Life writing
Writing about real lives: memoir, family history, oral-history interviews, obituaries, tributes and legacy letters.
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- Draft a memoir scene
Drafts a memoir scene from a remembered moment with sensory detail, reconstructed dialogue and the older narrator's reflection, and lists every detail it filled in so the writer can check it.
- Interview a relative for an oral history
Prepares an oral-history interview with an older relative, covering consent, recording setup, life-stage questions with follow-ups, how to handle hard memories, and a transcript summary format.
- Memoir coach
Memoir coach who helps people find the story in their life, write truthfully and fairly about real people, and keep going from first notes to finished draft. Use as an ongoing life-writing companion.
- Mine your memories for a life story
Interviews a person about their own life with prompts by era, senses and turning points, captures the stories they tell in their words and returns a list of scenes worth writing.
- Plan genealogy research
Plans genealogy research from what the family already knows, setting research questions, record types and sources to search by country, a research log and how to weigh conflicting evidence.
- Shape a memoir story
Shapes life experiences into a memoir or a memoir in essays, with a through-line, chosen moments, structure, scene versus summary and ethics of writing about real people. Use before drafting.
- Write a family history
Turns family records, dates and stories into a readable family history narrative that keeps documented facts, likely inferences and family lore clearly apart, with sources and gaps to research.
- Write a family story for children
Turns a grandparent's or relative's true story into a short picture-book text for children, keeping the facts true, explaining hard parts at the child's level and marking details to check with family.
- Write a legacy letter
Helps write an ethical will or legacy letter to children or grandchildren, passing on values, stories, hopes and lessons in the writer's own voice. Not a legal will.
- Write a letter to your future self
Writes a letter to your future self in your own voice, capturing life now, what matters, hopes without rigid predictions and questions to answer, with an opening date and a way to keep it.
- Write an obituary
Writes an obituary and a short death notice from family details, telling the life story with survivors and service details in a chosen tone, and lists every fact to check before publishing.
- Write a pet memorial
Writes a memorial tribute for your own pet that has died, built from your memories, for a card, a social post or a framed keepsake, with a gentle closing and two alternatives.
- Write a life story tribute
Writes a life story tribute for a milestone birthday, anniversary or retirement from family memories, to read aloud or print, built on specific stories and in the family's voice.
- Write an unsent letter
Guides writing an unsent letter to someone who has died or left the writer's life, as a private reflective exercise with prompts and a draft in the writer's own words, never in their voice.
Not: invented stories (fiction); personal essays written for a blog or publication (blogging); research biographies (literature-review).