Let’s Talk Memoir

Suzanne Roberts joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about why writing prompts are so powerful, images that haunt us, avoiding revenge prose, revising to create a rounded character, writing our truth, getting better at dialogue, how to navigate AI, the joy of creating something from start to finish, writing about family and friends, writing about our bodies, building writing community, how reading time is writing time, enjoying exploration, essay as immediate gratification while writing memoir, making stories from shame, and her new multi-genre craft book divided by theme 52 Writing Prompts: Inspiration for Writers.

 

 Suzanne’s first Let’s Talk Memoir interview:

https://ronitplank.com/2023/02/28/lets-talk-memoir-season-2-episode-16-ft-suzanne-roberts/

 

Camille Dungy’s Let’s Talk Memoir interview: https://ronitplank.com/2023/05/02/lets-talk-memoir-episode-41-ft-camille-t-dungy/

 

Also in this episode:

-reading broadly and deeply

-memoir as a gift to the universe

-writing for hands and hearts you cannot see

 

Books mentioned in this episode:

- The Art of Death by Edwidge Danticat

- The Art of Description by Mark Doty

- The Art of Time in Memoir by Sven Birkerts

- Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

- Imaginative Writing: The Elements of Craft by Janet Burroway

- The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick 

- The Triggering Town by Richard Hugo

- I Would Die if I Were You by Emily Rapp Black

- The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr

- Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert

- Tell it Slant by Brenda Miller

- Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing by Margaret Atwood

- The Writing Life by Annie Dillard 

 

Suzanne Roberts is the author of the essay collection Animal Bodies: On Death, Desire, and Other Difficulties, the memoir-in-essays Bad Tourist: Misadventures in Love and Travel, and the memoir Almost Somewhere: Twenty-Eight Days on the John Muir Trail, four full-length poetry collections, and a creative writing craft book: 52 Writing Prompts: Inspiration for the Creative Writer (October 2026, The University of Nebraska Press). Named “The Next Great Travel Writer” by National Geographic’s Traveler, Suzanne’s work has been listed as notable in Best American Essays and included in The Best Women’s Travel Writing. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, CNN, National Geographic Traveler, Ploughshares, Creative Nonfiction, Brevity, The Rumpus, The Fourth Genre, and elsewhere. She holds a doctorate in literature and the environment from the University of Nevada-Reno and lives in South Lake Tahoe, California. More information may be found on her website: www.suzanneroberts.net

 

Website: www.suzanneroberts.net

IG: @suzanneroberts28

X: suzannneroberts

FB: https://www.facebook.com/suzanne.roberts.798/

BSky: @suzanneroberts

 

Here are the links Suzanne’s books:

https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/nebraska/9781496239563/52-writing-prompts/

https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/nebraska/9781496231024/animal-bodies/

https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/bison-books/9781496236920/almost-somewhere/

https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/nebraska/9781496222848/bad-tourist/

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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. 
She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank
 

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Jamie Leigh Lorente joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about not getting to know her biological father who emigrated from Cuba during the Cold War from Cuba as an unaccompanied minor until the end of his life, how we learn to understand and accept one another despite our cultural differences, evolving as a writer and human as we write memoir, being able to comfort and repair the different versions of ourselves, coming of age and being safe, experimenting with alternating points of view to increase compassion and empathy, discovering a softening toward men, feeling too vulnerable to share a story, the existential fear of exile from our communities, loving each other despite our conflicts, the memoir writing process allowing us to get closer to loved ones, returning to and forgiving our authentic selves, and her new memoir My Three Fathers.

 

Also in this episode:

-complex trauma

-Jungian empty chair exercise

-mentally preparing to let a story out into the world

 

Books mentioned in this episode:

Clam Down by Anelise Chen

Family Trouble: Memoirists on the Hazards and Rewards of Revealing Family edited by Joy Castro

Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg

Her by Christa Parravani

 

Jamie Leigh Lorente is a Cuban-American writer, veteran, and advocate. She writes to reclaim the body and reframe the narrative of survival. Her work appears in My Teeth Don’t Chew on Shrapnel, the Anthology of Veterans Writing, Afterwords: The Real Me, and Poetic Prosthesis: Trauma and Language in Contemporary Veterans’ Writing (Edinburgh University Press, 2022). She teaches writing at San Francisco Film School and facilitates veteran writing workshops. Her short documentary, My Body Is explores the healing power of poetry. https://vimeo.com/1013310340?share=copy

 

Connect with Jamie:

Website: www.jamieleighlorente.com. (not live yet) 

Instagram: jamie_leigh_lorente

Substack: Jamie Leigh Lorente @jamieleighlorente

 

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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. 
She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank
 

Follow Ronit:
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Deborah Derrickson Kossmann joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about how complicated family dynamics culminated in her mother’s severe hoarding disorder, grieving what you didn’t get as a child, going back to rescue the past, sharing family secrets, recognizing shame in loved ones, telling a story in a fair way, how anger is a shortcut, waiting until someone has passed to write about them, how editing makes us better writers, recognizing when there is an emotional piece missing, wanting a memoir to read propulsively, keeping narrative arc in mine, and her memoir LOST FOUND KEPT.

 

Also in this episode:

-trying to be fair and accurate

-thinking about your book as a reader

-the important work of publishing and promotion

 

Books mentioned in this episode:

-The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa

-Writers and Lovers by Lily King

 

Deborah Derrickson Kossmann won Trio House Press's inaugural 2023 Aurora Polaris Creative Nonfiction Award for LOST FOUND KEPT: A MEMOIR (January 2025). Book Pages named it one of the Best Memoirs of 2025. She is currently working on a new book COMPLICATIONS OF CAPTIVITY.

 

Deb’s humorous essays have appeared several times as “Modern Love” columns in The New York Times and her story about her relationship with the world’s oldest captive gorilla appeared in the “Opinionator” section of that newspaper. Her poetry, essays and feature articles have been published in Bellevue Literary Review, Nashville Review, Memoir Monday, Rhino, Tiferet, Psychotherapy Networker, and PSYCHE, to name a few. She was the winner of the Short Memoir Competition at the Philadelphia First Person Arts Festival and has received a Poetry Fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

 

A clinical psychologist in private practice, she lives in Havertown with her husband and Sofia Carmela, a cat with a whole lot of “tortitude.” 

 

Connect with Deborah: 

Website: lostfoundkept.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drdebkossmann/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Deb-Derrickson-Kossmann/61562692720716/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deb.derricksonkossmann

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/deb_derrickson_kossmann/

Substack: https://debderricksonkossmann.substack.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drdebkossmann/

–
Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. 
She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank
 

Follow Ronit:
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Deborah Sosin joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about writing 70 micro memoirs of 70 words each to mark her 70th birthday, her love of compression and concision, working in themes, sitting with the memory of a scene and understanding its emotional truth, being clear on your quest as a memoirist, growing up in an overly close knit family, emotional and physical intrusion, forging a separate self, having no desire to write a memoir about her family, playing with constraints and form, feeling freedom to break the rules, and her new memoir Escape Velocity: How One 70-Year-Old Push-Pulled Her Way Out of Her Too-Much-Not-Enough Family. 

 

Also in this episode:

-distilling a scene 

-working in themes

-the push-pull of the writing process 

 

Books mentioned in this episode:

Place Envy: Essays in Search of Orientation  by Michael Lowenthal

The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick

Safekeeping by Abigail Thomas

Three Dog Life  by Abigail Thomas

What Comes Next and How to Like It  by Abigail Thomas 

Still Life at Eighty by Abigail Thomas

Heating and Cooling by Beth Ann Fennelly

The Irish Goodbye by Beth Ann Fennelly

Allegiance by Darien Hsu Gee

 

Deborah Sosin is a writer, editor, psychotherapist, and GrubStreet instructor. Her essays have appeared in the New York Times, Boston Globe Magazine, Salon, Cognoscenti, Brevity Blog, Oldster Magazine, Short Reads, The Manifest-Station, two anthologies, and numerous other publications. She is a reader for In Short: A Journal of Flash Nonfiction. Debbie is the author of Escape Velocity: How One 70-Year-Old Push-Pulled Her Way Out Her Too-Much-Not-Enough Family (70 Micro-Memoirs, 70 Words Each). She also authored the picture book Charlotte and the Quiet Place, which won a Gold INDIEFAB and Silver IPPY award; and a clinical workbook, Sober Starting Today. Debbie has an MFA from Lesley University and an MSW from Smith College School for Social Work. She lives outside of Boston. More at: www.deborahsosin.com and Write It Like It Is Substack.

 

Connect with Deborah:

Write It Like It Is Substack: https://deborahs27.substack.com/

Website: www.deborahsosin.com 

 

Purchase book directly: 

https://shop.ingramspark.com/b/084?params=RyWUrsfZlvtY9WuizGbq9ER8EtLO1eq9Kx4SC4T0pGE

 

Darien Gee’s Substack: https://substack.com/@dariengee

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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. 
She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank
 

Follow Ronit:
https://www.instagram.com/ronitplank/
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Kim Murphy joins Let’s Talk Memoir for a conversation about unburdening herself from decades of shame, her often absent and unpredictable mother, what we owe or don’t owe our parents at the end of their lives, gaining a level of remove from the character versions of ourselves, the push and pull of dependence and disappointment, hoping our parents will be different, getting raw and vulnerable on the page, molding lived experience into a narrative arc, depicting the younger versions of ourselves, the motivation and accountability of a writing partner, making art from a messy childhood, working with vulnerable and difficult material, creating her own imprint and becoming an indie author, and her new memoir Unmothered: A Memoir of Parental Neglect and the Search for Love and Belonging.

 

Ronit's upcoming workshop: Writing Dynamic Memoir: From Lived Experience to Gripping Story https://www.lmcmurtrylitcenter.org/workshops/writing-dynamic-memoir-from-lived-experience-to-gripping-story

 

Also in this episode:

- the divided self

- writing with metaphor

- having your family’s blessing

 

Books mentioned in this episode:

The Memoir Project by Marian Roach Smith

Deep Memoir by Jennifer Selig

 

Kim Murphy is the author of Unmothered, a memoir that explores the long shadow of maternal absence, the quiet work of self-parenting, and the ways women learn to survive--and eventually soften--without the care they needed. Her writing traces the intersections of trauma, identity, resilience, and healing, with particular attention to the enduring impact of childhood emotional neglect and abuse.

 

A longtime writer and communications strategist, Kim spent more than three decades as an independent contractor crafting narratives for government agencies, nonprofits, and Fortune 500 organizations, translating complex material into clear, easy-to-understand content. 

She is the author of The Vietnam Veterans Memorial: 25 Years of Healing and Educating and co-author of The Best Friends' Guide to Getting Fit. Her work has also appeared in Ritz-Carlton Magazine.

When she's not writing or hanging out with her husband, Kim plays Mahjong, pulls weeds from her flower garden, and walks the beach while listening to podcasts and audiobooks.

 

Connect with Kim:

Website: https://kestrelhousepress.com/

On Instagram: @kma_copy

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kim-murphy-593b01/

 

Purchase Book:

https://books.by/kestrelhousepress

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Ronit’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Rumpus, The New York Times, Poets & Writers, The Iowa Review, Hippocampus, The Washington Post, Writer’s Digest, American Literary Review, and elsewhere. Her memoir WHEN SHE COMES BACK about the loss of her mother to the guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and their eventual reconciliation was named Finalist in the 2021 Housatonic Awards Awards, the 2021 Indie Excellence Awards, and was a 2021 Book Riot Best True Crime Book. Her short story collection HOME IS A MADE-UP PLACE won Hidden River Arts’ 2020 Eludia Award and the 2023 Page Turner Awards for Short Stories. 
She earned an MFA in Nonfiction Writing at Pacific University, is Creative Nonfiction Editor at The Citron Review, and teaches memoir through the University of Washington's Online Continuum Program and also independently. She launched Let's Talk Memoir in 2022, lives in Seattle with her family of people and dogs, and is at work on her next book.

More about Ronit: https://ronitplank.com
Subscribe to Ronit’s Substack: https://substack.com/@ronitplank
 

Follow Ronit:
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