Your Memoir’s Content Triangle

I’ve been reading a lot about plot and theme recently, but the third part of the triangle in our memoir, is character.

It doesn’t matter how good our plot is, or whether the universal them is compelling and personal to our target audience, if they don’t like you (the main character in your story), they’re not going to stick around for the entire book.

Will your Reader like You?

Reading time is precious time, so why would a reader spend hours and hours with you if they don’t like you?

I just spent six and a half hours with Demi Moore listening to her Inside Out memoir, and if I’d felt she was self-centered, narcissistic, or lived up to the name Gimme Moore moniker (the name that stuck when she landing the starring role in Striptease for $12M to become the highest paid actress in Hollywood), I wouldn’t have stuck around to hear what she had to say.

Character Driven vs. Plot Driven

From the first few pages I automatically liked Demi, and whether I agree or disagree with the path she took in her life, the way she treated those around her, or how she reacted to life’s situations, I liked her as a character. I could emphasize with her, and she told an amazingly good character driven memoir.

I’ve been focused on writing a plot driven memoir. The pivotal part of the plot is an external desire to give up my corporate job and all the trappings of Hollywood, to revert back to the simple existence I was living, in a hammock on the tiny Thai island of Koh Tao.

But readers won’t care about my plot if they don’t like the me I show them in my story. They need to be able to connect to me, and they have to like what I have to say, enough to want to see how my story ends.

So although I’ve been focusing on plot and universal theme so far, I’ve realized the important of creating an interesting character arc.

3 Types of Character Arc

I’m discovering that Character Arc is just one more slippery can of worms to master. Here’s the three character arcs I’ve been reading about today:

• The Positive Change Arc: by the end of your memoir you’ll be in a better place.
• The Negative Change Arc: by the end of your memoir you’ll be worse off.
• The Flat (static) Arc: by the end of the story your external environment has changed, but you won’t have changed internally.
• Failed Arc: your memoir ends in tragedy, or you don’t achieve your goal.

As this point in my research I’ve realized I need to focus on researching what is relevant to the memoir I want to write.

It would be easy to go down all the tangents associated with these three arcs, and try to understand them all in full, but that isn’t going to get me to where I need to be.

After a cursory read of these three types of character arc I was able to identify that I’m going to be going through a Positive Change Arc.

So from this point onwards if what I’m reading isn’t relevant to a positive change arc, I’m going to have to skip it.

Write Before your Research

I’m glad that I’ve written a broad-strokes outline and done some freewriting of memoir scenes, before I started to dig into the nuances of what it takes to write a good story.

If I was starting with a blank page and trying to understand all of the different options for creating plot, theme, and character before I’d even had a chance to ruminate over my story, I’d have struggled to make any progress.

But by doing this pre-writing and structuring before I tried to master the mechanics of story telling, I’ve allowed myself the freedom to think and ruminate over why I’m writing what I’m writing and what I want to say. Then the next logical step is how I’m going to say it, and for that I need story structure tips.

Next Steps:

• I’m going to delve deeper into Positive Change Character Arcs for fiction, and see what is relevant and pertinent for memoir writers.

What I’m Reading:

Theme	Characters	Plot