The method
How a memoir gets written
People who write memoirs for clients — ghostwriters and personal historians — rarely start by writing. They start by listening, over many conversations, and by keeping careful notes. Sondeas Memoirs follows the same process.
1. Discovery
Before the first chapter, a professional asks about the project, not the life: why now, who will read it, how much of your life it covers, the tone you want, the stories that must be in it, and what must stay out. These answers decide everything that follows, so the interviewer begins here.
2. A theme and a structure
A memoir is not a list of everything that happened. It is built around a through-line — the question your life keeps answering — and a shape that serves it:
- Chronological. Life told in the order it happened, era by era. Clear for family readers and for whole-life stories.
- Thematic. Chapters gather around themes (work, faith, love, places) rather than dates. Good when a few threads define a life.
- Braided. A present-day frame alternates with the past, so the reader feels why the past still matters.
- Vignettes. Short, self-contained scenes and portraits. Gentle to write and easy to read aloud.
Your book plan names the theme, recommends a structure and lists chapters, each with a guiding question and the topics it should cover. You can rename, reorder, add or remove anything.
3. Interviews that listen
- One open question at a time. Short questions, long answers.
- Scenes before summaries: “take me to that morning” rather than “what was your childhood like?”.
- The senses and the concrete: rooms, smells, clothes, exact words someone said.
- Feelings then and meaning now — the person who lived it and the person remembering it.
- Following your energy, then gently returning to what is still untold.
- No judging, advising or correcting. Distress is met with a pause, never with pressure.
4. The ledger
Everything you say updates a living record: topics covered and pending in each chapter, people, places and objects, a timeline, your most characteristic phrases, and the stories you mentioned in passing — the loose threads a good interviewer always comes back to.
5. Drafts in your voice
When a chapter has enough material, it is drafted in the first person from your own words: your phrases kept verbatim, scenes built from the details you gave, nothing invented. Each draft lists the questions that would most improve it, and the interviewer brings them into your next conversation. You edit and approve every chapter.
6. Sessions with an ending
Professionals close each sitting with a short recap: what was covered, what is waiting, and something small to think about before next time. Press “Wrap up for today” whenever you stop.