Tag: fiction
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on how to start writing
“…and that’s my memoir idea. I’m so excited,” my friend C. said. “But…how do I start?” Ah, the age-old question. How do you start writing? My friends, here is the answer: ⚔️ First, you must register with the Secret Society of Real Writers. 🧬 This requires giving a DNA sample to see whether you have…
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on connection
When I first moved to Peru, I became obsessed with learning Spanish. I eavesdropped constantly. I was dying to understand, dying to know: What are people saying? About a month in, I was walking along the boardwalk in the tiny beach town where I lived. An older couple walked past me, hand in hand. The…
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on the failure of words
People sometimes ask me what it was like to live in the Amazon. I wish I could transport them there, just for a second. Or upload a snippet of virtual reality into their brain so they could experience it too. Because, like most places, it’s impossible to explain. You’d think that I, as a writer,…
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on changing
September 2005, South Bend, Indiana. I’m 17 years old, sitting in a class called Musicianship. Having declared myself a music major, I am now expected to do things like sight-sing melodies and sight-clap rhythms. (What is that, you ask? It’s when you have to read sheet music without an instrument. Alone, in front of the…
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on expansion
At midnight, the table went silent as we began eating our 12 grapes, one with each clang of the bell on TV. “Make a wish!” I’d been told. “Or rather twelve wishes. One for each grape.” I’m in Madrid with my boyfriend’s family, and it’s my first time eating grapes on New Year’s Eve. And…
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on detours
From Charleston, it’s about two and half hours to Tybee Island. Day 2 of my round-country road trip, and I’m already off course. Instead of driving to see my sister in Atlanta, like I’d planned, I’ve come here, entirely because yesterday someone said, “You haven’t been to Tybee? You’d love it!” I am gluttonous for…
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on arriving
And one cold day in January 2020, I arrive in Charleston. * It’s my first stop on a solo road trip around the U.S.—my circuitous search for where I belong. I’m instantly enthralled. Walking through downtown, I start picking out where I’d live if I lived here. I see the sparkling nights, the easy friendships,…
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on being interesting enough
“My sister might be the only person I know who’s interesting enough to write a memoir,” my friend Cayla told me recently, when I mentioned The Memoir Circle. I laughed out loud. “You know it’s not about being interesting!” I said. Then I paused.Maybe she didn’t know that. Writing a memoir isn’t about being interesting.It’s…
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on leaving
It is January 2020. I am driving around the country, starting in New York. From there, I’ll drive south, then west, then up and back east, possibly through Canada. Several people have told me that this trip is adventurous, and that I’m brave. I don’t feel that way. To me it just feels necessary. It is…
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on writing a memoir
“Want to join a memoir-writing group with me?” my friend S. asked me one day in 2019. This was pretty random. We’d never talked about writing memoirs before, and I wasn’t ghostwriting them yet. I liked reading them, but my specialty was fiction. “Yes!” I said right away. “When do we start?” Shoot, I thought…
Kimberly Bunker, MFA 