Access the book studies on Places We Left Behind by Jennifer Lang and Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs by Beth Ann Fennelly for a deeper dive into micro-memoir.

In this Micro-Memoir: Small Stories, Big Messages, we will study micro-memoirs, read and write them, and learn everything we can about this unique genre.

The books we’ll use are Places We Left Behind by Jennifer Lang and Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs by Beth Ann Fennelly. Lang’s book is a traditional, linear memoir, while Fennelly’s book is a delightful collection of micro-memoirs filled with a wealth of examples written in various structures.

In addition to Places We Left Behind and Heating & Cooling, we will also use many online sources to study micro-memoir, including:

• Brevity: A Journal of Concise Literary Nonfiction
• River Teeth: A Journal of Nonfiction Narrative
• Complete Sentence
• Five Minutes–One Hundred Words
• Six-Word Memoirs

I attached a list of possible structures to this course you might want to try for your weekly micro-memoir challenge.

Here’s the plan for each week:

• receive a micro-memoir challenge topic
• receive a maximum word count for your story
• brainstorm possible story ideas
• decide on a structure to use in writing your micro-memoir
• read one or more samples of micro-memoirs written on that topic/structure
• write your micro-memoir
• write a six-word memoir on the weekly topic or on any other subject you wish to write about
• post your weekly micro-memoir by Sunday at 11:59 p.m.
• read and comment on your fellow Life Writers’ stories

I also recommend you watch the June 11, 2025, episode of Inside Life Writers video. It will explain how the upcoming micro-memoir session will work, what you will experience, what will be expected of you, and some about the weekly micro-memoir writing challenge.