The story of a life *.(Memoir)(Excerpt): An article from: World Literature Today
by Joanna Parfitt
Category: Language Arts & Disciplines

This book comes as part of a complete home study course, comprising a 40 minute video, 2 hours of audio and over 200 JustWrite Inspirational stickers in addition to this text book. Inside the text book is information on how to download the 8 audio lessons, video and stickers. This home study course has been created, written, tested and produced by Jo Parfitt, herself a writer of 26 books, hundreds of articles and many blog posts and columns in the 20 years she has worked as a writer and teacher. Its eight lessons include: Introduction to the SPICE method for making your life stories leap off the page. Letting it flow Writing about childhood Writing about people Writing about places Writing on a theme Writing humour Writing complete stories, with beginnings, middles and ends There is an additional bonus lesson on the 20 most common mistakes and the editing process. Each lesson comprises an introduction to the topic, a limbering up exercise and a variety of examples of life story writing taken from published authors and the author's own students. The lesson concludes with a written exercise. Personal feedback on one or more pieces of homework is available for an additional fee. The author has lived abroad in five countries - Dubai, Oman, Norway, France and now the Netherlands, in addition to her native England. Living in an international community means that her course includes many extracts and examples from students and authors of over 10 nationalities. It is ideal for anyone who wants to write about real incidents from his or her life and turn those into individual stories, full-length memoir, blogs, columns, a family legacy, self-help books or fiction. Jo Parfitt has been teaching for 20 years and her students claim she is inspiring and empowering.