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Women Writing on Family: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing
Carol Smallwood and Suzann Holland, editors
The Key Publishing House Inc., Toronto, Ontario
$27.99 (paperback) 2012
ISBN 978-1-926780-13-9 343 pp.
Amazon Link
This is a handbook to encourage the novice who wishes to write as well as a resource for those who need additional encouragement. That’s most of us, isn’t it? The burgeoning of communication channels via the internet, social media, and self-publishing has contributed to rising numbers of community writers, most of them women, many of them unsure at the start, who could benefit from this book.
Taken as a whole, Women Writing on Family celebrates the rich material of family life as a literary source and the role of women as writers. Engaging and practical, the book is an anthology of articles organized into topics on such subjects as personal and legal issues in writing about family, recognizing family experience as subject matter, tips on genre and style, publishing, marketing and promotion, and — the perennial for multitasking women — how to find time to write. There is much to choose from. Varying in length, the articles are all by published authors who draw on their own experiences as writers. Most articles focus on memoir and fiction. The theme that runs throughout is the use of family material as the subject of writing.
The most challenging section of the book is its first part, Personal and Legal Issues about Family Topics. After a brief review of privacy rights, Martha Engberger’s lead article plunges into the emotional consequences of writing about family, its effect on the writer no less than on other family members. “Be sure you are emotionally ready,” she cautions as she lays out strategies for avoiding the pitfalls. On a broader level, a piece by Rosemary Moeller warns about violating community norms. Arlene L.Mandell’s article on poetry includes many helpful examples from well-known poets. Other articles in the section deal with avoiding sentimentality, clichés, and similar mistakes, and involving or not involving spouses when writing about family.
Many articles offer specific strategies and suggestions for various types of writing from using one’s dreams to blogging to editing an anthology. Although some strategies are formulaic or put forth as dicta, they may be useful to a writer starting out. Dahlma Llanos-Figueroa’s piece on how she turned memoir into fiction is especially instructive. It recounts her journey writing her book, the mixed reaction of family members, and gives suggestions for those making similar journeys. Among other articles exhorting writers to recognize family life as a source of materials, Karen Coody Cooper’s “Writing Poems about Grandparents” is a source of particularly good ideas.
A forthright description of what women can bring to the writing process is set out in Mary Rice’s article, “The Role of Women in Narrative.” Seeing women as keepers of family experience, identities and truth, she describes how to use those central roles as the scaffold on which a piece of writing can be built . Along similar lines, “Family in Nonfiction: Making the Familiar Strange” by Yelizaveta P. Renfro describes investigatory approaches to unearthing family stories and recognizing their significance. The writer often functions as an amateur anthropologist; it is hard, fascinating work.
Except for two articles dealing with writing about illness and family
violence, difficult issues are not identified nor are newer forms of family organization suggested in the book.
The book’s section on publishing, marketing and promotion highlights ways to identify markets, work with editors, find writing opportunities on the web, and self-publish, all sound advice on various ways to get one’s work out in the world. A final section addresses issues of self-confidence and belief in oneself as a writer. Here it would have been helpful to note the role of writing groups as providers of support and companionship on the writer’s often lonely road. In addition to its technical help, Women Writing on Family is sure to provide similar companionship and support to many emerging writers.
Ruth D. Handel author of Tugboat-Warrior
Web Site
Reading the White Spaces Finishing Line Press
Carol Smallwood, Pushcart-nominee, is in Best New Writing 2010. She edited Writing and Publishing: The Librarian's Handbook (American Library Association, 2010); co-edited (Molly Peacock, foreword) Women on Poetry: Tips on Writing, Revising, Publishing and Teaching (forthcoming, McFarland); Women Writing on Family: Tips on Writing, Teaching and Publishing (Key Publishing House, 2012); Compartments: Poems on Nature, Femininity and Other Realms (Anaphora Literary Press, 2011; How to Thrive as a Solo Librarian (Scarecrow, 2012). Her articles have appeared in such magazines as The Writer's Chronicle, American Libraries, Michigan Feminist Studies. Some of her other nearly three dozen nonfiction book publishers include: Peter Lang, Libraries Unlimited, Linworth. Her columns include those for The Detroit News. The book reviews she has written have appeared in such publications as: Book/Mark: A Quarterly Small Press Review. Carol appears in Contemporary Authors; some of the Marquis publications are: Who's Who in America, Who's Who of American Women, Who's Who in the World.
Email: Carol Smallwood
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