A few nights ago, my wife and I were hosting a thank-you dinner for two beta readers of my new novel, Once We Were Strangers. Conversation drifted to my plans for my next project, and I was urged, as I often am, to write a memoir capturing some of the stories from my career-hopping past. Memoirs are hot in publishing these days.
“Nope,” I said definitively. “Not interested in that.”
When pressed, I couldn’t give a good reason for my answer, though I knew that choice was not for me. Now I can and here it is:
First, my life doesn’t seem as interesting or as important as the stories I’ve been writing—about saving bluefin tuna and immigrants in America. The more I became immersed in Strangers, and the more the immigration debate heated up in America, the more I’ve wanted to make this new novel into a compelling book. I think I’ve done that.
Second, fiction is my favorite form of literature, so I write what I like to read, novels and short stories. I recently posted a short story, The Judge, on my website. Tell me what you think of it.
Third, I’m a plottser, not a pantser. A plottser, in the writing trade, is someone who carefully constructs his or her plot before beginning to write, whereas a pantser plunges forward immediately, deciding what happens next by instinct and intuition. With a memoir, I’d miss most of the challenge of assembling characters, settings, and events into a meaningful whole, a part of the writing process that gives me a lot of pleasure.
Finally, at my core I’m a storyteller, and my best stories are fictional. I’ve loved writing Strangers. I think it’s a helluva story, and I can’t wait for you to read it.
Today, I’m a novelist, not a memoirist.