Memoir Crafters

Last week, I attended a meeting at the Bellingham Library, featuring a woman named Sara Geballe. Sara operates a business known as Memoir Crafters. She helps people to turn their memories into books.

For some folks, these books may fall into the category of "vanity books", traditionally published by vanity book publishers. They are mostly for the benefit of close family members and friends who care enough about them that they want to learn more about them.

That is a valid thing to do for some people. But other people are more interested in creating books which can actually be sold in traditional bookstores (or at least online stores), partly in order to make money, and partly in order to make a difference in the culture in which they live. Some may even aspire to be "literary lions".

I am in the latter category. For one thing, I have no family members who are close enough to me that they would be fascinated with my life. For another thing, I have goals which could conceivably be advanced by writing and publishing my life story, or at least aspects of that story.

The main trouble is that there's an open question regarding whether or not I can afford Sara's services. If I can't, then writing my autobiography may have to be a do-it-yourself project for me.