Linda Wisniewski is a writer, author, and memoir teacher. You can find her at her website: LindaWis.com.
Linda has published two books so far. One fiction, Where The Stork Flies and one non-fiction memoir - Off Kilter: A Woman’s Journey To Peace With Scoliosis, Her Mother, & Polish Heritage.
She is also a memoir teacher so we got a chance to chat about the following:
At what stage in their writing do your students take your memoirist class?
The difference between mean criticism and constructive criticism
How to select what to include in a memoir and what not to include - what is too much sharing or too revealing.
Family considerations to revealing secrets in a memoir
A great exercise that Linda teaches students to use to identify the theme of their memoir.
Who said “if people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better?”
What people learn from memoirs and why the lessons are important.
Linda’s book marketing suggestions and how her author platform was enhanced by her book marketing choices.
How much time book marketing versus time writing.
The health aspects of journaling - who knew?
In this podcast, Linda mentions:
the book, “Opening Up’ by James Pennybaker
Writers Beware online - on the look out for book industry charlatans
The blog tour book promotion site: Kate Rocks Book Tour https://sites.google.com/katerockliterary.com/katerockliterary/services?authuser=0
Below is Linda’s Pushcart nominated essay that she mentions in the podcast titled "My Body, My Self," published in Mindprints:
I have moved through my life off kilter. My left side curves inward. On my right, I have no waist; my right side goes straight up and down. My left shoulder is lower than my right, and my left hip is higher than the right hip. I am about two inches shorter than I would be if I didn’t have scoliosis, a side-to-side curvature of the spine. When I sit, I often feel like I am about to tip over to the left. My spine is curved into a C-shape between my shoulder blades so that no matter how straight I stand, I look like I am slouching.
When I grew up in the 1950s, for some reason I have yet to understand, “having good posture” was a big deal. Perhaps because posture was so often discussed by the nuns who taught at my school, I thought that “good posture” was like having “good morals.” I stood as tall as I could, but by the time I was in eighth grade, my back was visibly curved. I felt inadequate and even guilty. I thought, surely, if I tried hard enough, I’d be able to stand up straight. I wish I had a dollar for every time someone said, “Don’t slouch, Linda.” Now that I’ve taught Sunday School myself, I feel some sympathy for those nuns. There isn’t much you can do to control forty squirming kids, but if they have “good posture,” the class looks somewhat orderly. And the 1950s, I recall, were very big on social orderliness.
I’ve tried chiropractic and massage therapy to keep my muscles from stiffening up on one side of my body. I walk every day, and do stretching exercises, but I still feel out of balance much of the time. I start out each day off kilter, and move through the hours trying to straighten up. When I stretch out my left arm and leg in opposite directions as far as they will go, my cramped left side is extended for a few seconds of exquisite openness.
Recently, I’ve begun to think of scoliosis as a metaphor for my life. I’ve struggled to please teachers, employers, parents, boyfriends, husbands, twisting myself into someone I can’t be. I hurt when I do this, because it’s not natural. And it never works. But when I stretch my Self, instead, the results are different. When I’m reaching for my personal goals—to be a good mother, wife, friend and writer—I feel my balance return. And the sense of relief, as I become more the woman I truly am, is simply grand.
Thanks for listening and don’t forget to leave a review on the podcast here.
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My latest book, co-authored with Julie Murkette, is available for sale NOW wherever you buy book and is YOUR publishing and book marketing resource. At 122 pages, it’s pithy but powerful. Buy your copy of Get Your Book Seen and Sold: The Essential Book Publishing and Marketing Guide today!
New Video Course! Sit & Write: Begin is a motivating, informational, inspirational, self-paced, and reasonably-priced, video course that merges writing with an introduction to book marketing concepts. Created with fellow Substacker, Kate Brenton (The Golden Thread), the course is fun and relaxing and could be your first step toward a successful book. (or you could share it with that aspiring writer who is just waking up to their own dream to write)
Contact me anytime with questions, suggestions, or niceties at wjcwolk@gmail.com.
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How Far Is Too Far In A Memoir?