Blog
On getting it written down
Questions worth asking, how to interview someone you have known your whole life, and what to do with a shoebox of photographs.
Writing· September 5, 2026 · 6 min
How to write about difficult memories in a life story
How to handle grief, estrangement, illness and regret in a life story: when to write them, how to decide what to include, and what to do about living people.
Interviewing· September 4, 2026 · 6 min
How to record family stories at home
A practical guide to recording family stories with a phone: room setup, audio quality, transcription, file naming and how to back recordings up so they survive.
Getting started· September 3, 2026 · 6 min
What to include in a life story book
Which chapters, photographs and documents belong in a life story book, what most people leave out and later regret, and how much detail is too much.
Questions· September 3, 2026 · 7 min
Questions to ask your grandparents while you still can
Questions that work on grandparents specifically: what they remember of their own grandparents, what the world looked like before you existed, and how to ask.
Interviewing· September 2, 2026 · 8 min
How to interview a parent or grandparent about their life
How to record a family interview: what equipment you need, how long sessions should run, which questions open people up, and the mistakes that shut them down.
Getting started· September 2, 2026 · 5 min
Memoir, autobiography or life story: what is the difference?
Memoir covers a theme or period, autobiography covers a whole life chronologically, and a life story book is a family record. How to choose which you are writing.
Getting started· September 1, 2026 · 7 min
How to write your life story when you have never written anything
A practical method for writing your life story without writing experience: answer questions instead of facing a blank page, one sitting at a time.
Questions· September 1, 2026 · 9 min
50 questions to ask your parents before it is too late
Fifty specific questions to ask your parents about their childhood, work, marriage and beliefs, grouped by subject, with guidance on when to ask them.
Family history· September 10, 2026 · 6 min
How to write a life story together as a family
How to share the work of a family life story across siblings and generations without duplication, arguments or the project quietly stalling.
Writing· September 10, 2026 · 4 min
What to write in a life story dedication
How to write a dedication for a life story book, with the conventions, what to avoid, and examples of the four forms that work.
Writing· September 9, 2026 · 7 min
How to turn recorded interviews into a readable book
The editing process from raw transcript to finished chapter: what to cut, how much to tidy speech, how to structure chapters and keep the person's voice.
Family history· September 9, 2026 · 6 min
Recording a life story when someone has dementia
How memory loss changes what is possible, why early memory often survives, and how to record a life story kindly when time and recall are limited.
Questions· September 8, 2026 · 6 min
40 writing prompts for childhood memories
Forty specific prompts that reliably unlock childhood memory, organised by sense and setting, with advice on using them without overthinking.
Family history· September 8, 2026 · 7 min
How to preserve family history before it is lost
What disappears from a family in one generation, which records survive without you and which do not, and the order to tackle preservation in.
Gifts· September 7, 2026 · 6 min
Gifts for parents who say they do not want anything
Why older parents refuse gifts, what they actually value, and gift ideas built around time and attention rather than objects.
Practical· September 7, 2026 · 6 min
How much does it cost to make a life story book?
What the options actually cost: self-printing, print on demand, guided services and ghostwriters, with the hidden costs most people miss.
Photographs· September 6, 2026 · 7 min
How to digitize old photographs properly
What resolution to scan family photographs at, whether phone scanning is good enough, how to handle albums and slides, and how to store the files so they last.
Getting started· September 6, 2026 · 5 min
How long should a life story book be?
Word counts, page counts and realistic timelines for a life story book, and why length matters far less than most first-time writers assume.
Photographs· September 5, 2026 · 7 min
How to organize old family photographs
A workable system for sorting boxes of family photographs: how to triage, what to label, which to scan first, and how to identify people while you still can.
Interviewing· September 4, 2026 · 6 min
Nine mistakes that ruin a family interview
The avoidable errors that make family interviews produce short, guarded answers, and what experienced oral historians do instead.