I’ve been reading about the different methods for plotting out a memoir, and the more I read, the more confusing it gets. I’ve been taking notes, writing blog posts, and reading books. It’s all getting a little overwhelming.

So I reached out to my friend, and fellow author, David Penny. He writes historical fiction and is eight books into his ten book series, so I figured he knew a few things about plotting and story structure.

I asked which books he’d recommend to help me plot my memoir.

As far as plotting goes I have two favourites:

No 1: “Save the Cat”, Blake Synder. This is my out and out favourite but is primarily aimed toward screen writing, but everything in it applies equally to novels.

2nd, and close runner up is “Structuring your Novel”, K.M. Weilland – this is excellent and is aimed an novel writing. It also has a number of additional books, one of which is like a structure walk-through exercise.

David Penny

Save the Cat

This title rang a bell, so I searched my Kindle library and discovered I’d already bought Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book On Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need. This isn’t by Blake Snyder (he’s passed away), but this is written by Jessica Brody who has taken Blake’s screenwriting approach and amended it for novel writing.

I’ve had this book on my kindle for quite a while now, and just forgot about it. So it’s time to dust of the pixels and give it a read. It’s based on Blake Snyders methodology, so don’t think I need to go down the path of investing on Blake’s books.

Blake Snyder’s Beat Sheet

If you want an overview of Blake’s Beat Sheet based on his Save The Cat! approach to script writing, follow the link to Tim Stout’s blog. I initially liked the look of this, but to be honest it has so many steps it started to overwhelm me too.

Structuring your Novel

Again this author rang a bell, and yep, Amazon let me know that

• Outlining your Novel – You purchased this item on January 15, 2012
• Creating Character Arcs – You purchased this item on January 28, 2019
• 5 Secrets of Story Structure – You purchased this item on September 28, 2019 (permafree)
• Structuring your Novel – You purchased this item on March 7, 2020

Most enlightening was that I’ve been thinking about writing my memoir for nearly a decade, and that’s too long! Eight years since I bought the first one, and I already have four of her books, but I don’t recall cracking them open or making use of them. How many books do you have on your Kindle that you haven’t read?

As well as writing books on her topics of expertise, she also created workbooks (savvy author, and it’s what all nonfiction authors should do!)

Before I delved into her books I had a look at her website and came across this useful post, which includes the beat sheet. This one includes the different plot points and pinch points, and the events that need to take place to write a compelling story.

So looks like I have a lot of reading ahead of me! I’ll post about the books and what I’ve found to be useful while writing a memoir.

If you’re on the same path, and want to write your memoir and are looking for some inspiration (or can provide some inspiration), please join in the conversation in the comments section below and lets get our memoirs written.

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