:

Faith, Sex, Mystery by Richard Gilman

Heavy by Kiese Laymon

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

The Measure of a Man by Sidney Poitier

You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith

Priscilla Gilman is the author of two memoirs, The Anti-Romantic Child (Harper, 2011) and The Critic’s Daughter(Norton, 2023) and a former professor of English literature at Yale University and Vassar College. The Anti-Romantic Child received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly and Booklist, was selected as one the Best Books of 2011 by the Leonard Lopate Show and The Chicago Tribune, and was one of five nominees for a Books for a Better Life Award for Best First Book. Nick Hornby called The Critic’s Daughter “beautiful: honest, raw, careful, soulful, brave and incredibly readable," and Kiese Laymon declared: “The Critic’s Daughter is an exquisite and rare example of how the memoir needs as much inventiveness in scope and form as our most lush fiction and poetry…I’ve read few books in my life as skillfully executed and willfully conceived as The Critic’s Daughter.” Gilman’s writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Boston Globe, Slate, REAL SIMPLE, the Washington Post, O, the Oprah Magazine, and elsewhere. She lives in New York City.

Connect with Priscilla:

Website: www.priscillagilman.com

X: www.twitter.com/priscillagilman

Facebook: www.facebook.com/priscillagilmanauthor

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/priscilla.gilman/

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Laura Carney joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about pluck, endurance, and being the biggest advocate for your book, writing about unresolved grief, what to do to reclaim memory, the truth about marketing your memoir including pitching early, befriending reporters, and building community, how to engage on social media, preparing for your book launch, and her new memoir My Father’s List. 

-Visit the Let's Talk Memoir Merch store: https://www.zazzle.com/store/letstalkmemoir

Also in this episode:

-transforming trauma

-making a person’s death part of our story

-letting go of the book

Books mentioned in this episode:

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield

Turning Pro by  Steven Pressfield

Before and After the Book Deal by Courtney Maum

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehesi Coates

Running Home by Katie Arnold

Laura Carney is a writer and copy editor in New York. She's been published by the Washington Post, the Associated Press, The Hill, Runner's World, People magazine, Guideposts, Good Housekeeping, The Fix, Upworthy, Maria Shriver’s Sunday Paper and other places, and her book My Father’s List: How Living My Dad’s Dreams Set Me Free is being published by Post Hill Press in June 2023. Her work as a copy editor has been primarily in magazines, for 20 years, including Good Housekeeping, People, Guideposts, Vanity Fair, and GQ.  My Father's List is Laura's story about completing the 54-item bucket list of her late father, who was killed in a car crash when she was 25, in six years.

Connect with Laura:

Website: bylauracarney.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/myfatherslist

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myfatherslist

Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/lac30

–

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

Leslie Ferguson joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about surviving childhood trauma and her mother’s psychosis, approaching her manuscript through an editorial lens, the toll of insecure attachment, how writing the story that forged her helped her shed some of the pain she carried, and her approach to choosing scenes that stayed in her memoir When I Was Her Daughter.

Also in this episode:

-the toll of abandonment 

-EMDR therapy

-Reparenting the self

Books mentioned in this episode:

Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls

Grand by Sarah Schaefer 

Blackout by Sarah Hepola

Love Sick  by Sue William Silverman

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert 

Leslie Ferguson enjoyed a career as a high school English teacher and college writing instructor for two decades before relocating to San Diego to pursue work in the publishing industry. She holds an MFA in creative writing and an MA in English literature from Chapman University. Currently, Leslie sits on the Board of Directors of the International Memoir Writers Association, and she loves performing original stories and poems, which often center on hope and the consequences of trauma. As an editor and book doctor, one of Leslie’s passions is helping other writers tell their own stories with courage and emotional honesty. Her multi-award-winning debut memoir, When I Was Her Daughter, tells her story of madness, loss, and survival as a foster kid in the 1980s. 

Connect with Leslie:

Facebook Profile: https://www.facebook.com/leslie.ferguson.42/

Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/Lesliefergusonauthor/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/moreleslief/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leslie-ferguson-221a1890/

Website: LeslieFergusonAuthor.com

Buy When I Was Her Daughter:

Amazon :https://amzn.to/3SphWmY

https://www.amazon.com/When-I-Was-Her-Daughter/dp/195211277X/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=when+i+was+her+daughter&qid=1638573773&sr=8-1

Barnes and noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/when-i-was-her-daughter-leslie-ferguson/1140422898?ean=9781952112775

Applebooks: 

https://books.apple.com/us/book/when-i-was-her-daughter/id1592175515

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/when-i-was-her-daughter

BOOKSHOP.ORG: https://bookshop.org/books/when-i-was-her-daughter/9781952112782

Warwick’s: https://www.warwicks.com/book/9781952112775

Diesel books: https://www.dieselbookstore.com/book/9781952112775

–

Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers

Adiba Nelson joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about putting humor in our work, the importance of voice, not worrying what people think, writing about mother-daughter relationships, raising teenagers, when you feel like you have nothing left, emotional labor and choosing when to educate others about her daughter’s disability, being a multi-genre writer, MFA programs, and her memoir Ain't That a Mother.

Also in this episode:

-Child loss

-Imposter syndrome

-Finding hope

Books mentioned in this episode:

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey

Adiba Nelson is the author of Ain’t That A Mother; the memoir that Essence, Bustle, Ms. magazine and Shondaland all hailed as a “must read”, and subject of the Emmy winning documentary, The Full Nelson. She is also a disability rights activist, Executive Producer and Creative Consultant on the tv series based on her memoir (currently in development), a freelance journalist, semi-retired burlesque performer and very tired mom!

In 2013 she self-published her first children’s book Meet ClaraBelle Blue after not being able to find a book that adequately and appropriately represented her daughter (disabled, Black). Since then Adiba has led numerous workshops and given keynote addresses around the country for parents and educators focusing on DEIA from a disability perspective.

In 2017 Adiba delivered her TEDx talk (Skating Downhill: The Art of Claiming Your Life) to a sold out crowd, and has since joined the NPR affiliate Arizona Public Media as a regular contributor on Arizona Spotlight, and was a featured speaker at the Smithsonian Institute National Museum of African American History and Culture. Her children’s book, “Oshun & Me” (MacMillan/Feiwel & Friends) will be available Winter 2024, and her next book, “Hazel’s Best Day!” will be available Winter 2026.

Connect with Adiba:

Website: www.thefullnelson.net

Instagram: www.instagram.com/adibanelson

Twitter: www.twitter.com/adibanelson

Facebook: www.facebook.com/AdibaNelsonWriter

Ain't That A Mother: https://www.amazon.com/Aint-That-Mother-Postpartum-Everything/dp/B0BMKG3M9M/ref=zg_bsnr_271583011_sccl_5/135-8794494-4325615?psc=1

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Ronit Plank is a writer, teacher, and editor whose work has been featured in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Writer’s Digest, The Rumpus, American Literary Review, Hippocampus, The Iowa 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 a 2021 Best True Crime Book by Book Riot and was a Finalist in the National Indie Excellence Awards, the Housatonic Book Awards, and the Book of the Year Awards. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes, the Best of the Net, and the Best Microfiction Anthology, and her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ Eludia Award. She is creative nonfiction editor at The Citron Review and lives in Seattle with her family where she 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 on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

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

More about HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE, a short story collection: https://ronitplank.com/home-is-a-made-up-place/

Connect with Ronit:

https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/

https://twitter.com/RonitPlank

https://www.facebook.com/RonitPlank

Background photo: Canva

Headshot photo credit: Sarah Anne Photography

Theme music: Isaac Joel, Dead Moll’s Fingers