The Memoir Market

Memoir is a genre with a stable market. People like reading about the life experiences of others. As an editor, proofreading and critiquing manuscripts, I come across many memoirs. Although the characters are different, I have noticed that the stories are basically the same, and there is a lack of uniqueness.

When trying to write a memoir for the first time, a writer must consider the following.

1) You want it to be read by people other than family and friends.
2) You must understand where your work fits in with consumers.
3) Determine is there a market for your book.
4) If no one knows who you are, why would they want to read about you?
5) Can you form remarkable experiences into a book that will appeal to a broad audience?

In general the most successful writers in the memoir market are people who are well known, such as celebrities, admired political figures, and people involved in extraordinary events receiving world wide interest. The public is familiar with these people and has developed an interest in them. They follow them in the media and want to know what led them to their current status in life. They want to know their background story. However, when it comes to an unknown writer, why should the public be interested in him or her?

MAKING MEMOIR CHARACTERS MARKETABLE
Even though the characters in a memoir are true, they must be marketable. First of all the true characters of an unknown writer need a solid concept to invite readers into their experiences. The writer's experiences have to be as unique and as interesting as a fictitious plot in a novel. The memoir must also be distinguishable from memoirs of the same topic.

The writer must have a unique voice. It must be distinctive in the way the author "speaks" through his/her words. This distinctiveness must also be expressed in the way scenes, characters, and events are described. The voice can make the memoir stand apart from others.

Most importantly if you are an unknown person writing a memoir you basically need a great story, a story so remarkable and so unique a person reading it would think "Wow Is this really true Could this have really happened? "

TYPES OF MEMOIRS THAT HAVE SATURATED THE MARKET
Memoirs of people overcoming alcohol or drug addiction and growing up in dysfunctional families have saturated the market from celebrities to the common everyday person. Alcoholism and drug addiction are so common now. They touch every level of society. Nine times out of ten the average person knows someone personally or knows of a person suffering from these problems. So hearing about people suffering with them is not as attention getting as it once was. Dysfunctional families are common too. Memoirs on these topics can still do well if they are about high profile and famous people such as Michael Jackson or Princess Diana. However for ordinary people like you and me- who cares?

War memoirs based on the Afghanistan or Iraq war are faltering in sells in the market. This can be attributed to various sentiments about the war. The antiwar sentiment, which is a large segment of the population, can hinder the sell of books portraying the wars positively. The strong patriotic segment of the population that support the war will likewise not be interested in books criticizing the war. Since the wars have gone on for so long and have been so expensive and since times are hard economically people just are not turned on about them.

BLUR THE LINES BETWEEN FACT AND FICTION
Memoirs have to be 100% true- period. For some reason it is against the law to make up stories about yourself, pass the stories off as being true, and make a financial gain on the stories. People have been penalized for this in court and have had to pay back money to publishers.

When writing, if you come to a point where you cannot remember details clearly, do not fill the gap by making things up. Connect people such as friends or family members who were involved in the incident you are trying to recall. Look up and interview old childhood friends, co-workers, neighbors, teachers, and even school bullies. Ask them what do they remember about that time. Take notes and voice record what they say. Use this information to write the hard to remember incidents.

If your life experiences are boring, let them be boring. Do not spice them up if you are tempted to do so.

TRADITIONAL PUBLISHING OR SELF-PUBLISHING
Truth be told the memoir market is a crowed market, and it is not a high money maker like the middle grade and young adult markets. Yet it still has its audience. As stated previously, unknown writers will have difficulty in getting their memoirs published. To get a traditional publisher, an unknown writer has to have a truly unique and remarkable life story. If the memoir is of the type of story that is selling in the market, such inspirational, transformational, or coming of age, an unknown has a chance. Otherwise, self-publishing is an option.

Now-a-days a person can be successful in self-publishing. A person with the time and determination can single handedly show what their books are capable of in the marketplace.

ESTABLISHING PLATFORMS
Before writing a memoir, a person should work to draw attention to him or her self. To draw public attention to themselves, aspiring memoir writers can establish web sites and blogs and work to build up an internet audience. The web sites and blogs should be relatable to the theme expressed in the memoir. For instance, if the theme of the memoir is meant to be inspirational in overcoming an eating disorder, the web site or blog should provide information on nutrition.

Work to establish followers through Facebook and Twitter, and address your followers daily. Also try building an audience by publishing essays and articles related to the theme of the memoir in national magazines. Get speaking gigs in front of audiences (do not charge a fee). The whole purpose is to build an audience of followers.

The next step is to write your memoir. Be sure to write it in a way to meet the needs and expectations of your followers and people similar to them.

If a writer decides to try querying agents and publishers, they will be impressed with the writer's ability to attract an audience.

MISTAKES TO AVOID WHEN QUERYING
When attempting to send out queries for a memoir avoid doing the following.

1) Neglecting to tell ones life story with a narrative arc.
2) Assuming the one being queried wants to have complete background information about the author's life in the proposal.
3) Querying a story with no universal appeal.
4) Starting the proposal with the author's day of birth and rolling up through childhood, adolescence, and so forth. This does not give the theme of the story.

To encourage agents or publishers to request the memoir, do the following.

1) In the query letter and proposal tell about the story using the unique voice used to write the memoir.
2) In the query letter, in the first one or two sentences of the description, try to describe what the book is about. These sentences should be attention getters.
3) Think of your memoir as a novel and prepare the query for the memoir as if you were preparing a query for a novel. Remember that the memoir is a story too, but the difference is it is a true story.

Here is a list of agents who represent memoir writers and have been successful in publishing their work. Their writers have reached the bestseller's list.

1) Laney Katz Becker of Markson Thomas Literary laney@marksonthoma.com
2) Mollie Glick of Foundry Literary + Media foundrymedia.com
3) Jeff Kleinman of Folio Literary Management foliolit.com
4) Byrd Leavell of The Waxman Literary Agency waxmanagency.com
5) Sharlene Martin of Martin Literary Management martinliterarymanagement.com

To make a memoir marketable an unknown writer must rely on his/her ability to express life experiences creatively. Keep in mind that even though memoirs are true and realistic they do not have to be boring. Use the same creative writing principals used to write a novel, yet be true to facts. The purpose is to make you life story as interesting as possible and make agents and publishers forget they are reading a true story.