memoir and fiction

Post #122 – Memoir Writing News – Matilda Butler

This Just In…

I have news of two giveaways for you. You may remember my interview with Diana Paul, author of the award-winning novel Things Unsaid. The book, while not a memoir, is based on Diana’s life experiences. Last year, I asked her about the link between her fiction book and memoir. You’ll find what she said at the bottom of this post.

Interested in the full interview? Here’s the link.

Diana wrote me last night:

I’m celebrating the one-year anniversary of the publication of Things Unsaid by offering a Goodreads Giveaway. This is Day #5 of my Goodreads Giveaway. Win one of three signed copies. October 31 is the deadline! So far 478 people have entered!!

And if you don’t already know about Goodreads, I highly recommend that you get over to that site. After you enter Diana’s giveaway, look around. Goodreads is a wonderful place to get book recommendations and reviews, to meet up with others who care about books, and even to build a following for your own writing.

Belong to a book club?

Diana ended by telling me:

I’m also offering a giveaway for book clubs on BookMovement.com Here’s the specific link to my giveaway–Things UnSaid for Book Clubs.

The book club giveaway ends November 17th. Two book clubs will win a box of 10 books maximum if they enter online at the above link. This giveaway just started last night.

In this excerpt from my interview with Diana Paul, she talks about the link between fiction and memoir.

DIANA PAUL: I feel that all writing is intensely personal and renders the writer vulnerable and exposed, in sharing the emotional truth of a story, be it fiction, memoir, or autobiography. My debut novel Things Unsaid focuses on secrets and lies, what a family cannot or will not say to each other. Half-remembered events.

Every child may think she knows her parents, but that’s an illusion, a fiction. Each family member sees differently and remembers what they choose to or only what they can bear. The emotional truth in Things Unsaid has scenes originating from, but never exactly like, my own family’s and there are other scenes adapted from friends, favorite novels, movies, and anywhere else where I could find rich material of shared moments of a family’s life.

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