Turning Memory into Masterpiece: The Crucial Role of Structural Editing in Modern Memoirs
- 3 days ago
- 10 min read
Do you remember an incident that changed your world? You can recall where you were, what you were doing, who you were with, the room you were in, the light shining through the window at that time, and the exact words that were spoken.
When it comes to writing your memoir, you start with great energy and enthusiasm, but somewhere around the third chapter or so, your writing starts to become disorganized and disjointed. Even readers are confused about the overall theme and flow, as they cannot understand the significance of your emotional highs and lows. The problems we experience while writing aren't necessarily due to our inability to express ourselves through words; rather, they stem from our inability to structure and articulate our stories in a coherent manner.
A professional editor can assist you in resolving the issues you are facing in your memoir and help you create a quality book.
Memoir has emerged as one of the most relevant genres of literature in today's society — from founders recounting how they built their companies to survivors of trauma sharing their experiences and transforming them into something relatable by putting them into written form. However, one of the greatest challenges is knowing how to structure your memoir appropriately. Turning your experiences into a structured, coherent narrative that resonates with readers and fulfills the author’s goals often requires professional structural editing.
So what do we mean when we refer to structural editing, and how does it differ from other forms of editing? Most people think about "editing" as what happens at the end of the writing process. That's when we correct errors in grammar, punctuation, and spelling, and make other minor adjustments to smooth out the flow of our sentences, which is called copyediting. Although copyediting is extremely important, it is the last layer of editing you will perform on your writing. In contrast, structural editing (also referred to as developmental editing) is the first and most impactful type of editing you'll perform on your manuscript. Structural editing occurs at the level of the entire manuscript; therefore, when performing structural editing, you'll be looking at the overall shape, logic, emotional arc, themes, and pacing of your manuscript in order to determine whether your manuscript meets the definition of a "book."
A structural editor does not simply correct your manuscript; rather, they serve as a collaborative partner, helping you see your manuscript as it is so that you can identify which sections need to be restructured, which sections are missing, which sections should be eliminated because they add nothing to or dilute the story, and what the overall through-line in your manuscript is from beginning to end.
The defining characteristic of developmental editing for memoirs is the human experience. Successful editors have to understand narrative structure as well as the psychological impact of writing about your life, and how close you are to the story can distort your ability to see the actual shortcomings.
Your Life Has a Story Worth Telling. We know how to tell your story. Simply contact the Rolling Authors team on WhatsApp, and let's discuss writing your memoir together. Rolling Authors is India's leading book development studio.
Table of Contents
The Paradox of Memoir Writers' Structure
At the centre of memoir writing is a paradox: the person who has the best understanding of the story is often unable to see the actual structure. This may not be a problem of writing skill, but rather an issue of proximity. The person who has lived the event has attached emotional value to every detail and therefore sees the event in its entirety. However, the person observing the events as an outsider will find that only some of the collected details fit within the context of the narrative.
An experienced developmental editor provides the writer with an outsider's perspective to help the writer identify patterns and connections in the story. In doing so, the editor will either assist in clarifying the gaps or point to the potential shape of the finished book, something the writer may not be aware of because they are too close to the original experience.
If you look at memoir drafts by first-time authors, you will find the following structural gaps and errors very consistently:
1. It’s a Flat Story Without a Spine
A memoir is not the whole story of your life; it’s a story from your life centred around one main question or moment. Most first drafts are too full of information and, as such, have no specific main focus. The spine of your memoir will help you answer the question, “What is this book really about?” In the process, you can see how to express your memoir in a way that is relevant to a reader who does not know you. A memoir without a spine is just a diary. A memoir with a spine is a valuable gift.
2. No Narrative Arc
All well-written memoirs tell the internal journey of the main character — who they were in the beginning and how they are no longer that person by the end of the memoir. First drafts contain all the events leading to the transformation, but they may not contain all the movement toward that transformation. A structural editor can help the author find their beginning (the inciting incident), a midpoint (the turning point), and a resolved ending structure.
3. Chronology Controls the Memoir
Following chronological order is frequently the instinct for new memoirists; however, chronological order is not always the most effective narrative structure for an opening that will hook a reader. An opening should be as engaging and emotional as possible; it should set up the climax (or payoff) for the reader. A skilled developmental editor can structure your story to begin with a dramatic moment, then return to the beginning to explain how you got to that dramatic moment. The most important question is always going to be which structure will tell the story in the best way.
4. Pacing Is Inconsistent
In a first draft, the writer has allocated the most space to scenes where they feel the most emotion, even though these may not carry the same weight for the reader. Good pacing allows for focusing on dramatizing those scenes that contain the most emotional and thematic weight while summarizing the pieces between the scenes. There is a difference between scenes that develop the growth of the character and scenes that are simply taking up space.
5. The Reflective Voice Is Missing
In a memoir, there are two versions of the same person: the person who experienced the events of their life as they were happening, and the person who is writing the memoir from a perspective of greater wisdom and understanding. When there is no reflective voice in the memoir, it is presented as a series of events without any indication of how they relate to one another or how they connect in the reader's mind. A developmental editor helps find the balance between the narrative and the reflective voice.
Four Different Types of Structures That Create Modern Memoirs
One of the greatest benefits developmental editors bring to an author is their knowledge of the type of structure that would work best for their individual story.
Chronological
This approach includes a powerful hook to draw in readers. To ensure maximum readability, your chronological memoir should not start at the beginning; rather, it should open at some significant moment that will pull readers in, followed by a brief history of the events that led up to that moment. For example, one of the best examples of this type of writing would be Eat, Pray, Love, as the stakes for the story are communicated from page one, and each section within the book has its own distinct arc.
Braided or Multi-Threaded
The memoir is told using more than one discrete thread (i.e., a past story and a present story), and the threads are interwoven as the story progresses to tell a complete story. The challenge when writing this type of memoir is managing the pace at which the reader moves through each individual thread, as well as the transitions between threads; thus, you need to have a strong technical structure.
Thematic
A memoir can use themes as its organizing principle instead of chronology. This works especially well when covering a lengthy period of time or exploring multiple ways to understand complex subjects such as identity, ethnicity, culture, or illness.
Circular or Mirrored
The work begins and ends in the same moment and/or scene; therefore, your audience will have completed their journey with you from start to finish after returning to the original image. By this time, all of us have been transformed or have grown, and therefore, this growth or change reflects the earned closure of a journey.
The Story Inside the Story: A Mission of a Developmental Editor
A developmental editor’s most important assignment is to identify the characteristics of the universal within the particulars, i.e., what it is about the circumstances of an author's life that will make another person who has never met that individual feel that the author has put something of themselves into the book's pages.
A great memoir has two components. The first component is the plot or storyline, which is generally made up of the events or happenings connected to a specific person's life. The second component is the underlying theme or idea of a story that pertains to the general human experience. Within both of these components of the memoir will be found a deeper hidden story that any reader will be able to identify with and relate to on a deeper level, regardless of their background or history.
For example, Mary Karr's The Liar's Club is a true story about the author's family, who lived in a small Texas town during the 1960s. However, there is a much larger story being told in the book. It continues to provide readers with an insight into how children come to understand life in a world created by adult behaviour, and about their capacity to love and care for those people who once caused them pain.
The presence of this underlying universal story is what a good developmental editor will be looking for while reading the draft of a memoir. When the underlying universal story is clear to them, they will have significantly less difficulty determining many other aspects of your memoir, such as what goes into the book, what comes out of the book, how the memoir will begin, how the memoir will end, etc.
Narrative Style
When you write a memoir, you're a lot more than just the author; you're also the main character in the story you're telling. In order for any character to be interesting, they must have an arc or growth. When working with a developmental editor, they'll review how you, as the writer and narrator, have made yourself present on the page; they'll also help you find ways to develop that presence at pivotal moments in your memoir. They will also explore the contrasts between the person you were while living through your experiences and who you are today, looking back on those experiences and telling the story in your memoir. It isn't just about looking at two different types of experiences; it's about honestly managing the relationship between those two perspectives in order to create a great story.
When to Get Developmental Editing Assistance
You can tell when it's time to find a developmental editor because:
Your manuscript is nearly complete; however, you still aren't confident that it fits together well as a complete work because several beta readers did not give you the same feedback.
You have revised the same chapters several times, but feel like the manuscript hasn't improved noticeably at all.
You know that your manuscript has merit, but you can't figure out how to describe it to potential readers or who your target market is.
The manuscript's middle part repeatedly sags or loses steam.
You have been working on the manuscript for months or years without making any real progress.
None of these are signs of failure — they instead indicate that you are a writer who has completed the first draft as far as you can on your own and are now prepared for a professional collaboration that will move it toward becoming a finished product.
Understanding Ghostwriting vs. Developmental Editing
Many people, like entrepreneurs, executives, and survivors, among others, want to write a memoir but have not yet done so. The issue for them isn't revising, but instead creating something from scratch.
Developmental editing, ghostwriting, and hybrid engagements fall on a spectrum of services and should not be treated as separate entities; rather, they should be viewed as different types of support for your writing goals. In addition, the stigma associated with ghostwriting has been almost eliminated.
The responses of readers depend on how authentic the story is and how well it was written. The ghostwriter's responsibility is to stay out of sight while fulfilling this requirement.
FAQs
1. What is the difference between ghostwriting and developmental (structural) editing?Developmental editing is about improving your already written material — how it's structured, the flow of the story, and the emotional tone — while still keeping your voice. Ghostwriting means creating a brand-new manuscript based on your life experiences, through interviews with you and other information that you've provided. Both editing and ghostwriting can happen together, depending on how developed your manuscript is at Rolling Authors.
2. How do I know if my memoir requires structural editing?
If your story feels all over the place, with no clear message or theme, or if readers don't understand where it's going, then you probably need structural editing. If you've gone through multiple drafts of the same book but it's still not flowing together as a complete story, structural editing can help.
3. Will a developmental editor change my story or my voice?
No, you will keep your story 100% true to yourself. A good developmental editor will improve the clarity, structure, and emotional impact of your story, but will never change your voice. Their job is to help you tell your story in a way that connects with people while staying true to yourself.
Your Story Needs to Be Transformed into a Book
The process of structural editing helps you close the gap between the life you have lived and the book that will move a reader.
The team at Rolling Authors consists of professional writers and editors who specialize in both the emotional hurdles of life story writing and the publication standards for memoirs. We do not use automated content generation software; we provide true voices, true experiences, and true legacies.
Want to turn your life into a book? Contact our team on WhatsApp and share your experience. Visit us today!
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