Muse & the Marketplace 2019

The memoir market is more competitive than ever. Two dozen agents told me my memoir was beautiful but no publisher would buy it because I wasn’t a celebrity. Instead of getting discouraged, I retooled my approach, found an agent, and got a publishing deal.

In this session, I’ll unpack how I turned things around. I’ll discuss how I framed my memoir as more than just a personal narrative by identifying and amplifying themes that resonate with cultural conversation. We'll broaden the scope by looking at other successes, including Educated, by Tara Westover; Sick, by Porochista Khakpour; and The Fact of a Body, by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich. A handout will show passages where each writer rose above her personal narrative to address a contemporary cultural conversation. By the end of the session, you’ll see your material from a fresh perspective. You’ll walk away with concrete examples of how to up your memoir game and carve a path toward publication.