Using Their Real Names in Memoir & Why?

Dear Tara,

A few weeks ago you answered the question,
Even if I wait until I've finished the book, will the story still feel like mine? Thank you!

Mandy
Hi Mandy and thank you for your question.  This is a sweet, simple question with a sweet and simple answer:  Write your book with all the real names the first time through.  Why?  Each of these names has a charge for you and to make the change during the creative process cheats you out of much needed emotional juju.  Or the better word would be "charge."  You need this charge to get to the deepest feelings and the feelings need to be felt in order to stop repressing and start healing.  So in our early drafts, stick with the facts.
Close the door too.  The first draft, even the second and third, are for you and your own heart.  

Once you have your feelings totally flushed out and you have really gone the distance with as much of your own memory, then play with changes. You can incorporate cue phrases too, once that let the reader know you are making character adjustments. "My step mother had a name but the sake of this story, let's just call her Deb."  See?  You can go on:  "Deb, if she were writing this book, would say that she was a fabulous woman.  Misunderstood but basically sweet and kind and nice, and all of that may be true but that was not my experience with Deb.  Deb, to me, at the age of eight was the wicked witch of all four directions.  A bigger witch could not be found.  My hatred towards her was complete."

See?

These cues serve many purposes.  One, they let the reader know that you are aware that your feelings are intense and personal, and may be seperate from the person who helped trigger them (ie: Deb).  Two, they make you a more reliable narrator because they show a level of vulnerability and integrty.  Three, they are the truth!  Reader's appreciate the truth.

That's the point of memoir.  We explore truth via self awareness.  Sticking as closely to the facts as possible allows us to maintain integrity towards our goal. 

Unfortunately many memoirs fall short.   My own work falls short.  But we try and that is the point. 

You are part of a genre in its infancy.  Memoir has only been around for a few years.  Yes, there have been biographies since the beginning of time.  But the "ordinary man" and woman, writing their own life with the tools of literature and calling it memoir--that is new.  We are writing and learning as we go.

Bravo to you for your courage.

Keep writing and don't worry.  Your story and your book--name changes and all--will always be yours.  Even when it is no longer who you are.  But that is a different conversation.

Good luck, Jennifer